147. Meet the San Antonio Founder Taking On Dyslexia in Our Classrooms, Courts, and Clinics

Bob Rivard [00:00:03]:
Welcome to Big City, Small Town, the weekly podcast all about San Antonio and the people who make it go and grow. I'm your host, Bob Rivard. Our guest today is jasmine dean, the CEO of Celebrate Dyslexia, a nonprofit she founded in 2019 as a resource for parents and educators looking for information and community for their dyslexic students. To date, Dean and her small staff have impacted the lives of more than 100,000 individuals. Her mission, however, is even more ambitious, as I learned after a mutual friend and supporter, Mike Molak, the president and CEO of Plains Capital bank, first introduced us. Dean seeks to change the way the legal system, the healthcare industry, and society in general understand and support dyslexia therapies. We'll hear much more about that in our conversation today. Jasmine Dean, welcome to Big City, Small Town.

Bob Rivard [00:00:56]:
Let's just start with a little bit of definition, if we can. Is dyslexia a condition or is it a disease? Is it just a learning disability? Can it be cured? Give us the basic education first of what we understand or misunderstand.

Jasmin Dean [00:01:12]:
Sure. Dyslexia is a neurobiological condition that affects up to one in five people. It is an unexpected difficulty with reading, writing, and spelling in an individual who can do much better. And so what that really means is that the individual with dyslexia has a whole host of strengths, whether it be critical thinking, problem solving, all kinds of different strengths, but has this strange, unexpected difficulty with reading text and comprehending text. And so it is so common, up to one in five people have it because we haven't really had proper, efficient systems in diagnosing dyslexia. A lot of people end up not knowing that they have it and just feel less than through education.

Bob Rivard [00:02:01]:
People are going to stop at that extraordinary statistic of 1 in 5. Is that observational or is that data driven? How do we know that?

Jasmin Dean [00:02:10]:
Sure, that's data driven. Sally and Bennett Shaywitz have done a lot of research out of Yale University and beyond that. National Institutes of Health has done a lot of research in this space. And so this is data driven. They use several tests, psychometric tests, that have been externally validated, to put together this preponderance of evidence that an individual actually has strengths and has this weakness in phonological processing.

Bob Rivard [00:02:40]:
In my own journey to learn more about how we succeed or how we fail at educating our children in society, and particularly our children that come from vulnerable or disadvantaged backgrounds, I've really been struck by the read by three metric, which makes a lot of sense and Helps all of us understand how students, children fall so far behind so quickly at the outset. If they don't learn to read by the third grade, do we. Are we good at identifying young children that are dyslexic by that age so that we can adjust accordingly if they're not learning to read not because of some external environmental impact or a situation, but because, in fact, they're dyslexic?

Jasmin Dean [00:03:29]:
Well, I can tell you what the data tells us. According to Peim's data, directly from the state, the Texas education agency, Region 20, which is the region that we live in, which is Bayar county in the 17 surrounding counties, the most recent data tells us that 5% have been identified. 5.15% have been identified in region 20. This is actually quite a difference from when I first started in 2019, where the statistic was more like 2%.

Bob Rivard [00:03:58]:
You're talking about 5% of all, I guess, public school students.

Jasmin Dean [00:04:01]:
That's right. K through 12 are identified dyslexic. So we have about 15%.

Bob Rivard [00:04:06]:
So are we at least attempting to identify that early on it is starting?

Jasmin Dean [00:04:11]:
Yes. In about 2018, there was legislation passed that every kindergartner and first grader needed to be screened for dyslexia. That is a universal screener. Letters are supposed to go home to notify parents. But I would argue it's still a big word. And it's a big word for educators. It's a big word for parents. And I can tell you what I was told.

Jasmin Dean [00:04:35]:
Just give your student the gift of time. Maybe they were flagged, but just give them the gift of time. Kids develop at different rates. Especially in my situation, I had three boys. Boys develop differently than girls. Just give them the gift of time. And really, by the time we got the necessary identification for my oldest son, it was too late.

Bob Rivard [00:04:55]:
Did this start then as a personal mission rather than you being a professional educator who came into this specific area?

