Interview with Lisa McCarty, and Raja Mahaba 8-14-2020

First, right?

So that you can go to your channel. Yeah, we'll go back to this page in a sec. That way you can go to your channel and we can go to your live videos wherever your live thing is. This this here. Oh, you can go to your channel.

So we're recording now.

Yeah, we're streaming now.

We gotta change this name here to eventually. We'll do that afterwards.

Um, I'll just take us back to the. Original page for that.

Yeah, okay, now we're ready to stream.

I'm just gonna edit your— I'm just gonna edit your post so that the link is the correct one, right, on both of them. Oh, okay, so get rid of this link.

There we go.

Get rid of that and then do this in Twitter. Yeah, normally you wouldn't have to do that. You just have to remember to start streaming first.

I have always that kid because I'll, I'll forget. I've got no chance of remembering all that. I've got to just practice it all.

Okay, uh, pinned here. Okay, looks like we have to. You think we should make a comment or just delete?

That's fine. I'll just delete it if it's a problem.

Okay.

You know, if it's a problem, don't do it because it's four o'clock. So I'd like to really get on. That's what I want to do.

You know, get on at four o'clock.

Yep.

So, um, now we can copy this.

You have me as the big picture though, it looks like.

Oh, I'm still not on there yet, so—

Oh, you're not on?

Yeah, I'm on, but we're not quite live yet because we're still— we're, um—

I think we are on.

Yeah, we're—

So now you can see.

Now, now there we are.

Now you can start.

Okay, now we haven't got Raja there, so your, your thing is here.

Um, and then when you're done, remember you got to go back into OBS and click stop streaming.

Ah, yes. So I'm happy there now. Now we've lost Raja. Is she coming back in? Do I have to do anything for her?

You may have to send her the link to the Hangouts.

How do I do that?

Which, to do that, you would want to not do— well, yeah, that. What else? So you'd want to go to add people. All right, copy link to share. And then send the email.

Compose and send. Okay, there we are on live streaming. We're waiting for Raja to join us.

Now you can go back to here.

Oh, thank you, thank you. I, you know, I couldn't do— and we deliberately Chris?

Yep, you're live now.

Hello, Lisa. I'm Lois Letchford.

And I'm Lisa McCarty.

Hello.

And we're here talking about When Learning Is Trauma. And this afternoon we have Raja— Raja Mahaba coming to join us. She was just trying to get her Her stream going correctly with the, with the picture.

Yesterday, with the picture, right?

We had Colleen minus the picture, and today we hope to have all of it as we practice for our upcoming series, When Learning Is Trauma, with all of our guests. Have you got your list there, Lisa?

I don't have it in front of me.

Okay.

Of the guests?

I guess. I can get it.

I have it on my phone.

First up is Steve Dykstra, Dr. Steve Dykstra. talking about reading and trauma. Next one is Hildebrand Pelsner, and he's going to be talking about reading pains. I need to get the name of his book. Third is Rosalind Kira-Nartley, going through life with learning disabilities. Rosalind is from Ghana and only learned to read at 17. Then there's third— 21st of September is my sister Lenore, who is a psychiatric nurse who still lives a lot of stress, and she talks about the implications of stress on the brain. And then her topic is providing emotionally safe learning environments, and that's going to be a very interesting session. October 5th is Martin Bloomfield, another dyslexic who who grew up non-reading, and listening to some of his videos is really quite heart-wrenching to me, talking about when equity, equality of opportunity became an opportunity for quality.

Is Don Nguyen before him?

Oh, sorry, you can read Don. Yes, I've left him out.

Oh, so Don Nguyen, and his topic is Learning to Read Is Not Enough for Dyslexics. I don't— I, I've seen some of his things, short things on YouTube, so I'm interested to hear more from him.

I haven't— I don't know that I've got a short one of his on my playlist yet. I've got to look through. I heard it had a long one, but he also, you know, had horrible times in school. So, um, and then we have Ashley Roberts. A mother from Houston. The cost of delaying diagnosis.

Mm.

We all talk about that. And then October 19th is Raja Mahaba, who is now hopefully going to join us today. And she is an advocate. What to do when learning is trauma. And yesterday we had Colleen Trilongo. The importance of advocacy to avoid trauma in education. Trauma is really disastrous. And finally, we're going to be talking to Dr. Neil Alexander Passé of personal and career growth following trauma. I, you know, I talked to Nicholas and someone else has asked to speak to him, and it's his wife who does the answering of the emails. And I think, I think part of it is Nicholas does not want to revisit a lot of the childhood, which is interesting. So, Raja messaged me. Let me see what Raja said. Um, new message. I'll see if I can get the video. I'm restarting my computer. Well, that's fantastic. We will keep talking until she arrives. So that's, that's working for us. Okay, that's okay.

So how did you come across Raja? I, I looked up some stuff on her also on YouTube, and her story looks very interesting, but how did you know about her?

I— it was a, you know, convoluted Uh, connection, move my picture. It was convoluted that I think I saw one of her articles, and then I saw she was on LinkedIn, and I connected via LinkedIn. And I just wanted to reach out to people who are in a similar position to me. And most of the stories are not my story. Most of the stories is of failure and failure And continued fighting in reading in school.

Yeah, yeah. Now her— she has—

does she own a company?

Yes, yes.

And do you know, do you know a lot about that?

No, no. But the— she— there's 2 components to her. One is the company, the construction company, and the other is the advocacy for children in schools. And she has helped other parents Uh, put their children through the school system, from what I'm—

Yeah, I'm really excited to talk to her to see all of that.

Um, so we hope she can join us today after all of our visitors. Um, I'm just live streaming and we keep going, and I've got to make sure I have it on the right window, and that's confusing.

Anyway, you have a lot on your end to do.

I could not have done this without the support of my son Isaac and his friend Chris as they walk me through it. I am really a slow learner.

You don't seem like one.

Oh, takes me multiple, multiple times. And you know, there are so many things to click on, and my husband says, and where's your checklist?

Well, I haven't checked.

You've got to follow the checklist. And you've got to be able to comprehend it. And I want it to be quick, and I— and it's— you can't take it quickly, you know. And then I get confused, then I get lost, then I lose my place.

Well, it seems like you're doing a good job on it. I think it's good that we're practicing the tech because, you know, when we have the speakers come real time, we want everybody to be set and ready to go. So—

And not panic.

Doing it beforehand.

Yes.

Yes.

And I was going to tell you something. And what was I going to tell you? I know what I was going to tell you. I've set up an Eventbrite.

I saw it. That's brilliant.

So people register, they give us their email so we can remind them every week that we've got something on. So that's— and we've had— we've sold it. We've sold— it's free, but people have joined in, and I'm just waiting to, you know, for more and more people to come.

Yes, I saw that yesterday and I started to share it with my friend list. And I actually saw my son today and I'm having him share it with his friend list. I don't think that age group is on Facebook as much, but, but that's helpful. And then I'll see my husband's going to share it just to get the, the numbers up so more people can see what we're talking about. That's the point. We want more people in on the conversation.

That's exactly right.

So that was a good idea.

Yeah, yeah. So, and I did that all by myself. Oh, did you?

