Well yes, that sounds like cheating the system to me. At the same time, I'd be very surprised if they aren't getting any external diagnosis. Either way, just because people cheat, doesn't mean we can give up on people who NEED this help and extra time - it just means we need to fix the system - so that schools such as yours can not get away with that and so that everyone needs external diagnosis. Just to say, that although there is no "extra time" in life, there are also no exams. How many times have you EVER heard of an employer ask their employee to sit down without the aid of the internet and complete as much as they can in an hour? Never, assignments are typically given much more time and much more freedom to carry out how and when you like.
In my school I referenced one person with extra time - he has extremely slow handwriting - I've seen it in exams and man do I feel sorry for him. The two people I know who have supervised rest breaks; well one has frequent panic attacks and the other has a rare heart condition. The latter is in my English set and before the English speaking and listening I witnessed him having a panic attack. It was truly terrifying and there was no way he could complete his speaking and listening - our teacher moved it back a week for him. As he became stressed he started putting his head in his hands, lashing out violently at anyone who tried to help and breathing heavily. That 100% deserves supervised rest breaks in order to stop that happening.
I've never witnessed schools 'coaching' kids for extra time - but that is plain wrong. I'm not sure how anyone can fake the test that you had - surely it seizes up or it doesn't? On a more personal note I would drop the subject of extra time with your friend because it's not worth losing a friendship over extra time in exams - friendship is far more important than any grades
YES YES YES and YES! So very true - the fact is exams do not equal intelligence and sadly school life is now solely focused on getting grades when it should be about expanding your horizons, forming your own opinions on world views and the important questions in life, getting morals (which would stop people cheating on tests out of moral conscience) and most importantly forming interests - so that people know where they want to go and feel impassioned by what they do so that they can have an enjoyable life. BTEC's stigma is another thing which needs to be fixed - this is why I created the thread about educational reform, so please do comment on there as I guess we are sidetracking a lot...
Sadly people believe only in equality nowadays - the fact is equality is not fair - equality in OPPORTUNITY is what is fair and we should be moving towards that, rather than just out and out equality.I would even say try not to be bitter towards the system - just try to help reform the system nicely, its more likely to get done then - and you are completely right - just because a system is flawed, doesn't mean you give up on it and scrap it - no you work and improve it!
Either way, its a good idea to get diagnosed to see what the genuine situation is rather than wondering around blindly in the dark.