Jasmin Dean [00:05:03]:
It started at my dinner table, my dining room table, where I was trying to do homework with my three children. And what should have just taken 20 minutes. It was just an easy worksheet. It should have been easy. Was so hard.

Bob Rivard [00:05:19]:
Hard for you or them or everyone?

Jasmin Dean [00:05:20]:
For them. Hard for them and challenging for me to teach it to them because clearly, whatever the method was for, for them to learn, it was not working. And so I was very old school in my methods. I thought just more of the same would work. If they didn't get it the first five times, we would just keep. Keep repeating ourselves, hoping that it Would work, and it didn't. And it wasn't until birthday party, my oldest son's third grade year, that I heard the word dyslexia, and my whole life changed. We kept hearing that if he read poorly enough that we would meet a reading specialist.

Jasmin Dean [00:06:00]:
And I started thinking that the reading specialist was an urban legend because he was not reading well, and we still weren't meeting the reading specialist. So I wasn't really sure what it would take for him to be able to read. But I really don't like to micromanage in general. And so I believed and trusted in the system that they were telling me the truth, that I needed to give him the gift of time, and eventually he'd figure it out, and that just never happens.

Bob Rivard [00:06:26]:
Can I ask where your children are enrolled or were enrolled at the time?

Jasmin Dean [00:06:29]:
Sure. All three of my kids went to Bob beard elementary, Garcia middle school, and Brandeis high school in the north side.

Bob Rivard [00:06:37]:
Northside independent school district, which is our biggest school district and one of our wealthiest, certainly our wealthiest big district. Wealth is maybe not the right word, but they have resources that you don't find in the inner city school districts. Do schools there have been people that are trained to be experts in identifying and treating dyslexia, or do they each have reading specialists? I'm not familiar with that particular. Is that a form of faculty member in the public schools?

Jasmin Dean [00:07:08]:
Well, I can tell you everyone's trying the best they can. Whether it's working well or not is another topic in our situation. There was an amazing woman who was a reading specialist at Bob beard elementary, a master's degree in special education. And as soon as my son heard that he would be spending time with her, he immediately told me, you know, the kids that go to her pass the star test. I'm willing to do whatever it's going to take if I can finally pass these tests. She did with him what she did with everybody else, and it didn't work. And so I kept hearing in the dyslexia world, because I was learning also. I was drinking through the fire hose of learning as a parent.

Jasmin Dean [00:07:49]:
I kept hearing, you need to find an academic language therapist. But I wanted to trust in the system. And so I started asking her, what do you know about this academic language therapy? And she was aware of it.

Bob Rivard [00:08:02]:
What do you know about what, please?

Jasmin Dean [00:08:03]:
Academic language therapy. Okay, so it is a very specific study in how to teach students with dyslexia how to read. It's 200 coursework hours, 700 residency hours. But I wanted to believe that whatever her master's degree was in had prepared her to work with my son. And so my husband and I scholarshiped her to go ahead and get this academic language therapy training. Because if it was going to be available to my children, I wanted it to be available to everybody at that campus.

Bob Rivard [00:08:35]:
And you learned otherwise that she didn't have that training and probably neither did anybody else there at the school.

Jasmin Dean [00:08:40]:
What I wanted to hear her say is I already knew all this, but after she went to the training, she came back and told me that had completely changed the way she would teach reading.

Bob Rivard [00:08:51]:
Where did she get that training?

Jasmin Dean [00:08:53]:
So she. There was a program that was an offshoot of the Scottish Rite Hospital here in San Antonio that she went to. And so she took that training, took the exam, became certified. But by the time she finished the training, my son was in middle school. And there were just a lot of comorbidities that developed from the struggle of learning how to read. He had trusted his teachers, he had trusted the process much like I had. And it just got to the point where he didn't trust it anymore. So unfortunately for him, he will have to decide as an adult whether he wants to come back to that reading intervention table and really go through the program to fill in the gaps that he has in reading.

Jasmin Dean [00:09:36]:
But that will be a decision he will have to make as an adult.

Bob Rivard [00:09:39]:
But otherwise, adults like your son just don't read, or they don't read effectively or they don't read as deeply as they otherwise would.