See, you are a fast learner. You don't give yourself credit. I was listening to something today, um, actually, in fact, and they were talking about how dyslexic people and people that are neurodiverse in general— it wasn't just for dyslexic people— but they said that some, some people really beat themselves over the head, and they say things like, And you've mentioned, oh, I'm dumb, or I'm stupid, or I can't do that well. And, you know, that's kind of a shame. That's not true. I know that's not true. And there might be some things that are harder for some people, but it's never true that they're dumb, or they'll feel like an imposter. So I thought that was— that sort of tied in nicely with what we were talking about today.

Well, I read something on Facebook about not saying anything negative. To yourself, have yourself chalk change. And it's really interesting how quickly that comes out.

So you have it.

Yeah. Mind you, I'm working with a 16-year-old student at the moment online, and he came with nothing, literally. Couldn't read a sentence. And the fact that I make mistakes Is one of the best things that he's seen.

I agree.

And I can laugh about it, and it puts them in a position of monitoring what I'm writing about, uh, and not just accepting that everything is going to be perfect.

Well, isn't learning— learning isn't just about being perfect. It's not about regurgitating information. It's about Yeah. And I think that's another mistake that our education system seems to make. I mean, again, we don't want to beat schools over the head, but, you know, that's part of learning. And as you say, the instruction is key. And if the kids aren't engaged in the learning, they're not going to be learning. You know, how many times do we force children children to memorize things only to have them forget them in, you know, a couple days. We had a— I'll just give a quick example. My son's 8th grade science class, they had to memorize the first 20 elements of the periodic table. And I thought, why would you— why would they need to do that? I mean, even, you know, scientists and chemists are going to be remembering what they need to remember by working with the elements, not just flat out memorizing them.

Yeah.

But whatever, they, you know, that's their curriculum, that's fine. But one of the students who was really good at memorizing did well on the test. And then a couple weeks later, the kids were fooling around and they were doing this, they were just playing in the backyard and the idea of aluminum came up and they started arguing back and forth about something. And I just happened to ask, Well, who remembers the atomic number of aluminum? And they're all like, uh, no. You know, so here is this kid that was really good at memorizing, but in a couple weeks' time, that information is completely out of their mind. And they were learning more about actually doing, you know, they were messing around with a baseball bat. I won't get into the whole thing, but they were learning about things that way, and nobody could remember the atomic number of aluminum. So I thought, well, that was a waste of everybody's time. But that's what I mean.

Yes, yes.

As to we have to rethink what's important. Yeah, and how kids are— oh, somebody's coming.

Ah, Amy, she's confusing me.

I'm really trying to sign on. It's not happening.

Raja, it's okay. We will take you as you are, and we will, um, we can just have you talk. We'd love you to introduce yourself.

My name is Raja Marhaba, founder of the Jonathan Foundation for Children with Learning Disabilities.

Welcome. And how did this come about?

How did what? This Jonathan Foundation? Oh, you're testing me? We're doing a—

No, we're just doing a little trial and just getting a conversation going.

Just getting to know each other. I only know a little bit, so I want to get up to speed.

Well, my story started over 20 years ago when I was told that my younger son Jonathan had a learning disability in a private school, and I was recommended to transition him to the public school. And when I transitioned him to the public school, my private school teacher said, you're your son's best advocate. So a mom only knows what's going on with her child, and so advocate for him. We went there, we did assessments, He said that his reading was really deficit. They put him in special education. We ended up working really hard to get him to read. The school district had some issues with special education teachers, and they could not keep them. They had a turnaround of special education teachers. And so I think it was the first time in first grade. His special education teacher called me and told me that he can't read. And, you know, he stopped pre-K, K, first grade, and now he still can't read, and he's only learned 11 letters of the alphabet. And so it turns out when they were doing like a half a circle reading with the teacher and the students, he was memorizing the actual story as his peers read until it came to him. So he has an extremely high comprehension and memory. So when it came his turn to read, he was actually reading the whole story, but never looking in the book. And that's how the teacher figured out that he can't read because he was compensating. So we ended up, you know, trying to get him educational therapy and reading programs. Everything was a fight in the school system to get for him. Ended up hiring a private assessor. She told me that he's twice exceptional ADHD, learning disabled. His reading ability was, uh, and back then was referred to as mentally retarded, 67 standard score. That's what they used to say 20-plus years ago. It was not intellectual disability. These days it's referred to as intellectual disabilities. And so his IQ is over 145, but his reading ability was 67. So the discrepancy was extremely significant. And she said he was severely dyslexic. And that was the first time I figured out what was happening with him, and he needed educational therapy and intensive programs and remediation. And the school wouldn't do everything that he needed to do, so it forced me to initiate due process. So I ended up initiating 4 due processes for him. We took him out of the public school, put him in a private school, and Smaller class sizes, better therapy. By the time I found an actual school that fit his needs, it took about a, a year or so. We were still in due process. He ended up going to the Frostic Center in Pasadena. It was an Ivy League school, $50,000 a year that LAUSD paid for, and he stayed there from that age until he graduated high school. So hundreds of thousands of dollars went into his schooling. My lawsuit was in the 7 digits. I'm an average mom, middle middle-class mom. I don't have a money tree full of millions of dollars in my backyard. And while all this was happening, my other son, Omar Jr.'s teacher in the 4th grade says to me— this is all simultaneously, so I got 4 due process on one and I'm starting another due process on my other child— and they said that he's having issues with comprehension. So we went and got him tested. He too is twice exceptional, ADHD, learning disabled with vocabulary and writing deficits, but he struggles with depression.

Wow.

And so he ended up— we tried to get him services. They gave him a 504 plan. They refused to give him an IEP. So of course we were going to lawsuit again. And by that time he was graduating into the 6th grade, went into the 6th grade and ended up bullied by his 6th grade teacher at 11 years old. He was coming home with panic attacks and heart palpitations because he was bullied by not only his teacher but his peers in his Hmm. So, um, I reported all this to the attorneys. I ended up recording every IEP, transcribing every IEP. I became a mini paralegal. That's why I said to Lois that I want to train the parents to be mini paralegals, because that's the only thing that's going to help them navigate this broken special education system when they go back to school and hold IEPs. Documentation is key. So my 504 child ended up going to Ninth Circuit Federal Court. We started at the school level, went to the state level. State was a 50-50 split, and each attorney appealed to Ninth Circuit Federal Court. That's how we got there from the state level. When we got to Ninth Circuit Federal Court, the judge reviewed the case, called my attorney, my ex-husband. Who was my husband at the time, into closed chambers and says, although you have a really good case, I cannot rule on this case because it's a 504 case that would be converted into an IEP, making it case precedence and opening the floodgates for every family on a national level to use the lawsuit, the case precedence from your case, to use it in their briefs and their complaints for other families to give them an open door to have an IEP. So I'm remanding it back to the state. Went back to the state and he told the state judges, you made the 50/50 split, you decipher it and figure it out. State's judge conclusion was have LAUSD do another psychoeducational assessment, go back to the IEP, whatever the IEP dictates will prevail whether you win or lose the lawsuit. So I started the First level, climb up to Ninth Circuit Federal Court. I'm talking hundreds of thousands of dollars in the 7 digits coming out of my pocket. Marriage failing, business failing, kids on hold, stress beyond belief financially, emotionally.

