By Peter W.D. Wright & Pamela Wright

Last year the U.S. District Court of Nevada issued an exceptional decision for a child with dyslexia in O.R. v. Clark County Schools.

O.R. is a child with dyslexia and other learning disabilities…Dyslexia is the most common cause of reading, writing and spelling difficulties.

Although dyslexia makes learning to read more difficult, children with dyslexia can learn to read if they have the right instruction. Parents of children with dyslexia who seek the “right instruction” in public school programs are often stunned when they encounter major obstacles to their reasonable requests that the school teach their children to read.

Most teachers, including special education teachers, are not trained to teach children with dyslexia to read. The programs selected for use by many elementary schools are not effective or research-based.

This case is noteworthy in several respects. The Court held that:

• the IEP team failed to consider evaluations provided by the parents and failed to meaningfully consider the parents’ concerns for enhancing their child’s education; 
• the IEP team ignored the findings and recommendations of the professional evaluations of O.R.; 
• because O.R. needs were complex, she required a methodology that was research-based, systematic, cumulative, and rigorously implemented;
• the district’s response to the parents’ requests for a program that met their child’s needs was “trust us to provide her with what she needs”;

the Court ordered the Clark County School District to reimburse the parents $456,990.60.

To learn more about this important case, see the full article, with key details of how it unfolded, on the Wrightslaw Website.

Peter and Pamela Wright are co-founders of Wrightslaw, the leading resource for special education law and advocacy.