Jasmin Dean [00:09:48]:
It is laborious reading. And so they're still trying to decode each letter. They're still trying to blend letters together. And when you have so much labor that goes into putting those letters together and blending them, you don't read fluently enough to comprehend what you're reading. So ultimately, nowadays we have assistive technology that helps in reading things to you. But ultimately, I will argue, they still are marginalized individuals and marginalized students because we are such a text heavy society. You can't open a bank account without reading. You can't buy a house without reading.

Jasmin Dean [00:10:26]:
You can't really, even if you get a job, you can't fill out HR paperwork without being vulnerable and without needing a translator. Even voting. It's difficult to vote if you can't read. There's so much that you can't do if you can't read.

Bob Rivard [00:10:44]:
Go back to what you said. The condition is. And is it literally medically the way you, you visualize text, something happens that it doesn't translate to your brain, whereas, you know, a stoplight or a building or everything else that you see in the. In the environment makes sense.

Jasmin Dean [00:11:04]:
So there have been a lot of studies done with functional brain imaging, which really looks at the process and the circuitry movement and circuitry engagement for an individual who reads. And what we see is for individuals with dyslexia, they have a very inefficient circuitry base to read fluently. So that's why it's so laborious for them. What's amazing is if you get dyslexia.

Bob Rivard [00:11:31]:
Intervention early, meaning when?

Jasmin Dean [00:11:33]:
Before the age of nine.

Bob Rivard [00:11:35]:
Okay.

Jasmin Dean [00:11:36]:
If you get intervention early, that circuitry can form, so then you have the opportunity to have more fluent reading. And what happens, especially with early intervention, is the individual finds more success in reading and will independently engage in reading more, increasing the repetitions, the number of times, which is what we know we need in order to have fluent reading across the board. And so when we wait for academic failure, when we wait for tier two, tier three interventions in schools, Tier one is general education. Tier two is small groups in the general education setting. Tier three is when they're pulled out into another classroom, into special education. Right. When we have that, the student has already experienced failure. So if we can catch them early, if we're really looking at the science of teaching reading and equipping teachers to know how to teach every student how to read, then we're catching.

Jasmin Dean [00:12:40]:
We're throwing that net wide, and we're catching more students earlier to avoid that academic failure later on.

Bob Rivard [00:12:49]:
Well, as a parent of dyslexic children, did you want them put into special ed programs? A lot of parents, they have their own attitudes about that. And actually, the schools, which spend a lot more money on special ed classes, will do many, in many instances, will do everything they can in Texas to dissuade people from having their children in those classes because they don't want to have a larger student body of special ed students.

Jasmin Dean [00:13:15]:
Sure. What I wanted as a mother was for my children to learn how to read. It got to the point when they were in middle school that I felt every morning like I was leading the lamb to slaughter.

Bob Rivard [00:13:28]:
That's not a good feeling.

Jasmin Dean [00:13:29]:
There is no escape. If you can't read, what subject is going to be a subject that you thrive in, especially in this day and age? Right. Even math. Now, when I was going to school in math, we would have a worksheet full of arithmetic, and there would be one word problem at the bottom. So if you get all the arithmetic correct and Just didn't want to do the word problem. You'd still get an A. Right. But now all of our questions in math are word problems, which I'm not saying is a bad thing, but if we're not being intentional in teaching students how to read, it also eliminates that possibility of doing well in math.

Jasmin Dean [00:14:10]:
And so teaching a student to read is a non negotiable in elementary school. It's not going to get easier the later on they, they progress in education. And so catching it early before academic failure is so important. Regarding special education, at the time when my kids were young, dyslexia was not under special ed, it was under section 504. So.

Bob Rivard [00:14:37]:
Well, you want to explain what that is?

Jasmin Dean [00:14:38]:
Sure. So section 504 basically gives accommodations to the student, but does not require specialized instruction. Currently, dyslexia is under special ed, which is the way it's handled the rest of the country. So Texas just became compliant under IDEA and put dyslexia under there's another acronym.

Bob Rivard [00:15:01]:
What's idea?