Yeah.

And so we ended up going to, um, back to the drawing board. We met with the IEP. They gave me a school psychologist who I did not trust. Because I don't— at that point, I've been done so wrong, I didn't trust anybody from the district. And the school psychologist was trying to calm me and saying, you know, she's going to do her best. But at that point, no, it didn't help me. I didn't trust. And so she did her thing. We went to the IEP. I had my son Omar with me. And to my belief, this disbelief, the school psychologist was actually advocating for my son Omar to have an IEP. And by this time, we are graduating high school 6 months early, last IEP for the entire duration of his education. So, um, it just was delay, delay, delay. 8 due process for children. I didn't think Omar would be the 9th Circuit. I thought Jonathan would be the 9th Circuit, but Omar surprised me and turned out to be the 9th Circuit lawsuit. Long story short, the— after the meeting was done and the psychologist for LAUSD advocated for my son and got him IEP, means I won the case. I don't pay anything. I get services 3 years of services with an escrow account for my son with money in it to help tutor him for 3 years of college because now he graduated high school. So I asked the psychologist when the whole IEP was concluded, and I says, why did you advocate for my son? And she said, 2 years ago, my boss called me into her office and she gave me your son's school record, and she said, this child's been done wrong since the 4th grade, make it right. So then, uh, I said, and what happened? And she says, 2 days ago my boss got hit by a motorcycle and died. I have a hard time talking about it. Anyway, she came so that she can, um, Make her boss's last wishes come true by saving my son, therefore saving a seven-digit lawsuit with Ninth Circuit Federal Court. And that's how we won. And after that, the three years that money were put in account for my son, he had no desire to go to college, did not want to get tutored, did didn't even want to work, ended up staying in his room. Gaming. He's super, super gifted with IT. So he was gaming and, um, lost a lot of weight, didn't take showers, was very severe depression. Then he came into my, my bathroom one day and he had a wife beater on, and he— I haven't seen him with skin. He was all skin and bones. He was anorexic. Um, and so I had a lot of problems with my ex because he did not understand special education. He did not understand what's happening with my sons. They have 145 IQ. He doesn't understand what a learning disabled is, doesn't understand any of the above.

Yeah.

Says, you know, the kids are smart, what is wrong with them, they're lazy. And I fight him for them. And then it became, why are you taking my son's side over me? You're supposed to be with me against them. And it was just a whole marriage mess. And then I finally reached out to a friend of mine in OC Who owned a tech company, and I says, can you mentor my son? You don't have to pay him, just teach him a skill. He doesn't want to go to college because of this whole history. So then he said, um, I'll mentor him on 2 conditions. One, if he can't cut the mustard, he's got to let go. And 2, I want to pay him so I can reprimand him when I need to as his employer. And, um, by the way, 3, our friendship remains the same no matter what. So I was grateful for that opportunity, and I told my son, if you do the drive from Chatsworth to Laguna Niguel, which is in the OC, it's about a 2.5 to 3-hour drive each way for, uh, an 18-year-old by this time. So this kid did the drive every day for 6 months, and I told him, if you can land a full-time job, I will personally relocate you, help you sign, uh, uh, the rent. I'll co-sign for you for the rent lease. And I will co-sign to get you a car, and we can make this happen. And so it was six months later, he he they loved him. They made him a full-time offer. I relocated him. He became independent, held his own. About he was there seven years, and within the seven years, his FICO score was eight hundred. He was paying his own bills. He bought another car without me. He changed his lease because he moved to another place without me. He didn't need me to co-sign on anything. This kid that the school wrote off became a success story without a college degree, and he hates college. And so he's online on the computer right now. He's learning to code, um, gaming and create games and programs and coding. He's just, um, he doesn't have a college degree. He doesn't get paid for what his brain offers him, but he's got a phenomenal brain and he's a success story. And Jonathan went on to Mopar College. And, and did Abdul enrolled in high school and college. And he got a year of college the year before he graduated high school. And he graduated Mopar with a 3.999, 4.0 GPA on a 5th grade reading level. So these kids, if you give them the right services, the right assessments, put the right procedures in place, give them the direct support, explain to the parents what's happening with them, advocate and advocate with the school district, talk to the children, give them encouragement, tell them, you know, we understand what's happening with you. The assessments show how the brain is wired. Our trademark with the Jonathan Foundation is how are you wired?

Why?

Because everything that the child is struggling with internally is found within the confinements of the brain. And the only way to figure that out is to do the assessments, look for all the red flags across the board. speech and language, OT, AT, psychoeducational, like there is a common denominator across the board. For me, it's like a forensic study. You look for the red flags in every assessment, then you pinpoint what the issue is, and then you go address the problem. And so that's why the foundation was formed, because I did not want families to go through the emotional and financial burden my family did. And I did not want children to be sacrificed for a free and appropriate public education. And so I went and got educated. I, I formed a nonprofit. And during this time, I actually— my son Jonathan was going for, um, uh, therapy, psychology therapy, because his self-esteem was shot. And so while he was having therapy with a psychologist, another psychologist came to me and called me into her office, and we started chatting. And within 10 minutes into the conversation, I looked at her and I said, you're giving me therapy? And she goes, yeah. I go, why? She goes, because you need it.

Yes.

You're broken and you look like you need it. And I said, well, I'm so pissed off at the system and what they put my family through. I want to do something and I don't know what to do. And I says, I was thinking of a nonprofit. She goes, just do it. Just do it. Don't think about it. Just do it. And I had no idea what I was getting into. I had no idea how to formulate a nonprofit. My, my saving grace is that I do own a construction company. I do know how to run a business. And you have to run a nonprofit it as though it was a business. And so that gave me some strength.

Yeah.

And then the foundation was formed, but it was formed in 2001. By the time I got through my lawsuits, the 8 years of hell, and, um, trying to navigate what's happening with my children and my marriage problem and the business problem, now it was around 2013. And I would be advocating for families from 2001 to 2013 on my own, but just as a novice mom without really having the education behind me other than my own hands-on experience with my 2 boys. And so in 2013, I went to a friend of mine. I says, we need to do something. I need to— how do I start the foundation to really build on it? And he said, well, go get a board, get 10 people you trust, and let's make it happen. And so I went and every board member has a special needs child or they're a special needs child of their— when they were younger and they've grown to be adults and they went through a whole bunch of turmoil on their own. while they were in their younger years, and we're talking a whole other generation. So we opened up the nonprofit. We had our first fundraiser in 2014 at the Petersens Museum in Los Angeles. We had over 250 people showing up to the point where the fire department told us that we couldn't have any more people come in because of capacity.

Yeah.

And the only reason we had these people, because the majority of the families I— the people I was helping were all parents.

Yes.

They weren't, you know, people with deep pockets. They weren't, you know, when you go for a fundraiser and you have congressmen and councilmen and celebrities and all these people that have all this money and they throw it at you. They were parents looking for information, parents that needed support, and parents that needed help. And that's how it started, and it's grown from there.

Raja, this is just— I mean, you know, it's just an amazing story that you have to fight so hard and so long And, you know, the theme of our series is When Learning Is Trauma. But the trauma you have been through, I mean, it just blows my mind.

