One reason suggested for the sudden change was concern over Johnson's methods that may have inflated the numbers, though this concern didn't surface in the records until 2012.
Recently, an alternative theory has developed among UNC critics of UNC's athletics department suggesting that the high incidence rates of LD/ADHD found in UNC student-athletes by Dr. Johnson's screening methods were welcomed and exploited by the athletics department and the Academic Support Program for Student-Athletes (ASPSA) in order to leverage the accomodations (and, more scandously, the abuse of medications) to make academic life easier for more student-athletes than was warranted. It has also been suspected that this leveraging of extraordinarily high LD/ADHD evaluations increased in the mid- to late-2000s, coinciding with the pressure to reduce reliance on independent study and so-called "paper classes."
In one of Coaching the Mind's last articles, Bradley Bethel refuted these suggestions, disdainfully rejecting them as partisan-guided conspiracy theory. In his February 23rd article, he offered some of his insider perspective on background:
Thanks to the efforts of Bluedevilicious and other sleuths who've combed UNC's public records and discovered many datapoints in UNC's athletics department's LD/ADHD history, we can see that concerns about Dr. Johnson's screening methodology, starting in early 2012, had come from both UNC's College of Arts & Sciences Learning Disability Services (LDS) and also from the athletics department's own sports medicine staff, itself, from sports psychologist Dr. Bradley Hack and allegedly football team physician Dr. Mario Ciocca as well.
But no records have yet been found that can corroborate Bethel's claimed involvement in that evaluation or which demonstrate his claim that he, too, felt concern for Johnson's diagnoses, either in 2012 or later in 2013 when other ASPSA counselors are seen vetting alternative neuropsychological services. (Here and here.)
As Bluedevilicous noted, Bethel includes himself among the "we" who solicited the opinons of outside experts, but the record to date shows it was Dr. Bradley Hack that contacted Dr.s Adam Shrunk and David Coppel in early 2012 to assess the testing methods of Dr. Johnson. And despite this concern, ASPSA counselors aren't seen sharing it. In fact, they were supportive of Johnson's defense of the utility of her computer-based screening tools and screening battery in use at the time.
It wouldn't be until a year later, during the summer of 2013, that we find ASPSA representatives suddenly and inexplicably searching for an alternative to Johnson. Johnson, herself, is seen expressing uncertainty over why her services were no longer desired, believing she was suffering from association with Mary Willingham.
Bethel's assertion that it was concern for inadequacy or impropriety of Willingham and Johnson's study of the incidence of LD/ADHD in scholarship collegiate student-athletes is not supported by any evidence from the internal communications that has so far been revealed. If they do exist, they are presently hidden from view, and only Bethel's own assertions support the counterpoint to the so-called "conspiracy theory."
The concern expressed by Hack and UNC's Learning Services was that Johnson's screening, using the CSN Vital Signs and ImPACT tools, was "thin" and possibly over-diagnosing LD and ADHD in student-athletes. There is no evidence that ASPSA (including Bradley Bethel) supported such concerns, at least not for another year; and then only after Willingham and Johnson began to publicize their study findings, beginning with the College Research Sports Institutes (CSRI) Conference held in Chapel Hill April 2013. (See timeline here.)
Bethel's refuting of the LD/ADHD exploitation theory might, itself, be suspect since he has a vested interest in protecting "his colleagues," specifically Beth Bridger, Beth Lyons, Jenn Townsend and Jaimie Lee. If he, and they, had lost confidence in Dr. Johnson in 2012 at the time Dr. Hack and LDS raised concerns enough to seek external expert opinion, as Bethel claims, it's not evident in the documentary evidence, and it belies the athletic department's decision to renew Johnson's contract in July 2012 for FY12/13 in spite of those concerns. It also contradicts the ASPSA support for Johnson's services in later 2012, contrary to the concerns to which Bethel claims to have been a party.
If Bradley Bethel, or any of his former colleagues in ASPSA, wish to point to or volunteer communications evidence or documentation not present in the UNC public records release that dispels this suspicion, I will gladly accept it and post/publish it hear in their defense.