Jasmin Dean [00:15:03]:
What is idea? So it's the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. Okay, okay. And so it became compliant under idea, and so dyslexia is now under special education, and it allows individuals with dyslexia to take advantage of that specialized instruction. When a student doesn't need specialized instruction anymore, let's say they've gotten the intervention that they need and they are reading fluently. All they need is the accommodations in Tier 1 instruction, which means orally administrated tests, text to speech, speech to text, that kind of thing. If it's just accommodations, then they can go under 504, which means they're still protected as an individual with a disability or with a condition, a different condition that needs attention, but all they need is accommodations. They don't need special instruction. Does that make sense?

Bob Rivard [00:16:00]:
It does. And I think there must be a lot of people out there, Jasmine, who are adults now, who sort of lament that they didn't become better readers when they were young and have just accepted the fact that they're poor readers when in fact they're probably dyslexic and they don't know that. And I, I wonder how, how does somebody decide or, or find out, am I dyslexic? And is there anything I can do about it? Because I'm, I'm not nine years old or younger now, which is the period in our lives when we're so our febrile brains can learn language so easily compared to later. What do you do about it? If. If you do want to find out that you might be dyslexic, sure.

Jasmin Dean [00:16:40]:
The current process to be identified with dyslexia is to find a licensed psychologist or an educational diagnostician. It is all currently private pay because insurance doesn't cover it and get evaluated that way. It's a very expensive process, but if someone wants to know, they can know that way. There are also screeners. If you go to the International Dyslexia association website, there's a free screener that someone, if they're just curious to see, is this probably something that I've dealt with before? There's a screener that you can do as an adult and answer those questions and understand more about dyslexia. For people who need workplace accommodations, they do need to have that official evaluation done. If someone wants to. To learn how to become a better reader as an adult, they absolutely can.

Jasmin Dean [00:17:31]:
They can engage in dyslexia therapy or adult literacy programs and become a better reader, but it will. It is important that they want it. No one can force it upon you when you're an adult. So there are definitely ways to go around learning how to become a better reader and finding community in that space, but it's something that you'll have to seek out.

Bob Rivard [00:17:55]:
I can't think of an industry that frustrates more people more often than the insurance industry, now more than ever. And I am sure they don't want to do anything that involves one in five people. So why? What's behind them not recognizing dyslexia the way they would recognize other conditions?

Jasmin Dean [00:18:14]:
Dyslexia has been the hot potato for over a century between medicine and education. And I think what I have learned through understanding both systems is that in tandem, they can work together and build this bridge between the two silos to actually end up saving money in the long run. Because with prevention, which is a lot less expensive than dealing with the comorbidities of incarceration rates, low economic mobility, anxiety, depression, all of these additional things that come with being in this pressure cooker between the age of 5 and 18, where you can't easily. It will actually save both industries a lot of money in the long run.

Bob Rivard [00:19:06]:
What should they be ensuring, though? Because I think the insurance companies would turn around and say, we fund our public schools, we fund special education programs, it's their responsibility to identify dyslexic children and to treat it. Would you argue that? Well, we need. We need additional expert treatment and counseling, and that's what insurance should cover.

Jasmin Dean [00:19:26]:
So insurance covers billable conditions through Medicaid in public education. So if the school is treating a condition through speech or ot, ot, occupational therapy, then they can bill Medicaid for those services. And what I argue is that the same should happen for dyslexia as well. The screening, the identification and the treatment. If schools could have that extra revenue source, they can build capacity in ways that they can't do right now. But I will also say that I do believe it's the education system's responsibility to be preparing teachers upon exit of an education preparation program to teach students how to read. And so if both are working in tandem, we build capacity to serve the one in five. And it's not just the burden of one system or the other.

Jasmin Dean [00:20:23]:
If the two systems are working in tandem together, we can catch a lot more sooner. Right now we're in a situation of triage because we need to stop the bleeding. But with both systems working together in the future, we really can be in a place of prevention like we have found with other conditions. Whether it's diabetes or cancer or any of the other things, prevention always leads to better outcomes.

Bob Rivard [00:20:49]:
Well, I'm a big believer that one person can change the world. And so I hope that's you. But I just wonder. That's a steep uphill climb to convince political leaders, elected officials, educators, the people in Austin that regulate education to make the changes, insurance industry, et cetera, could go on and on. Are you having an impact beyond, for instance, the school districts that you're working with, or are there others that you're allied with out there? Is there a network of others pushing for change?