It's, it's, um, it's very, very difficult. I mean, even when I tell the story, especially about how we won with, um, the psychologist and the, the lady that passed away, I break down. And my son now is 30 and his brother's 28, and I still break down every time I tell the story because it so impactful in my life.

Yes.

And, you know, think about it. You have 7-digit lawsuit, million dollars over your head. You have children that are sacrificed waiting for services. You have attorneys that say, give me money, give me money. No money, I can't move forward. I went through 3 attorneys before I found an attorney that knew what the hell he was doing, but he came at a high price. I had attorneys that had 180 students per attorney in their firm and put my kids on 2-year hold until they were able to file the complaint and the lawsuit for my children. I have researched everything and anything under the sun to try to come up with resources for both children. I ended up doing the SEED Advocacy Program. I got into it. I was placed in Valerie Vandeman's office for a 4-month internship, which was part of the SEED Advocacy Program that COPA sponsored with IDEA. That was one of the first cohort years ago. And, um, I did all my schooling and everything. And when I went to Valerie Vanaman's office, they gave me to an attorney. Her name was Sophia, and she was a marriage counselor transitioning into special education. And when she started talking to me, she goes to me, I can't mentor you. And I said, why? She goes, you know too much.

Yeah.

She took my hand straight into another attorney's office. His name is Henry Tovmassian, an amazing attorney. And she says to him, I can't help her because she knows more than me, but you can help her. So you need to mentor her because she's smart. So I ended up putting his cases together and researching, and I'm really good with assessments because I needed to find out what the numbers meant and how to understand all this. And so I would find errors in the psychoeducational reports, and I can get a free IEE, and I've managed to get that for the attorneys. And now I do it for myself and for these other families I advocate for because I know what to look for. So then he ended up telling me, why don't you be an attorney? And I said, I cannot be an attorney. He goes, well, I went through 8 years of hell with attorneys. I respect you, but I don't want to do what you're doing, and I don't want to have my time absorbed the way the time of the attorneys is absorbed to put a case together.

Yeah.

Then he says, why don't you go become a paralegal? And I says, paralegal? And he goes, yeah. He goes, I can't pay you as an advocate, but I can pay you as a paralegal if you help me with due process cases. So I went to UCLA and I got my paralegal credentials and I went back to him and, you know, he's helped me on a lot of cases. He'll do some pro bono for me. We'll get it on the back end with the school district. I work for free for him because then I know if we win, I'm going to have money coming in when we settle. And if we don't win, then it's a pro bono gift to the family. But we have had an extreme success rate in the cases that I work on. I set them up for lawsuit purposefully. Because I don't know what the school's going to do. And I figured if it goes to an attorney, it just makes that much— the attorney's life that much easier, and a 90% plus chance for the family to win. And so that's my story.

I need an Excedrin after that. That's brutal.

It's, it's been hell. It's been hell. I ended up, um, I'm 4 years separated from my husband. It's been hell trying to explain to my husband what's happening with my children, at the same time navigating the business, the children, and the school district, and the attorneys. So it just came to the point where I, you know, he walked out. Um, we're still amicable, but, you know, he threw in the towel, in my opinion anyway.

Yes. Well, again, we're talking about trauma, right? And we're talking about trauma with the kids, but This is a perfect example of the stress level and the trauma that goes on and affects everybody. And I think the first week that Lois and I were talking, we said this affects everyone. It's not just the child, it's the whole family unit. You know, it's like a waterbed. When one person moves on a waterbed, everybody else gets shaken.

Yes.

And, you know, that's one— one that the stress like that is enormous and the families need help.

Yes.

It's not just the— it's not just the children. It's not just getting the awareness out to help the kids. That's a piece of it. But then the other piece is this, you know, the destruction that this creates in its wake is unreal. And that was the perfect story of, of chaos and, you know, heartbreak and stress.

It's— it, it took—

You're one strong lady, I'll tell you that much. I wouldn't mess with you.

Well, when I go to districts now, and I used to go years ago with a rolling briefcase, and I take out the IDEA book from rights law and all my other legal documents, my DSM-IV, I mean, I just lay it out for intimidation purposes. And the first thing they would ask me, are you an attorney? And I'd say, no, I'm not an attorney. And they said, well, what are your credentials? They're presumed. My credentials are presumed.

Right.

And they said, what do you mean they're presumed? I go, you don't need to know what my credentials are because the fact that I'm here, I have knowledge that the parents tell me to come here and I'm here at their request. A lawyer told me to say that, so that's what I started saying. That's awesome.

Well, what a nightmare. I mean, just the whole legal system in this, uh, you know, in this— in these cases is a nightmare to begin with. But then if you have somebody that doesn't, like you said, quite understand how to fight— and it sounds like you went through a couple different people until you found somebody that knew what they were doing— um, it's hard, you know. It's expensive and it's hard. I was just talking to a woman— I don't give any names— but she was stuck. She was literally stuck. with an attorney that was not fighting for them. And it was heartbreaking. Yeah, absolutely heartbreaking that the child was suffering, that they were in a, you know, they were in a pickle financially. Uh, it was stressful and, and it was going nowhere.

It's so difficult. I, I had my first attorney did that to me, and it was even worse because in 2002 I lost my dad. He passed away and Prior to my dad's passing, the attorney was really good to me the first year, and I wrote a nice letter about her, you know, thanking her for her support. And it was a year later, I'm telling her what's happening with my kids' cases, and they're on hold, hold to find out. It was 180 cases per attorney in her in her office, and so she delayed the cases and put my kids on hold. But I'm struggling with them at home, and so she. She ended up— I, I reported her to the board, um, because I was so upset. I wrote a letter, and so she ended up writing a letter to me telling me that I should cease and desist of complaining about her to the board and that, um, I, I need to back off or else she's gonna pursue, uh, issues against me, you know.

Wow.

Uh, claim against me. And I said, at that point, I was I had nothing left to give, you know. And you say, you know, I know you lost— she's in her letter— I know you lost your father, you're traumatic, you're going through all these emotions, you reported me to the board, it's in your best interest to cease and desist. And I'm thinking, how much worse can this get, right?

That's just that.

Oh my gosh, what a story. So you're, you're a nonprofit. What, what is the name of that again?

The Johnson Foundation for Children with Learning Disabilities, but we've expanded to beyond that because when families come to see me, they they have more than just learning disabilities. And then the majority are have autism or Asperger's or Down syndrome or intellectual disabilities. I have children that have medical issues. I have one child; he he can't sweat, so he can't cool his body down. So his life is threatened. I had child. I think it was. Type 2 diabetes, which was the worst one, 1 or 2, but like his life was threatened all the time. And so I'd have all these rare medical health issues with these coexisting diagnoses for these children coming to me, and they were not all learning disabilities. And I said, oh, well, I need to start learning and understanding. So, you know, thank God there's Google. So I started learning and understanding what the medication was, what the diagnosis was. Is there a medical plan attached to the IEP? If not, why not? What are the procedures? What if there's a catastrophe in school? What did the school do for the child? You know, what if the child dies in the school? I mean, anything is possible these days because the district staff is not, not trained.

Yes.

