Dyslexia: To Be or Not To Be?

Young Reader, Credit: Kriss Szkurlatowski; 12frames.eu

I was recently outraged at a recent post regarding the possibility of dyslexia being "unclassified" as an official learning disability.  If it's not an official "problem", then all the kid has to do is try harder. That's like telling a nearsighted person to see better (Thank you for that analogy, Dr. Ned Hallowell!).

This issue very closely parallels ADHD. A child that has ADHD or is at least struggling to sit still in a school environment and deal with a lot of distractions will not get any accommodations in a public school setting unless he has a diagnosis.

Many boys struggle with being able to sit still for long periods of time and write as much as these schools want them to. Schools are designed for the way girls learn, not boys, so boys will struggle. I'm almost thankful that my son has ADHD, so he can get accommodations that every boy his age should have.

Plenty of schools (mine included) will say they have individualized plans to help every child, but they are not held accountable to implement anything unless there is a 504 or IEP in place. Even then, only the boldest of parents, that are willing to tirelessly bird-dog the schools, will see action.

Then we wonder why doctors overprescribe ADHD meds so easily?  It's an injustice, especially because many people think ADHD is a joke at best, or at worst, an excuse. ADHD is a real condition that is really debilitating for many people that actually have it.

When a kid's brain flips letters around with dyslexia, and they need to remap their whole approach to reading, it's despicable to say it's not a "problem". Oh, and hold the phone.... ADHD and dyslexia are two conditions that are frequently co-morbid (or for us lay folks, they frequently occur together).

I hope you'll join me and sign the Yale Center petition decrying this change to the DSM-5, the upcoming edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, published by the American Psychiatric Association (APA).  Just because we can't "monetize" dyslexia and prescribe medication for it does not mean that it is not a valid medical diagnosis.

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

 

We’ve been back in school for a month.  As fall rolls in, so does the sleep deprived stupor that many of our public school students face as they grapple with early school start times.

There are some unsettling things we’ve found in our quest to educate the public about the need for healthier school start times.

At Start School Later,  we are dedicated to letting the general public know about the need to establish healthy school start times that do not conflict with the biological needs of students.  We’ve met with legislators, public officials, community members, parents and anyone else that will listen to our message. 

Ironically, a 7:17am start time does not seem to resonate with most folks that do not have high schoolers.  The impression is that this is the time students WAKE UP for school.  It doesn’t seem so bad to wake up in the seven o’clock hour, since most adults do it.

Our kids need to wake up at 5:30am or 6:00am to get ready and be AT school by 7:17am.  This is the eye-opener that most people do not understand about this problem.  

Most students get more sleep by sacrificing breakfast, passing up a shower or getting a ride instead of walking or catching a bus.  (They can’t go to bed earlier if they are getting home from sports events later than 9:00pm with homework waiting to be done).

As a sophisticated industrialized nation, we are sacrificing the basic needs of children to save a fast buck and maintain a system we are loathe to change.  What about the students that don’t have access to a car?  What about the students that have no choice but to walk to school in the dark, sometimes on busy, dark streets with no sidewalk and lots of traffic?

Most adults would not choose to stand outside on a pre-dawn corner to get a ride to work.  Yet, we ride by in our cozy cars and vans, passing many of our children who have to “report to work” earlier than most adults.

Somehow, we can jump through hoops when schools mandate early dismissals or sports schedules change, but we are not willing to consider collaborating in our communities for the long-term health, safety and equity of all of our public school students.

Hold on, there’s more.  Our magnet students face an even larger burden.  Because most of them are going to schools outside of their normal jurisdiction, they face longer bus rides.  And, ironically, instead of magnet programs starting on a different schedule, they start at 7:17am, forcing students to get to a centralized bus stop (which might require a longer walk, prior bus trip or car ride) even EARLIER than their mainstream counterparts.

In Anne Arundel County, MD, the #727 and #747 buses both make their first stop at 6:00am in order to service students that are in the Performing and Visual Arts High School program.  Bus #543 starts at 5:45am in order to service West County.  Bus #144, which serves the South County High STEM students, starts at 6:15am.  Bus #130 starts at 6:10am.

So, if you are a motivated individual excelling in school, you have to get there even earlier and travel farther than your sleepy “regular” contemporaries.  No good deed goes unpunished. 

Here’s the other kicker.  More economically advantaged students would just go to a private school or other specialty school outside of the public school system to hone their skills or prepare for their career. 