Jasmin Dean [00:21:25]:
I do think that there are others that are pushing for change. But I also have found that dyslexia is that low hanging fruit that is equal opportunity opportunity and crosses both sides of the aisle. The story is raw. The experience is raw and everyone has a story. So when they see that this is such low hanging fruit, it's been a pleasure and a privilege to be able to unify people in this space. There are people in other states, like I mentioned, the Shaywitzes at Yale University were pioneers in this space and I think they've developed a following of people across the country. Now Charles Schwab has donated significant amounts of money to the University of California in San Francisco to have a dyslexia center. The Cassidy's in Louisiana have a charter school for dyslexic students and are really working on federal definitions.

Jasmin Dean [00:22:25]:
They passed the federal definition in the First Step act for dyslexia that I mentioned earlier. So there are kind of hot segments, spots around the country for dyslexia. And I just see this as a solvable problem for the next generation. Too many people have suffered for too long for this to continue in this way.

Bob Rivard [00:22:45]:
You haven't talked at all about the school that you've helped start here. Let's hear about that and where it stands today, that effort.

Jasmin Dean [00:22:52]:
Sure. So we started celebrate dyslexia in 2019. And I very quickly went just on a listening tour to hear all different stakeholders talk about their experiences with dyslexia. And parents kept asking for a school. So I kept reporting to my board and parents keep asking for a school. But our mission is that every school is going to do this well. And I had a board member that really wanted me to second, to really think about that for an extra second, not just an extra second, for a long time and see what we could do to support the community and meet that need because we are a nonprofit and we do serve the community. And so I was completely committed to equity and access.

Jasmin Dean [00:23:33]:
It was really important for me that if we were going to open a school that it be tuition free. One thing led to another and we applied for a charter school in the state of Texas and we were approved generation 28. And we're in our second year of operation.

Bob Rivard [00:23:50]:
And where is your school?

Jasmin Dean [00:23:52]:
We are currently co located at Girls Inc. Which is off of Bassey and West avenue. We have 100 students kinder through fourth and it as a parent that has walked this journey who is on this mission to bring system level groundwater change to hear a parent tell me, well, we don't really know a struggle with dyslexia because we had a resource in our community. Our child was identified with ease and is getting the intervention they need and is now reading is still.

Bob Rivard [00:24:25]:
That's rewarding.

Jasmin Dean [00:24:26]:
It's so rewarding, but it's still jarring to hear that it happened. And if I can do it, everyone can do it. School systems can do it all over the country. I don't have a traditional education background and I again started this journey at my dining room table with my children and, and if we were able to accomplish this in a few short years, I know that our school systems can do it. I think really coming alongside them and making sure they have the resources they need, understanding what barriers they have had to do dyslexia well and doing everything we can to remove those barriers so that every school eventually can do this well. And every teacher knows how to teach reading and every doctor knows how to diagnose it will lead to the narrative change for the next generation.

Bob Rivard [00:25:18]:
I'm sure your passion and you know, your, your commitment to your own children may prove to be more powerful in this situation than some formal education. As an educator, how are you funding that school though? Obviously when you get a charter in the state of Texas and it's a public charter that qualifies you for per capita student spending, which is not insubstantial in terms of the, the mechanics of putting together a school budget. But it's nowhere near enough and it's certainly not enough to sustain it long term, even if somebody's donating facilities to you in the near term and making other allowances. So let's hear a little bit about your budget as for the non profit and how this school is being funded. And, and you know, I assume kindergarten to fourth grader or pre K to fourth, fourth grade would be the key period of time you want to capture all these students. But we're, I think we're at about 475,000 students in Bexar county right now, counting both public school, public charter and maybe parochial schools. So you have I don't know how many kids.

Jasmin Dean [00:26:28]:
You said 100.

Bob Rivard [00:26:29]:
There's a lot more people that would be knocking on the door, maybe coming in the coming future.

Jasmin Dean [00:26:34]:
Sure. This school was never intended to be the only solution. It was intended to be the lab school. Now we have two separate organizations. We have Celebrate Dyslexia, the original nonprofit that is doing all of the outward facing work. And we also have the school. And so when we offer to train teachers in school districts, we have an opportunity for them to come and observe at our school. Because I do have to run the school and I am committed to, to being self sustaining by year five for this school.

