Sandison v. Michigan High School Athletic Association (1995)

Details:

Students who had been retained early in school because of learning disabilities filed suit in order to participate in interscholastic sports in their senior year of high school, claiming that the age requirement constituted illegal discrimination under the Rehabilitation Act and the American Disabilities Act. The Supreme Court determined that an exclusion based on age was not the same as an exclusion based on disability, because without the disability the students would still have been overage. Waiving the age requirement is not a reasonable accommodation, it is a fundamental altering of the sports program.