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CHEYENNE, Wyo. — Frustration and tears filled the LCSD1 Board of Trustees meeting room Monday night as parents, guardians and educators shared personal stories about their children’s learning difficulties. Like a broken record, parent after parent stated the same thing: The district is not doing enough to teach students how to read and support readers who are struggling.
Speakers who shared their stories during the meeting’s public comment period said LCSD1 isn’t administering effective reading interventions for students. Furthermore, the district’s lack of resources is creating a financial burden for parents with children who are falling behind as readers.
Several parents said their children hated going to school because they feared having to read. Others said the district refused to provide reading evaluations for students, forcing the parents to pay for them themselves out of pocket.
A mom said her young son died because of his dyslexia.
A financial burden
Less than half of LCSD1 students are reading at grade level, according to Megan Hesser, who runs the tutoring business Hesser Literacy Partners. Hesser voiced her concerns at Monday’s night meeting and also provided additional information to Cap City News via Messenger.
Hesser said that over the past several years, 10 families she knows have collectively spent around $500,000 to help their struggling children. In addition to tutoring services, the families have been paying for neurological evaluations, psychological diagnoses and fees for attorneys to ensure LCSD1 is complying with federal law regarding individualized education programs. One family has spent six figures to rent a second home in Colorado so their dyslexic child can attend a private school.
“This board claims to prioritize literacy,” Hesser said Monday night. “There is no action behind your words. … How can you best serve the principals to best serve the teachers to best serve our students if you don’t know yourself?”
Annie McGlothlin and her husband are one of the 10 families Hesser referred to. McGlothlin is raising her 12-year-old grandson who has “profound dyslexia,” she said. She has spent $25,000 for attorney services and other evaluations to help her grandson.
“I hope that there is some sort of effort to create a task force — something — because there’s a lot of kids with dyslexia,” the grandmother said.
Another parent, Charlotte Martinez, said her second-grade daughter wasn’t progressing in her reading, so the mother decided to get her daughter evaluated. She paid for the services out of pocket.
“I am paying for tutoring, I am spending my evenings with her and pushing her to get her what she needs,” Martinez said. “I will take extra money out of my own pocket to make sure that she is getting the tutoring that she needs because the school cannot provide her what she needs.”
Fear of school
Several parents said their dyslexic children loathed going to school. Matt Edwards, a father with a dyslexic daughter, said she would cling to her mom’s leg in the school parking lot. The mother, Kristin Edwards, would have to “peel her off just to go to school.”
She “was just so frustrated; she felt stupid,” Matt Edwards said about her daughter’s reaction to reading. “There was no way to get her the help, so we tried to get her squared away at the school that we were at and plugged into something that would work.” He added that “when it comes to dyslexia, there’s really nothing available at the school district.”
“It’s not just us,” Edwards continued. “There’s other folks, and whatever we can do, I just want to encourage us, please, let us put our heads together and find a way to not leave kids behind like this.”
Another parent with a struggling child is Kim Coulter. She echoed much of Edwards’s sentiments.
“There’s nothing more frustrating than having your kid cry and not want to go to school because she’s scared, because she’s not doing good,” said Kim Coulter, a mother to two LCSD1 students. “So if we can find a way to support these kids, identifying [their reading challenges] early on, and just supporting them, would make a huge difference.”
Climbing a mountain
Chandel Pine spoke about her fifth-grade son, Paul, who was dyslexic and suffered from ADHD. Paul’s reading difficulties resulted in him developing anxiety, depression and suicidal ideation, his mother said. He died Jan. 12, 2023.
“What if I told you that the cause of death was dyslexia, often referred to as reading struggles?” Pine said. “Paul’s death was preventable in many ways. Paul was never identified with a learning disability until Paul’s inpatient stay [at a behavioral institute].”
Pine learned during her son’s admittance at the health facility that he was reading at a first-grade level. A reading evaluation later determined that Paul had not mastered letter sounds and basic phonics rules, Pine said.
“People with reading difficulties are more likely to struggle with anxiety and depression, but so are people with ADHD,” Pine said. “Paul was very aware that he was behind, but young enough that it was impossible for him to process that he had a learning difference, not deficiency. That was beyond his control and had no bearing on his intelligence. It does, however, show a bearing on Wyoming public education, specifically Laramie County and the inability to teach kids how to read, prioritize funding for reading support and put students first.”
Pine further criticized the board for not understanding the “science of reading” and for utilizing tier reading curricula she said are ineffective.
“What are these parents supposed to do?” Pine said. “You need to teach teachers how the brain learns reading. And once the teachers understand how the brain learns reading, then they can apply the tools they need to teach every child how to read.”
Paul’s Mountain Non-Profit Organization was formed by Pine and her family in late 2023. The group provides free reading evaluations and reading services to families.
After the public comment period closed Monday night, LCSD1 Board of Trustees Chair Tim Bolin thanked speakers for sharing their experiences.
“You have a lot of our senior staff administrators here who are listening tonight,” Bolin said. “We will try to do whatever we can.”