Right. So now you're an RN and an MD on top of being a lawyer and an advocate and a parent and a therapist, and the list is going on and on here. But it's crazy though, that's what it requires.

It does require that. I end up giving one-on-one therapy to parents. They come in my office and they cry. And so I— right, that used to be me. I used to go and cry and didn't know what to do. And I have parents that come in on the verge of divorce. I've had parents that are divorced with their significant others. Imagine this, 4 of them coming to an IEP and inputting about the child that's theirs and not theirs. And that was a catastrophe by itself because it was volatile between the 2 birth parents, and now they have their significant others. And so it just came to the point where I said, I, I got to go beyond learning disabilities because I don't know what's going to walk in the door, and I'm not going to turn anyone away. So the Jonathan Foundation has no walls— no, no walls of ethnicity, of religion, of color, of Of diagnosis, of eligibility, I don't care. The child needs help; the child gets help. End of story. Because a soul saved is a child saved. So I don't, you know, I don't want to discriminate.

Are you overwhelmed with people now?

I get a lot of phone calls for families that don't know what to do with virtual learning. It's been a problem. I have educational therapists that called me and says, "I'm trying to do one-on-one tutoring for this child," and the mom puts the sibling next to him, but the And somebody has to redirect the child and I can't go through my screen to get the child to come and pay attention to me.

Yeah.

And, you know, parents are overwhelmed with work or no work or one income or no income or a single parent or dual parents but maybe 2 special needs children, 2 typical children. How do they navigate this? And then I— you know, it's a catastrophe. And then I thought— you know, I had a parent that forwarded me an email from a teacher and the email said, look, I know your child is not a problem. Needs help, but I can't give your child one-on-one. I have 200 children that I need to teach, and I don't have the time of day for your son. And by the way, I'm not obligated to do virtual learning. And I didn't know how to react to that because— and then I had to think, we're doing COVID, you have the MLB going on, you have— our world is in a crisis mode right now. I don't know who this teacher is, what her personal issues are. Maybe she has no income, one income. Maybe she has special needs children, no special needs children. She must have her own issues going on. So I cannot treat them the way I was before COVID where I can go in the school district in an IEP and slam them and say, here's what you have to do and here's what we need to do. And so I had to take a step back and think outside the box and say, okay, How do we collaborate? The school districts and the parents must be aligned, and the enemy is COVID, not the parents and the school district. And the school district has to come up with a strategy to help the parents so the students don't lose education, right?

Right.

They don't have a lack of progress. And I don't know what that magic formula is for the school districts because we're dealing with budgetary issues. We're dealing with IDEA 2004 that does not correlate with the budget issues that the schools are dealing with on a national level. Yet these kids have IEPs in their legal documents and they need to be implemented accordingly. Then you have assessments and the schools are not doing assessments out here. I don't know if they're doing it out there, but my take is the reason they're not doing assessments, although I did speak to private assessors that are willing to do virtual assessments with adjusting the assessment battery of testings, if you will, but they can do it virtually where it's still in accordance to the publisher's guide. And I said, well, if the school's not willing to do the assessments, it could mean, in my opinion, well, if you have an assessment report, you have a summary, you have recommendations, and you have diagnosis. Now, if there's deficits The school has to implement services, placement, and support. So they don't want to do that because they can't do that virtually. We have a problem here. We have a huge problem here.

Yeah.

So this is my brain, how my brain works, and I've been, I've been, I'm like doing this for decades. And so I'm thinking if the school districts don't assess because the assessments drive the IEPs, Then we're putting all these kids on hold. The parents are struggling more with them, and we don't know what the issues are because we don't have a report to tell us what's going on with the child. I think it's a delay tactic not to provide services, because if they provide services, then they're obligated. If they do an assessment, they're obligated. So the best thing to do is say social distancing, virtual learning, we can't do this. So assessments are on hold until we have in-person, and we may not have in-person for another year.

Yes.

Wow, that's— yeah, it is a nightmare.

Yeah. And our— the school district I'm here close to, they just cancel all the reading teachers.

Yeah, yeah. Oh, and then there's another issue. I've been, I've been teaching my parents how to be mini paralegals. So I told them, when school begins, what you need to do immediately, ask for a 30-day emergency IEP. You go to the IEP, and what you need to do is ask the What are you going to offer my child in distant learning? Because now the IEP is no longer being implemented the way it was prior to COVID. And that has to be written into the IEP, because if there's loss of learning and you don't have a clear path of how this school district is going to teach your child, Houston, we have a big problem here. We're going to have illiterate children.

Yeah.

And that's not acceptable.

Yeah, yeah.

You can't teach them.

Yeah.

Right.

Yeah.

Wow.

Raja, this, you know, so this, this session— did you want to say something, Lisa?

No, I— well, I was just gonna say I feel pretty blessed at this point because my, my youngest son is at AIM Academy, and, you know, their learning plan is, is pretty decent, and I now don't have to stress over That situation. So, I mean, it's not perfect, but it's at least way better than what other parents are dealing with. And so just hearing all of this is, is, it's a nightmare.

I, I had a parent actually, uh, a friend of my son's parent went to Vegas. They have a vacation home in Vegas, and I guess she was walking her dog and met another parent, and they were talking, and this parent was having problems with her special needs child, and it's, she, the child is MOD. modular orthopedic disability. And school was not helping them at all. And so the parent spoke to her son who spoke to my son Jonathan, and I got the number of this parent from Las Vegas. And so I called the parent, I says, how can I help you? And she goes, oh my God, and she started crying. I went to your website, I saw your video, I can't believe it. We need the Jonathan Foundation in Las Vegas. These are criminals out here. Clark County is criminal out here. They're not doing anything for my child. They're not doing anything. And it's a catastrophe. There are school districts that are doing what they need to do, like what you just said, and there are school districts that don't want to do it. And then you have teachers with independent issues and challenges within their own lives. You have great teachers and you have teachers that shouldn't be teaching. So how do— does the school monitor all this? And how does the school provide help for the families and reprimand the teachers if they're not doing it right? So, you know, I don't know what the answer is. I came up with a 30-item tip for parents. I wrote an article for Arianna Huffington Thrive Global, and it's 30 items, 30 tips, what parents need to do now. And it's all about documenting, recording, videotaping, asking them what virtual therapies are available. The school is going to have to offer that to the families. The families aren't going to know.

Yeah.

And just document, document, document. Do a log, do a date, do every day, you know, videotape your child being taught, you know, on the screen virtually. I've had parents that told me they put a YouTube something for the child. They don't even teach the child. The child's looking at a YouTube instead of the teacher teaching the child.

Hmm.

So it was a YouTube session of whatever topic. And children, they're not going to sit and watch and learn it. You give them gaming, they're engaged, but you give them education, and if it's a boring topic, they're gone. You lost them, and so the best thing that we can do for our families now is show them how to document the progress and lack thereof happening every day virtually with the school. So when there is an IEP, there is an in-person IEP, whether it's virtually or in person, and that's another story. Not all the schools are doing IEPs virtually, and they could because I've attended them. Then they have documentation and evidence for what's happening or not happening with their child. You take it to the school district, you present it to the school. District. You tell the school district, here are my concerns, how can you help me? How can we navigate this? One of two things are going to happen. You're going to be with a great school district that's going to do everything within their ability to help you, or you're going to have a school district that's not going to give a damn, because they're all out there. And then if it's the school district that doesn't give a damn, you go to an attorney and you have all the evidence you need to go to due process, and you let the attorney take it from there. And there are attorneys that do advocacy and litigation for For pro bono because they get it at the back end from the school district versus from the parents. If, you know, it just depends. That's a case-by-case basis.