Many of our public school magnet students are coming from economically disadvantaged locations. They don’t have their own cars and may have to walk a mile to get to the bus stop.  Their parents are most likely to both have to work, leaving the student to fend for themselves without a convenient ride to school.  Is this the message that we want to send to our motivated students that want to excel?  That to work hard and perform well, you have to endure an even more demandingly sleepless schedule than your peers?

There is something severely broken in this system, when we continue to turn a blind eye to the basic health and safety needs of our youth and couch them as “character building” for when they “grow up”.  Let’s open our eyes and wake up to what we are really asking our youth to do.

Chime in below and tell us of your early morning sojourns.  How do the students in your family get to school?  Let’s get the conversation started, so we can get our heads out of the sand and start getting real.

Maribel Ibrahim, The Frugal Writer, created www.StartSchoolLater.net and is a Co-Founder of Start School Later, a grassroots coalition dedicated to ensuring that the health, safety and equity of children are protected when determining school start times.  Maribel’s Patch blog has recently been ranked in the Top 100 out of over 22,000 bloggers in the Patch network.

We are Not OK

The Real World (c) MTV Productions

This is a message that needs to be said.  I know it will be criticized, and anger and blame will be tossed around like a beach ball in Ocean City.  But it must be done.  You see, we are NOT OK.  Another senseless tragedy has seized our community.  And, yes, hold your breath, because I’m going to say the word:  Suicide.

It is gut-wrenching when I hear a mom friend confide in me that she is glad her son (a close friend of the victim) is meeting up with a group at a friend’s house.  She relates, “What do I tell him when he comes home?  That it’s going to be OK?  I don’t know anymore.”

She’s exactly right.  We are not OK.  The counselors can’t stop it.  Parents can’t stop it.  School administrators can’t stop it.  Not by themselves.  I’m not blaming anyone and I’m not trying to make people feel guilty.  But we all have a part to play in this.  We all need to roll up our sleeves and get busy changing things.  If collectively, we do not acknowledge what is going on, if we choose to continue to put our heads in the sand, suicide is going to keep happening.

The aftermath is not encouraging.  In the letter sent home to parents, the local principal mentions the death and the fact that there are counselors available.  However, there is no mention of suicide.  Even though there are local organizations such as Building Life and a 24-hour national hotline available to students and families, these are curiously omitted.  Perhaps it’s school policy so maybe his hands are tied.  But if we can’t even name the problem, how will we go about fixing it?

Unfortunately, in an attempt to be “respectful”, we lose the opportunity to talk openly about what to do and start healing.  An inquisitive middle schooler, a revered high school coach and a promising high school sophomore have all taken their lives in as many years, right here in my neighborhood.

To coin a phrase from a popular 90’s MTV show, it’s “time to stop being polite, and start being real.”

When patients finally get a diagnosis for a perplexing condition, there may be grief and anxiety.  But, when the disease in named, there is relief, or at least, determination in the face of adversity.

When more value is placed on how kids score on tests instead of being able to inspire them to learn, they just do what it takes to get by and pass the test.  When copious homework requirements compete with the need for sleep and sports, plagiarism and cheating start looking acceptable.

We can have as many counseling sessions and inspirational speakers at our schools talking about “getting help” and how you’re “not alone” but this is all talk with no meaning.   It is a bandaid covering a cyst.

With the mounting pressures of schoolwork, demanding extra-curricular activities and lives that run on a nonstop treadmills, our environment is the perfect breeding ground for suicide.  When top producers are receiving accolades, praises and compliments, who among them is going to stop and say, “I’m tired and I need a break?”

When our students are told, by our society’s standards, that sporting events are more important than family dinners or free time off on the weekend, who is going to speak up and say they’d rather have just a few hours to unwind from all the pressure?

Our students are told to be more responsible and learn to deal with competing interests, to get up and get to school before the trash is picked up and figure out how to fit 30 hours of activity in a 24 hour day.  Students and staff that want a break, state they need a change, or admit that they are tired, are classified as irresponsible, underachievers, selfish or unmotivated.

Who is going to stand up and say enough is enough under these circumstances?  We can say what we want about “getting help” and “not suffering in silence”, but the rules and expectations that we drum into our kids clearly say the opposite.  And they are hearing that message, the message that you should be able to “handle it all”, loud and clear.

As a parent of three young kids, I’m leading my own battle of independence from pressure.  We reserve Sundays for church and unscheduled free time (no organized sports!!) and leave at least one night a week open for unstructured activity.  But, how successful will I be at maintaining this stance when my kids are assaulted with the need to compete with others gunning for the same college admissions and the limited number of coveted jobs in respectable professions?