Jasmin Dean [00:27:07]:
I understand school budgets and I understand the barriers of those school budgets. So we have to be creative in how we serve our students and serve them well. And so if I can show that I can do it especially for the dyslexic student, then every other school can do it as well. So the things that we have learned in running the school are turning into opportunities for programming. For example, Dyslexia curriculum is extremely privatized and it's really expensive. And so we've committed to creating an open source curriculum that everyone will have access to. Whoever has access to Internet will have access to this curriculum. But our primary goal is for this to serve our partner school districts in our area so that they don't have the added expense and burden on their budget and as they identify more dyslexic students, they can have an open source curriculum that is available to them and not one that they have to pay extra for.

Jasmin Dean [00:28:06]:
So these are some of the things, some of the growing pains that we have had at the school and barriers that we see in this system. We've been able to really be proactive and solve for that. So in terms of our funding, we are just so grateful to City education partners for their incredible startup grant that they gave us so that we could get our feet underneath us. In addition to choose to succeed. The Breckenridge foundation and Ewing Housel, they were really the ones that invested in the school in the very beginning and we're really grateful for that.

Bob Rivard [00:28:40]:
And are those sustaining gifts of support as you're, how, how far into this school are you?

Jasmin Dean [00:28:46]:
This is our second year, second year.

Bob Rivard [00:28:47]:
So hopefully they'll come along and see the results and continue to support you. And I told you I wasn't going to make you read all your donors on air, but if you took the top five to 10 family foundations in town, are you starting to gain more support?

Jasmin Dean [00:29:03]:
We are receiving support. And again, what's so incredible to walk this journey with people here in San Antonio is that we get to hear their stories as well. And so this is one of those things that I think if more people had a safe space to talk about, they would find that they are not alone. They are not alone.

Bob Rivard [00:29:22]:
So what you're finding is when you talk to adults anecdotally, people are telling you that they know they're dyslexic or that they have this condition and it was never treated. There was never any available options when they were in school, but they're aware.

Jasmin Dean [00:29:37]:
Of it and their children are dyslexic and they tried to find solutions. They had to advocate a lot at the school and still weren't able to find solutions. This is a common story with the same cadences, just different names.

Bob Rivard [00:29:55]:
Why don't we have open source solutions already? You're not the first person to discover this. You talked about the Yale research. Why is the broader research and medical and education community not made more progress on this front across 50 states?

Jasmin Dean [00:30:11]:
I don't have a good answer for that. You know, I've been asked, people can't believe that the medical quoting isn't there and isn't appropriate. Like, are you serious? This is such low hanging fruit. I don't have an answer. But all I can say is for such a time as this, and if this is the contribution that we make to this generation. Then the future generations will have a new narrative. They will have solutions. Their kids will be able to read.

Jasmin Dean [00:30:40]:
They will get identified, not just their kids. When you think about the adults that never received their identification, to have an opportunity, when we talk about workforce development and economic mobility, for them to be able to get an identification so they can finally pass their GED exam with accommodations, that changes the trajectory of a family's life.

Bob Rivard [00:31:02]:
Yeah. I assume that a significant number of people that have dropped out of public education over the years did so in, in part because of being dyslexic. And I know that you have some data on the high percentage of people that are incarcerated as juveniles and as adults that are, that are both didn't finish their education, but also are dyslexic.

Jasmin Dean [00:31:25]:
That's right. And it's hereditary. And so oftentimes families, parents will see that their children are struggling very much the same way they did. And if the parents never got the identification, the parents feel less than so then they start to see it in their children and all the alarms start going off inside. Not wanting your kids to have the same thing that you had, but you don't even have a name for it. You don't have a word for it. And to know that you're actually a part of a really incredible group of people that have changed the world as we know it. When we think about the invention, from the light bulb to the assembly line to the smartphone, all of these inventions were a result of the dyslexic mind.

Jasmin Dean [00:32:09]:
And when people really understand that just because they can't read and they struggled in school, they actually can do a lot of incredible things. It can be life giving.

