Rider Will Host ‘Rethinking Dyslexia’ Seminar on May 2

Rider University will host Rethinking Dyslexia: Changing Policies, Changing Strategies, Changing Lives, on Thursday, May 2, in the Yvonne Theater. Registration will begin at 4 p.m., with welcoming remarks scheduled for 4:30. The event is sponsored by Decoding Dyslexia – NJ and Rider’s Counseling Center, Disabilities Services and Council for Exceptional Children chapter.

Dyslexia is the most common, yet perhaps most misunderstood learning disability. Dyslexics are not stupid and do not read backwards, so what, exactly, is Dyslexia? What instructional strategies work? And how can parents, teachers, administrators and policy-makers help? These issues and more will be addressed.

The 5 p.m. keynote address will be presented by Dr. Sally Shaywitz and Dr. Bennett Shaywitz, co-founders of the Yale Center for Dyslexia and Creativity. Sally E. Shaywitz, M.D., the Audrey G. Ratner Professor in Learning Development at the Yale University School of Medicine, is the co-director of the newly formed Yale Center for Dyslexia and Creativity. She has devoted her career to better understanding and helping children and adults who are dyslexic. Her research provides the basic framework for the scientific study of dyslexia. Together with her husband, Dr. Bennett Shaywitz, she originated and championed the “Sea of Strengths” model of dyslexia which emphasizes a sea of strengths of higher critical thinking and creativity surrounding the encapsulated weakness found in children and adults who are dyslexic.

Bennett A. Shaywitz, M.D., the Charles and Helen Schwab Professor in Dyslexia and Learning Development at Yale University, is the Chief of Pediatric Neurology and co-director of the newly formed Yale Center for Dyslexia and Creativity at the Yale University School of Medicine. He has a longstanding interest in disorders of learning and attention in children and young adults, and has devoted his career to better understanding and elucidating the neurobiological basis of reading and dyslexia, as well to ensuring that this new knowledge is translated into the better care and treatment of children and adults who are dyslexic.

Following the keynote presentation, there will be a 6:15 p.m. screening of the film The Big Picture: Rethinking Dyslexia, followed by a panel discussion and Q&A session at 7:15. Students, parents, teachers and professionals will discuss the changes needed to effectively address dyslexia today.

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Rethinking Dyslexia is being presented as part of Rider’s 100th anniversary celebration, taking place throughout the 2012-13 academic year.