Money may be determining whether Bermudian children with severe reading disabilities reach their full potential, according to outgoing Reading Clinic director Janet Kemp.

In September, Dr. Kemp will step down after 22 years with the Reading Clinic, although she is not going far.

She is setting up a private practice in the same building to carry out learning assessments and to act as an advocate for children with reading difficulties.

Between the students coming through the doors at the Reading Clinic and also the many phone calls she has taken from worried parents, she has probably dealt with about 3,000 students over the years.

"I have found that when parents of children with severe learning difficulties, particularly severe dyslexia, have exhausted resources on the Island, there are often no other options for them," said Dr. Kemp. "There are specialised schools in the United States and the United Kingdom that could be very beneficial."

Some high schools for students with dyslexia in the United States can cost as much as $50,000 per year, however.

"It is very expensive," said Dr. Kemp. "In the United States the law dictates that once you have exhausted government services, you are entitled to the private services and it will be funded."

But this is not the case for students in Bermuda.

"In Bermuda, parents who want that option, find it financially not viable for them," said Dr. Kemp. "I have found that over the years there is a huge inequality in terms of families who are able to do this for their children."

She said children with mild to moderate reading problems are often easily helped locally through the Reading Clinic or through programmes at their schools.

And she said she has often seen children with severe problems, who were lucky enough to receive specialised education abroad, go on to achieve great things.

"If the family can't afford the option of a specialised school they are really stuck," said Dr. Kemp. "I have seen some gifted children placed in programmes for slow learners because the student is struggling with reading."

She described one middle school student who was only able to read 25 words by sight.

"The student is not reading at a primary two level," said Dr. Kemp. "His day in middle school is spent just sitting there. He is a prime candidate to eventually drop out."

She said that there were a number of things that could help students like this.

There are text books on tape, computer programmes, and machines that scan any page and read it aloud.

"The technology is there, but it is not there eight hours a day in the classroom," she said.

She wants to advocate for local students to have the services and accommodations they need to do their best.

"They need much the same as what is done for a child who is visually impaired," she said. "In that case the equipment and assistance is put in place quite well, as far as I know.

"But for the children who stay here the same intensity of intervention and support is needed. It is just that their disability is less visible."

In her new role, she also hopes to start a parents' resource list of specialists on the Island that can help children with different types of learning difficulties.

"There isn't a central resource," she said.

Dr. Kemp first started as a teacher at Sandys Secondary School. But she became so concerned about the reading skills of her students, that she went back to school.

She earned a master's doctoral degree from Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She also has degrees in educational psychology and school psychology.

After university she was a senior psychologist with the Ministry of Education for six years. She made the shift to the Reading Clinic in 1987.

In the last two decades she has overseen the testing, tutoring and outreach programmes of the clinic, while also conducting assessments of children and adults referred for suspected learning difficulties.

She also has liaised with parents and schools, provided workshops and advocated for the needs of students and employees with learning disabilities.

When she became director, the Reading Clinic served roughly 25 children. Today, it sees about 80 students per year.

Dr. Kemp said there are many misconceptions about reading disorders, particularly dyslexia.

"I never refer to people as dyslexic. It doesn't define their whole being," she said. "I always say that people 'have a pattern of dyslexia'. Dyslexia is a subtle weakness.

"It has nothing to do with intelligence. The brightest individuals can have difficulty learning to reading and write."

And she said that dyslexia is not so much a visual problem, or a problem of reversing letters, as is commonly thought.

"It is more that people with it have difficulty working with sounds in the initial sense of reading," she said. "Reading comes to a standstill because they can't decipher a word. Spelling comes to a standstill also.

"Therefore, they can't comprehend what they are reading because they can't get beyond the words."

But she said when read aloud to, people with dyslexia could often understand at a level far above their reading level.

"For children with reading difficulties at the end of grade three, 74 percent of them will continue to have difficulties," said Dr. Kemp. "That is why the Reading Clinic has been trying to identify problems much earlier.

"We are honing in on children at the end of primary two and primary three, who have not been helped by taking part in in-school intervention programmes such as Reading Recovery."

She said one of the job's greatest rewards was hearing from satisfied parents and former students.

"You run into the parents and they describe how pleased they are with the success of their students," said Dr. Kemp. "It isn't always that they've gone on to college, but just that the student has found an avenue to be really successful.

"They feel the work we did at the Reading Clinic really helped get the child in the direction of that success."

She said she was glad to be continuing her relationship with the Reading Clinic. She has accepted a position on the Reading Clinic's board of trustees.

"The beauty of the Reading Clinic is that there is a tremendous amount of passion for the work we do," she said. "People go above and beyond their normal duties to help fund raise and do whatever needs doing. The tutors as well put in many volunteer hours."

Julie Dunstan will take over from Dr. Kemp as the new director of the Reading Clinic.

Dr. Dunstan is no stranger to the facility, as she has consulted with them for about 15 years.

She has a private practice in the building called Evaluation Solutions. Part of her work at the Reading Clinic will be introducing a pilot intervention programme for children with maths problems.

Statistics:

¦ Up to 20 percent of the population has some form of a reading disability.

¦ Dyslexia is about five to ten percent of that.

¦ In 1999 a study done by the Reading Clinic on literacy skills among prison inmates in Bermuda found that out of 159 inmates, a quarter were reading below the 6th grade level and three quarters were reading below the eleventh grade level. Dr. Kemp thought statistics might be higher than that since those inmates with severe reading problems may have elected not to volunteer for the study.

¦ In the United States it has been found that 85 percent of all juvenile offenders are school dropouts with learning problems.

Some famous people with dyslexia:

Actor Tom Cruise.

Musician John Lennon

Scientist and genius Albert Einstein

British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill

Chemist Archer Martin (1952 Nobel Laureate)

Brain researcher John R. Skoyles.

Former President Woodrow Wilson

Former President George Washington

Dilbert cartoonist Scott Adams

Mystery writer Agatha Christie

Sir Winston Churchill once said: "I was, on the whole, considerably discouraged by my school days. It was not pleasant to feel oneself completely outclassed and left behind at the beginning of a race."