It is commonly understood that levels of support for students with language-based learning disabilities begin to wane after the completion of grade school. While public elementary programs may offer students a multisensory structured approach to language, many families live in fear of the transition to the middle grades. This fear is only intensified when we consider the statistics for these students and their lifelong pursuits of literacy.

Early Interventions have been proven effective. However, while most schools continueto depend on the Discrepancy Model for the identification of children with disabilities, many students do not exhibit a broad enough discrepancy early on, and thus do not qualify for interventions early enough. Many of these students, as a result, will require life-long support in order to achieve academic success. Seventy-five percent of children who are not intervened upon by the third grade will require some level of support for the duration of their education. Unfortunately, less than two percent of these students will pursue a bachelor’s degree.

Between 15% and 20% of students experience weaknesses in language processes and many, or most, of them will require lifelong support in reading because of our current identification procedures. What happens when we do not provide the critical on-going supports necessary for success? Well, according to Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, approximately 7,000 American high school students drop out of each day- 1.3 million students a year! Let that number stew for a moment- 1.3 million a year. According to Mr. Duncan, nearly 30% of students will drop out of school in the United States. For students in the 15-20% group who do not receive on-going supports,   continue reading