Right, right.

Yeah, but my son is here. My son is here helping me, and he says there's no way in the world you're going to get these conversations down to 30 minutes.

Well, not this one.

This one was— but we needed to hear this one.

Okay, tell your son we're gonna have— you guys have to come up with a question.

And now we know your story.

Yeah. And we're just— and then we'll time the answers and I'll try to be very short. And, and what else you could do is if people have questions in the chat box, we can answer them. I can answer them for you and you guys can post them on however you get it out there.

Well, Roger, what do you, what do you think is the major, um, your major passion surrounding this topic of when learning is trauma? What stands out to you the most?

The regression of the children and the uncertainty of what districts are going to do to help prevent loss of learning. And there's like so much stress factors happening within the family component. The districts also have their stress factors. Teachers have their stress factors. And that's why I'm saying the parents and the districts must come up with a strategy to unite against COVID because IDEA is not gonna change. It's gonna take an act of Congress and that's gonna take a big thing to do. Like it's gonna be an act of God for Congress to change IDEA 'cause they're gonna have a big fight. It's not gonna happen anytime soon. So we know the issues. Now, why can't the school district work with the parents and try to get them as much as they can within their ability considering the circumstances versus not giving them what they can And parents going to due process and forcing the school to do what the school needs to do. Why can't we have a meeting of the minds?

But we didn't have that before COVID No, but now it's worse than COVID.

Yeah. Before COVID you can go in person and due process is easy if you find the right attorney. But now it's—

you don't—

we don't have a lot of options, both sides. We don't have a lot of options. So do we still go? I say make due process as the last resort, but document and back yourself up. If the school is not willing to help you, by all means go to due process. I'm not telling you no, but you need something in your hands to go to due process to prove your case.

Yes, yes.

So you know the school has an option: you help the parent or we sue you. There's there's there's no black. It's no gray area. It's black and white. We're trying to collaborate with the school and not create a catastrophe because the school is going. to be overwhelmed with assessment requests, IEP requests, 30-day IEP requests. You're talking millions of students.

Yeah.

And the lawsuits, if it comes out, I don't think the school districts can afford to pay their attorneys to do all this and to pay the assessors to do all this. They don't have enough manpower to do all this. So do we have a civil war within the school system and the parents, or do we try to have a meeting of the minds? Do we want to create what's happening in the world we live in now, which It's horrible.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, the beauty of what we're doing now is that this is available and that people can watch and, and hear your story and hear the background of it to even start with. And I really like that. So it's just another platform.

No, I appreciate that. I appreciate you reaching out. I don't know how you're going to make it in a half hour, but I'm going to have to be very savvy with your questions.

The beauty is we don't, you know, we're not paying for time or anything. So if it goes over, it goes over and people can listen. So—

And they can listen again too. It's really, it was really for the speakers' convenience, I think, that we kept it at 30. But if somebody has time and wants to and can continue on, I don't see why we couldn't do that.

That's right.

Okay, well then Can they see this?

Oh, last, there's a chat coming up and they want to know if anyone can see it.

Let's see, let's see.

They have to go to your profile page. My profile page in YouTube. Just to see the chat. Yes, you've got to search Lois Letchford YouTube.

Click on your thing and then the live should be the first one down there.

The live chat.

Scroll down, there should be the chat.

The chat. So that'll give us You know, so I'm going to, I'm going to have support when I do this. I'm going to have someone sitting right here knowing.

Oh, I see, I see questions.

No. Yep. Let's see.

To Amy, how did your sons get into game, game design? Also, what made them choose that as their profession?

So that's— yeah, that's John.

Yeah, I was testing the chat box anyway.

Good.

John, uh, Omar Jr., um, built his first computer at the age of 14. He actually came to me and And remember, he's 30. We're talking a few decades ago, right? So he came to me and he said, Mom, I want to build a computer. And I said, you sure? And he said, yeah. I says, I'll give you a budget. You do all the research. You tell me how much everything costs. If it's within the budget, I'll buy everything for you and you put it together.

Yeah.

And he did that. He did all his research at 14, gave me everything. And, um, we had all these boxes come at my construction office. And my ex-husband says, what is this? And I said, oh, your son's building a computer. He goes, yeah, right. I'm going to end up helping him. I'm like, you know, give him, give him the benefit of the doubt. Let's see if he can do this. So I take everything home that day. He focused on it and he built the most powerful, sophisticated computer you've ever seen at the age of 14.

That's crazy.

So, so since then he's, uh, coding, gaming, technology. He used to work for a trolley company. He actually programmed the trolley, the He can program the trolley from, um, from his office outside looking out the window, and he can tell the trolley what to do. It's like driving, you know, having the cars that drive without a driver in it. He can do that to the trolley also because, um, that's the company he worked for, and his job was coding it and coming up with the, with the, uh, the codes to make the trolley do what the trolley needs to do. And then, um, he ended up— because he, he had a really good offer to go work for a company before COVID hit, and he was going to make in the 6 digits, and I was so proud of him. And then COVID hit, and that offer is— I don't know where it is right now.

Yeah.

Um, but it had to do with him learning, uh, about a product that goes into a server system, and he would be traveling all over the country, and he would be trained on the product, installing it in the server system, and training the, the, the staff about how use the system. Um, and then COVID hit and that went down the tubes. And so he started— he started— he games. So he started gaming a lot. And then he's— I said to him, you know, what are you doing home? You need to do something. I have my, my nonprofit. I'm always busy doing something. If it's not a parent I'm advocating for, I'm, I'm working on an article for Thrive Global or, or, or some project, right? My mind's just always busy.

Yeah.

And so then he started to take, um, online classes for, uh, programming game gaming. And so he decided, after he, he started to create characters and what they're doing in the gaming, he was excited. He goes, Mom, look. And I, and I saw it develop from zero to characters shooting weapons and fighting and doing whatever they do in the gaming. And it was pretty impressive because he started with nothing. And then I said to him, can you do me a favor? And he said, what? I said, can you create a gaming for children?

Yeah.

But instead of shooting and killing people, the same concept, shooting, because that's what engages these kids, right? The gaming scene, if you will. They have to shoot an object and a letter would pop out, and they have to shoot a few objects to have a few letters pop up to create a word, to learn how to say the word or what the word is. And you would be teaching them that concept in a very fun way versus A is for apple plus the button, you know, 3 words, what are the 3 words, and try to guess what the letters are to make up what the 3 words are. I figured, well, if children can game and— but gaming in an education way where they're learning letters and sounds and vowels and putting 3-letter words together, then they're learning in a very fun way.

And he—

I go, can you do this for the Jonathan Foundation? And he said, I think I can do that for you. I said, good, then start working on it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So where— how far along are they?