I co-founded Start School Later because ensuring the health and safety of our students is the first line of defense to help them thrive in life.  Improving sleep fixes all kinds of problems, including apathy, obesity, juvenile diabetes, truancy, risky behaviors, addictive behaviors, depression and suicidal ideation.  It also places a priority on the well-being of our students over all other competing interests and expenses.

My community has a huge homeschooling network, filled with people that are bucking the status quo and doing things by a new set of rules.  People seeking these paths of independence will strike out on their own and be marginalized or ignored by the mainstream members of our community.

What about the people that don’t have the choice or ability to homeschool?  What about those that don’t have the fortitude to take a stand against Sunday sports?  What about those of us who don’t have the reserves it takes to change the rushing tide of unquestioned busyness?

The symptoms of a person who is contemplating suicide is strikingly similar to a person suffering from sleep deprivation.  It’s no wonder we can’t see the signs of suicide until it is much too late.  Let’s stop this dead-end treadmill to merely survive and slog through our days in a relentless stupor.  Let’s reexamine what is really important in our lives and establish realistic priorities and limits.  Let’s talk about really making it important to give our children and community members room to breathe.  Let’s make real, lasting changes and live it by example.

Maribel Ibrahim, The Frugal Writer, created www.StartSchoolLater.net and is a Co-Founder of Start School Later, a grassroots coalition dedicated to ensuring that the health, safety and equity of children are protected when determining school start times.  To get involved, visit Start School Later and join the effort to ensure that children do not start school before 8 a.m.

Sleeping In Saves Lives

While I hate to be melodramatic, there are two indisputable facts right in my community of Anne Arundel County, MD:

1) Anne Arundel County has the earliest public school start time of any school district in the state of Maryland, 7:17a.m.

2) In Anne Arundel County, suicide is the second leading cause of death among youth ages 10 to 17, second after unintentional injuries, according to a September 2010 report issued by the Anne Arundel County Department of Health.

Coincidence?  No.  Not when you consider that sleep deprived people often have feelings of depression and hopelessness if they continue to not get enough sleep.
An out of state petition signer (#3149) even stated as such, commenting: "Being tired every day is, I think, one of the reasons behind my suicidal impulses."

And yet, even a small change to start schools later will improve mood and lift depression almost instantly.  This is in addition to the preventable accidents that occur with student pedestrians standing in the dark and sleepy teens driving to school.

For now, if you or someone you know is feeling hopeless, has mood swings and is withdrawing from their normal daily activities, visit http://www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org/ or call 1-800-273-TALK anytime day or night to speak to someone who cares.  Here in Severna Park, we also have Building Life, a local community of people that can help pave the way out of darkness.

Start School Later plans to go to Washington, DC on the week of March 5, in honor of Sleep Awareness Week, to present our national petition.  But, if we don't have at least 5,000 signatures, our plea to give kids what they need will fall on deaf ears.

We also plan to bring the local Anne Arundel County petition, which is in dire need of signatures to accurately represent this problem in our county.  Every person aged 13 years or older, with a valid email address, is eligible to sign both the local and national petitions.

With only two weeks left, there is no time to lose.  The most effective way to get more signatures is to forward this blog post to five family, friends and associates.

Another simple, but effective way to increase signatures is to invite five Facebook friends to sign our petitions.  Simply share the national (http://bit.ly/tWa4dS) and Anne Arundel petition links (http://chn.ge/xO0DYf) and tag a few of your friends on your Wall's posting.  They will be able to see the link(s), learn about our petitions and click the appropriate links to add their signature.  (To "tag" a friend in Facebook, simply type @ followed by the first few letters of their name.  Facebook will then recognize and suggest your friends to include on the post).

If you are still not convinced that school start times are a problem, take a look at this YouTube video.  Filmed right here at a Blue Ribbon school in Anne Arundel County, the film is a disturbing look at what really goes on in classrooms early in the morning.

We hope you will sign both our petitions and spread the word.  Your support could be a life saver, and it could very well be one of our own.

Maribel Ibrahim, The Frugal Writer, created www.StartSchoolLater.net and is a Co-Founder of Start School Later, a grassroots coalition dedicated to ensuring that the health, safety and equity of children are protected when determining school schedules.  To get involved with Start School Later, sign the national petition and the Anne Arundel County petition to ensure that children do not start school before 8 a.m.