Bob Rivard [00:32:21]:
There is some association, I think, with, well, I, I personally known people that I regard as either being polymaths or genius that I think also are dyslexic. And so it's not surprising when you meet somebody who has extraordinary talents in a very given or focused area that they might have a, you know, an intellectual deficit elsewhere. Is that your finding with people that are dyslexic that some of them have the ability to work around that because they're so extraordinary at coding or whatever it is that specialty that they attracts their interest and attention and their abilities?

Jasmin Dean [00:32:58]:
Absolutely. And for a long time, this is actually how dyslexia was sold as a superpower. And then it became kind of taboo because either it put pressure on a student with dyslexia that they had to change the world. Or it made the struggle. It made the struggle feel like it really wasn't as much of a struggle. And you should be thankful that you have dyslexia. So that's why we don't necessarily use those words anymore. But if you are in an environment where you can be supported, for example, the sharks on Shark Tank, many of them talk about being dyslexic.

Jasmin Dean [00:33:38]:
Richard Branson often talks about his dyslexia and that he dropped out of school at the age of 14, and his headmaster told him that he was either going to end up in prison or he was going to be a billionaire. It helped that he came from a family that could support him in his efforts. And so we have to take the whole story and understand the whole picture and not either assume that if you're.

Bob Rivard [00:34:05]:
Dyslexic, you're a loser, which is. I think there is an association with that because you meet people who are. There's a. There's an element of shame.

Jasmin Dean [00:34:15]:
There is an element of shame because how do we measure intelligence in school?

Bob Rivard [00:34:20]:
Yeah.

Jasmin Dean [00:34:20]:
With reading and writing. And if you can't, you're never going to be called up. You're never going to get the certificate, you're never going to get the gold star, regardless of how hard you work. And oftentimes, your brain is on fifth gear all day long just to hang on, especially because most have not received proper interventions. And I'll tell you, when I was looking for an academic language therapist to work with my children, no one would take my money. So even if you had money, they didn't have room in their private practices to work with him. So even if you do have means, it doesn't mean that you can find the supports for your children that you need. And so that is really one of the reasons why, if I can find a solution for my children, I want it for every child so that nobody has to go through what we went through at our home.

Bob Rivard [00:35:14]:
Does the state, now, the Texas Education Agency, have a formalized set of standards and criteria? So if a parent out there is listening to this saying, I think I know my child's dyslexic. What are my rights?

Jasmin Dean [00:35:28]:
Yep.

Bob Rivard [00:35:29]:
What are your rights?

Jasmin Dean [00:35:30]:
Yes. So the good news is, is that they can just Google Texas Education Agency Dyslexia Handbook or State Board of Education Dyslexia Handbook, or just put in Texas Dyslexia Handbook, It'll pop in English and in Spanish, and there is a whole slew of rights. We actually have a parent academy that goes through this process for parents, they can reach out to us at any time and we're happy to walk them through the process. Just because there's a process to get your child identified doesn't mean the system can handle the capacity. When we talk about how many licensed school psychologists it takes, the amount of time that testing takes, the process of holding an ARD in a school, yes, it is the right. It is the appropriate process, and there is a whole procedure for this to take place, but it doesn't mean that the system has the capacity to do it well.

Bob Rivard [00:36:29]:
And I'm sure the inner city school districts in particular, that they're funded on property taxes, that they don't have the resources that maybe a Northside or an Alamo Heights Independent School District has to. To create the kind of programming that you and others want to see every public school have.

Jasmin Dean [00:36:46]:
Maybe not. Ultimately, the funding in this area comes from special education. And so if they're identified, there's additional funding that comes into play. If we get the medical code passed, then even that evaluation can be billed past where?

Bob Rivard [00:37:02]:
At the state level or at the federal level.

Jasmin Dean [00:37:05]:
I'm so glad you asked because there are different levels for different types of approvals. If we're talking about Texas Medicaid, it would be Texas. If we're talking about federal all insurances, then that is actually an act of Congress. U.S. congress. It's really interesting how little the medical field, even if they identify that this is an issue, it still has to be a legislative process to get passed. And so we're really fortunate to be able to work with significant partners in this space. And if we got a charter school approved and passed in the state of Texas and are able to serve students the way we are, I am confident that we will get this medical code passed.