He just started. He's just started with the— it was all brand new. My other son superintends, um, our construction projects. We have, uh, contracts with the federal government, and he's running some pretty nice-sized projects. And he's my 28-year-old. These, these, these kids have a phenomenal brain. And not just my kids, kids in general, especially the ones that end up in continuation in school, they're not bad kids. They're very smart kids and smarter than the teachers. And I think the teachers get insulted because these children, um, when they speak, they make sense. And the teachers have a problem with these children making sense when they speak. So they get reprimanded for being, you know, mouthy or defiant. And so they end up having a record.

Yeah.

And I think it's a crying shame for, um, You know, you're wasting, you're wasting a life by throwing them in continuation. Maybe that child was never assessed. Assess and see, you know, is there something going on that was not identified that's causing the child to behave the way the child is behaving, right?

Yeah, yeah, I totally agree.

So, um, the other thing I'm working on is I have— I'm trying to get with I tried to get with LAPD out here before COVID hit. Yeah, because I wanted to assess juveniles before they turn 18 in prison, whether they're on probation and minor. They could have a minor offense or they could be on probation, but they're still at a problem with the law. These juveniles either are victims of circumstance, born into a difficult family, born with a good family that is very strict and end up on the streets and meet the wrong people. The situation There's a lot of variables involved, and they end up in jail. But they're really good kids; they're not bad kids. But now they have a record. So why not tap into the police department and get these kids get them assessed? Get them assessed and see if they have you know detention record. Are they in trouble with the with the principal in school? Are they failing grades? Like do a background history and find out. what may have caused them to be there, right?

Right.

They may or may not be special ed kids too. And if they are special ed kids, then we know what fell through the cracks. If they're not special ed kids, then, um, let's, let's find out what's happening with them. And the only way you can do this is through assessment. So I, I told the police, I says, why don't, why don't the foundation, um, assess your juveniles? And he says, well, I have 355 of them I would love to give you. In our jails right now as we speak. And I says, well, do you have the funding to help me? I can get you the assessors and we can go on to this. And he says they had a program where they were going to get funding and he wanted to work with me, and I was going to get the Department of Rehabilitation involved, the school police involved, LAPD involved, my nonprofit involved, and maybe another nonprofit, so we can all kind of have a brainstorming session and see if we can build it from there.

Well, let me know because I'd like to get in on some of this. We're trying to do some work around here, and one of my, um, my My personal story is surrounding some of that where my middle son had— he was truant a lot. And here I didn't know that he was struggling the way he was. And again, we've talked about the mom guilt. I've got plenty of it. But I didn't know. And he was a kid that completely fell through the cracks, completely. And so, yeah, I agree. I think that's a big topic. Of, of, um, like, who needs that awareness? Because we can't just— yeah, they need to be assessed and we need to figure out what's driving some of that.

It's beyond, you know, I, I'm a business entrepreneur person, so my mind works in a business mode. Okay, advocates are awesome, but advocates— and I'm an advocate too— but advocates, if you don't have the business experience behind you under your belt, then you're just an advocate helping a parent to do the IEP and to go to the next parent and do the same thing over and over again. I like to think outside the box. And when I was advocating for these families, I, I've had 14-year-olds old that had 351.50s. I had— I advocate for Children of the Night. Um, I don't know if you've heard of them. They rescue children prostitutes from their pimps.

Yeah.

Um, so I do all their advocacy for free, and they— I was advocating for this young girl about 4 years, and just this past year she ended up throwing herself in front of a car and killing herself. And she's had 3, 4 5150s on her, and it broke my heart. And so those are the forgotten ones. They're not bad kids.

I'm—

I meet with these children prostitutes. I— they're 13, 14, 15 to 17 years old. They're broken, they're battered by their pimps, they want a mother's love, a father's love, and they can't find it, so they turn to the streets. And Lois Lee, who's the founder, embraces them and gives them everything that they've been missing, including love.

Yeah.

And I, you know, I have children that have a roof under their head. I'm very blessed. I had a nightmare with LAUSD, yes, but you know what? I gotta look at the positive and all the negatives that I went through, and then I have to think, okay, why did make me go through this path. Okay, I went through a very severe journey and a lot of trauma. And one of the attorneys I work with, he says to me, Raja, there's 0.01% of the parents that are taken to Ninth Circuit federal court, and you are in that 0.01%.

But this is, this is what we're talking about, you know. You've got— that's where you are. I'm on the other extreme of having this, you know, incredible journey of 4 months changing my son's life. But, but the difference and the number of people that get to where you and I get with our children is staggering because the vast majority are falling through the cracks because we want kids to be normal.

Right.

And then look, if you tap the jail systems and you assess the juveniles and you tell them you believe in them and you show them that there's nothing wrong with them, that they have a learning disability in this area, Or they have Asperger's and they didn't know it, or they have an intellectual disability and they don't understand it, or they're immature. I mean, it could be anything. But once they understand it, then you have a foundation to, to, to grow from there.

Right.

Then you can explain to the parents, you know, Mom, Dad, here's why your child is doing all these things. And then healing can start. You might need psychologists, therapy. You're going to need a whole bunch of stuff put into place. But nobody wants to pay this big ticket. It's a lot of money for mental health illness, for assessments. And if we can get them out of the jails, then God, we could save money on 355 students in the LAUSD and LAPD jails as we speak right now.

Yes.

You get the 355 out that the police was willing to give me to assess, and I'm praying for God to send me a tree of money to help them, right? And then, you know, they can do something positive in the community than to hate the system and turn into a criminal because Because they're 18 years old and they're still in freaking jail. And what did we do?

And then we cried.

We cried when we have MLB and you see the, the, the protests and the riots. Those kids could have been those children that I'm talking about because nobody gave a damn. Because you look at them in their background and you say, oh, you know, they're criminals or they're bad kids. Are they?

Right. And I had made the, um, the, uh, point before to someone else that with the human trafficking You know, a lot of the people, the girls, the young girls, and sometimes guys that get into that, you know, they may have had some trauma in their background, and learning problems might have been part of it. But we also have to look at the people that are driving, you know, the pimps, if you will, to say, well, what's in their background? Like, there's so many things we could fix in this society if we just gave people a chance early on and let them know what they could— what their possibilities are in life. Because I would argue that, you know, some of those people get into it because they've been, you know, maybe they've failed through the system. Maybe they don't have hope to go to college. Maybe they can't get a decent job and they're making money doing the wrong things. Maybe they've been embarrassed in school. Maybe they think that that's a way to get some respect in the wrong way. And I would make the argument that that a lot of our problems in society really could be cut down if we, as you're saying, you know, identify these kids early on and just in general across the board, let people see where their talents are and see— and let them know that they are important people from the beginning. Don't let them fail like this. Don't let them just flounder and not know what to do in the system. And again, that's one of the reasons why we're doing this whole series. Um, but we've, we've hit a lot of real heavy stuff today, ladies. Usually we, we end laughing and giggling, and now we're kind of like, oh boy, that was, that was heavy.

It's the, uh, it's the elephant in the room. It's what nobody wants to talk about. And the reason nobody wants to talk about it, because it's attached to money. There's a cost involved.

Yeah.

I agree. I'm not gonna argue that.

