What We Do

Protecting Every Child's Right to Learn How to Read ​

We are a grassroots movement driven by families concerned with the limited access to educational interventions for students with dyslexia or at risk of dyslexia. ​

What We Do

Our mission is to stop the school-to-prison pipeline through advocacy, education, legislation, and intervention.

We aim to stop learning differences from becoming disabilities by educating school districts and encouraging early screening and structured literacy support for students at risk of dyslexia. 

• We professionally advocate for students who cannot read, are not making progress, and are in crisis
• We evaluate, advocate and organize remediation and support for underprivileged students including children in care and foster homes
• We organize screening and remediation for incarcerated youths and adults

How Common is Dyslexia?

​
Dyslexia is the most common reading disability affecting up to 1 in 5 people or 20% of the community (Yale Scientific).
Dyslexia crosses racial, ethnic and socioeconomic lines. With a structured literacy approach that is explicit, sequential and multisensory every student with dyslexia can become a skilled reader, fully participate in their education and successfully achieve their potential.

• 3 out of 4 people on welfare cannot read (National Assessment of Adult Literacy) 
 
• 80% of youths brought before the courts have low reading skills (National Assessment of Adult Literacy)
• 70-85% of people in prison cannot read (National Assessment of Literacy) 

• 38-45% of people in prison have dyslexia (Moody, 2000)
• 89% of suicide notes left by youths when studied were found to have a disproportionate amount of dyslexia-type spelling mistakes (Learning disabilities and Adolescent Suicide, 1997) 

• 85% of children classified with Learning Disabilities (LD) actually have dyslexia (Yale Center for Dyslexia) 
• Dyslexia is genetically inherited (International Dyslexia Association)
• Students with learning disabilities including dyslexia have a three times higher risk of attempting suicide (Journal of Learning Disabilities, 2006) 

• Low reading scores and levels of intelligence for students with dyslexia have no correlation. In fact, the most innovative scientists, inventors and artists of our time have dyslexia (Yale Scientific). What are we doing to our potential geniuses?
• The cost of reading failure (prime reason for school drop-outs) in New York State is: $ 3,088,573,000 (Education Consumers Foundation)

   What we do

• Advocate for individual students at their public school district​
• Advocate for children in care and foster homes
• Organize remediation for youths & adults in jail and prison
• Organize parent support groups
• Organize parent advocacy training workshops
• Organize teacher training in structured literacy, multi-sensory programs and approaches
• Organize school psychologist training to identify dyslexia 
• Multi-Sensory summer reading camps
• School consultancy to support implementation of structured literacy programs and strategies that prevent students with a learning difference from becoming students with a disability

Our Impact

Orton-Gillingham Tutoring

Coming soon! We use science-based methods of instruction and our teachers are trained to fidelity.

LEARN MORE

Grassroots movement

We are a grassroots movement driven by families concerned with the limited access to educational interventions for students with dyslexia or at risk of dyslexia. ​

We empower parents and raise dyslexia awareness by advocating for individual students at their school districts.

We organize professional training for teachers and follow-up with mentoring. We organize professional training for school psychologists. We provide school Implementation and Impact Services to increase levels of reading skills from students with dyslexia to entire school districts.

Our approach

Dyslexia Advocacy Action Group is a registered not-for-profit that works to ensure students with dyslexia and students at risk of dyslexia learn how to read. Undiagnosed, untreated dyslexia impacts children's emotional wellbeing as well as their ability to receive a free and appropriate education. Poor reading levels lead to behavioral problems, detachment, poverty, incarceration, ill health, vulnerability to addiction, suicide and environmental degradation.    
                                                               
We advocate to increase literacy levels for students with dyslexia/at risk of dyslexia and general education students by advocating for individual students, holding parent support groups and partnering with schools to provide inexpensive training for school teachers and psychologists. Every school district that participates in our training programs also receive our school Implementation and Impact Services (IIS). 

Untreated dyslexia is a symptom of a broader misunderstanding about how to teach reading.

Implementation & Impact Services (IIS)

Our IIS programs support school districts by supporting teachers. Our professional development  workshop is for the entire school district.
Our expert scheduling strategies enable students with disabilities to get the services they need without compromising the fidelity of multi-sensory structured literacy programs or exclusion from subjects that are important to them.

Breaking the school to prison pipeline

One of our main projects is to identify dyslexia in women and organize remediation services in prisons in NYS. Prison reform needs to include screening specifically for dyslexia and teaching people in prison how to read.
Some statistics:
▸ 70- 85% of people in prison cannot read (National Assessment of Adult Literacy)
▸ 38-45% of people in prison have dyslexia (Moody, 2000) 
▸ 80% of youths brought before the courts have low reading skills (National Assessment of Adult Literacy)

Mija Ali and Ameer Baraka talk about dyslexia and its impact at school and in prison