Jasmin Dean [00:37:49]:
It will not just affect our community, it has the potential to affect much larger groups of people. But this way it will start to remove the barriers that all of our communities are experiencing. Whether you're in K12, opportunity, youth, adult literacy, workforce development, to get the resources that you need.

Bob Rivard [00:38:11]:
Well, launching the school is an enormous achievement. So congratulations on that. And sustaining it will be an enormous achievement. And if I'm listening and I want to seriously think about my 3 or 4 year old maybe going there, how do I. Does your school have a name? It must have a name.

Jasmin Dean [00:38:28]:
It does have a name. It's called Celebrate Dyslexia Schools. And you know what's really funny about that is that we had just named it that as a placeholder when we were filing the paperwork for a 501C3, fully intending that the founding families would change the name. But when we brought parents together to ask them, okay, we just didn't mean for this to be the name long term. What name would you like this school to have? They were so attached to being able to keep it, celebrate dyslexia, because they wanted to have joy in referring to their kid.

Bob Rivard [00:39:03]:
It's a very positive, even aspirational title. But I wondered myself, if it is a neurobiological condition, why celebrate it?

Jasmin Dean [00:39:12]:
If we can't celebrate our children, who will? If we can't change the narrative in our own homes that they can do, and we can see that they can do, who else is going to convince them that they can do?

Bob Rivard [00:39:26]:
That's a good place for us to just get ready to leave this conversation because we're just a little bit past our deadline. But I want to ask as my last question, how people out there who I hope will respond can help you. I think you need to grow your budget and grow your reach and grow your school's capacity. So I think individual donations, and not just from major family foundations, but people who care and who give to other community causes should think about giving to you. I wonder whether or not you're a United Way recipient or whether you've tried that. And. And how do people donate?

Jasmin Dean [00:40:06]:
Yeah, you can go to our website celebratedyslexia.org or even the school celebratedyslexiaschools.org and find the donation button. But yes, we are so proud to be a new partner at United Way and to really broaden our reach with our after school programs that United Way works with and other school districts that United Way works with to continue to change the groundwater and make the training as accessible as possible, make the curriculum as accessible as possible, and really come up alongside our public schools here in San Antonio and support them to build solid, sustainable programs for students with dyslexia and really support their teachers in learning how to teach reading for every student in their classroom. In terms of funding, we are always happy to have more partners in that space, but really, if you just tell us your story, continue to amplify the voice that you are not alone. People with dyslexia are not alone and that they're a part of a really incredible group of people. I think if you want to get involved with advocacy and add your voice to that, please reach out and let us know if you're interested in getting trained in dyslexia therapy. We have a learning center that can train you. I think anyone who's touched with this story and with dyslexia, we are happy to bring them along as an additional partner.

Bob Rivard [00:41:35]:
Okay, Jasmine Dean, Celebrate Dyslexia. Thank you for coming on to Big City Small Town. As we approach this podcast 150th episode later this year, we'll be adding some new sponsors that reflect the robust growth we've enjoyed this year after welcoming producer and co host Corey Ames to our enterprise, launching our YouTube channel, and our weekly Monday Musings newsletter. If you do not yet subscribe to my free digital commentary, I hope you'll do so now by going to our Big City Small Town website and clicking on newsletters. The local media presence in San Antonio has been steadily shrinking since 2007. Believe me, I've experienced it personally, first as the Executive Editor at the San Antonio express news from 1997 to 2011, and then as we launched the Rivard Report in 2012, where I worked until 2022. If your company or organization would like to consider supporting our local journalism and programming as a sponsor, please drop me a line via social media or to my email@robertjrevardmail.com thank you. Thanks for joining us for this episode of Big City Small Town.

Bob Rivard [00:42:47]:
Please share this episode with friends and colleagues and if you haven't already, sign up for Monday Musings, my weekly newsletter. Just go to bigcitysmalltown.com and add your email. Big City Small Town is brought to you by Western Urban Building, the city our children want to call home, and by Geekdom, where startups are born and smart ideas become businesses. Thanks to Corey Ames of Ensemble, Texas for the production of this show. We will see you next week.