Yeah, I'm, I'm about to going public with all this crap and saying, you know, let's go to juvenile, let's help the juveniles. As a matter of fact, I just was provided an opportunity to write a proposal for L'Oréal Paris Women of Worth that wanted to know what am I doing for, um, the social issues we're having. So I, I gave them that whole proposal about juveniles, and then I ended up— one of my board members met, um, an organization called Defy Venture, and they're adult adult prisoners that are reformed and they're out of jail. And we're going to see if we can collaborate on a level where they can mentor the juvenile prisoners and show them, if you continue on the track you're working on, you're going to turn like me.

Thank you.

That's awesome.

Go for that, full steam ahead.

Yeah, so I mean, I have, I have a lot going on. I mean, I'm, I'm, I'm, I, I don't know, I have this drive inside me and I I think it's about collaborating, partnering with organized— one person cannot do this by itself, by themselves. This requires a huge collaboration amongst a whole bunch of people. Have you gotten—

are you connected to any of the dyslexia organizations like the IDA or the Decoding Dyslexia people, any of those folks?

Only online. I haven't really communicated with them, like online as a resource.

I just wonder, because there's so many of us out here doing so many things, and it's like, we— if we could all come together and really move this train forward in an organized fashion, we wouldn't be having to do— having these fights for decades. You know, it's just that, you know, I think that part of it is the awareness that we really have to bring out the awareness so people understand what's happening since it's been so shoved under the rug, as I like to say. But I feel like there's so many of us out here and just little pods of parents here and there going through their own personal hell. It's, it's so, it's so painful that it would be best if we could get everybody together and really, you know, make an impact and stop this because it's been going on for It's going to take exactly what you said—

parents and organizations, corporations, sponsorship— to make this happen. One, I cannot do this by myself. I have a huge vision. I know exactly what I want, where I want to go, but I'm going to need money to get there.

Yeah.

And, but, you know, it's finding the missing link, finding people with the same passion, same cause, and collaborating, coming together as a whole and saying, okay, here's the plan, how do we execute it and move on from there? And I think if we collaborate, as a whole, then we can go to the school districts and say, hey, this organization is this powerful, and we're not going to let you do this, and you're going to do what IDEA tells you to do, and you're going to do it the right way.

Right.

You know, it's, you know, there's— what other choice do we have? They say, oh, IDEA is not fully funded. That's what I get here, LAUSD. We don't have the money. What do you mean you don't? You took me to Ninth Circuit Federal Court. I spent in the millions to get my kids Kids elementary, middle, and high school education. My son Jonathan has an Ivy League education by a school that you private parents pay $50,000 a year. Why? Why can't you districts put this in a program for dyslexia or a reading program and help the students? Why are you taking me to court and spending your legal funds? I'm spending my legal funds. So that I could— I can have my son have an Ivy League elementary, middle, and high school education?

Then we have a discussion on how we have to teach reading, and then we get back to a program, and then children fall through the cracks again, and we're back to, why didn't this work?

It's really— it's difficult. I think we have to do it in baby steps, and we have to do a pilot program and see if the— because that's my idea with the juvenile program.

Pilot program.

I want to do a pilot program out here, and then I want to do the Jonathan Foundation movement nationally across the nation.

Yes.

That's my big, big vision.

I love the idea of a pilot program because we know, we know what's required to teach children to read. We know it cannot be prescriptive. We know children have to be involved and actively involved in their learning. And I think That's the component that we've absolutely forgotten at many levels. Anyway, don't get me started on that. However, my son, my son is saying you've got to answer the chats.

Even though we have to do that now?

Yes.

What's in the chats? I only know how to send. How do I answer?

How do you get your sons into— now, and, and of course the answer is not simple. How did your sons get into game design and what made them choose that profession?

So we answered that one.

Good. So, Lisa, what are your— what do you do differently for your children?

Well, for my youngest son, he goes to AIM Academy, so I don't have to do anything. Now, that's not true, um, but we did. We had to fight for him to go there. Um, and my middle son, and I am, I am struggling. We're struggling as a family to get him, uh, to a place that he needs to be. mentally and, you know, professionally, and it's been a nightmare. But we are, we are on that journey. And again, I know, I know Amy had mentioned— what's that?

Raja.

Yeah, Amy Raja.

No, it's my construction alias. Raja is my special education name. That's my given name.

You had mentioned— now I forgot what I was gonna say.

Journey with yourself?

Oh yes, yes, you mentioned God, um, and I really feel that God has a plan for myself, my family, and there's a reason we're going through this. So we'll get there. But, um, I'm just— oh, you know, the thing that I am doing differently for my sons is talking about, um, what dyslexia is and talking about these things, and then not focusing so much on the what we can't do, but Let's think about what we can do. So that's what I'm doing differently for my kids.

That is fantastic. Thinking— that is fantastic, thinking about what they can do. Raja, you have a phenomenal vision. We've got so much to say, so much to do. You know, I just love this conversation.

Well, thank you. I just— it's life. You know, I always have to look for the positive in every negative. And believe me, There's, there's negatives happening every day, and I, I don't allow myself to sit and dwell on the negative. I, I gotta pop out of it and figure out, okay, what am I going to learn from this negative, and how do I turn it into a positive?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's it. Tell me about it. Well, look, I have to go. I have to go. We can work on getting your video—

Yeah, we should do a video test before the event so that, yeah, we can work I can certainly do that.

We'll set up another time to do it and just make sure it all works. Because one of the reasons we're doing this is not, you know, to not only give people background, but so Lisa and I can really work with the technology. And that's the big deal. Well, thank you. Thank you.

Thank you both.

Thank you, Raja. Thank you, Lisa. And we will talk to you again. Lisa, are you coming Monday on Not.

Yeah, anyway, and Monday you're working, right? Monday, Tuesday night we're doing with your sister.

Sister.

So Monday, no.

Monday, no. Wednesday I'm talking with Martin, and then Thursday we've got— I'm not sure.

Someone?

No, I thought that—

no, I thought Wednesday you're— I thought Thursday you're Talking with Martin. Oh, email.

I've blown that. I've got to change that. I've got a lot of things on Thursday then.

Well, we'll chat.

Okay, well, thank you. Thank you, Raja. Thank you for all that you've provided. And people can find this chat on YouTube Live, and they can listen to it all in full through your channel. Yes, on my channel, Lois Letchford.

You have to practice, practice, practice, Lois.

Yes, on my channel, Lois Letchford. I'm going to say loislatchford.com, but that's not right either. My website is loislatchford.com.

You can find information about me.

And you can find information about me on my website. And Raja, yours is the Jonathan Foundation, so they can find you By Googling the Jonathan Foundation.

Yeah, the JonathanFoundation.org.

And Lisa, yours is where do we find you?

I'm just on Facebook.

Facebook and Decoding Pennsylvania.

I'm with Decoding Dyslexia Pennsylvania.

Yeah.

Fantastic. Well, thank you.

Thank you, people.

So much good information.

Well, thank you so much, both of you, all three of you for hosting. Thank you. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Thank you.

It's a pleasure meeting you.

And we'll be in touch as well.

You take care.

Oh, and thank you for Isaac for my tech— Isaac and Chris for my tech support. Otherwise it would never work. Okay, I'll talk to you soon.

All right, thank you.

Bye. Bye. End stream. End stream. End. End stream.