My dyslexic son is in 7th grade at MSA. He previously spent 3 years at the Swift School. Two of his four MSA teachers for sure lack any training or understanding of how to teach a dyslexic child. The math teacher is a bright young (inexperienced) man with a booming voice who intimidates my son and uses math terms that no dyslexic child is going to be comfortable with. We expect to work with our child on homework but 2 - 3 hours most nights is exhausting. The so-called 'levels system' and 'values' education seems to be emphasized at the cost of genuine teaching techniques for learning disabled kids. The pre-upper school seems to have a 'sink or swim' attitude in that while they do provide good resources for the students, they expect the student to have the maturity, judgment, and experience to know how to take advantage of these things. My son is bright and capable but he is not ready for that kind of responsibility; I doubt many 13 year olds are. The school mottto is something like 'we'll teach the student the way he needs if he can't learn the way we're teaching. This is a joke, if not down right fraudulent. At $20,000+ per year, MSA does not deliver, and should not pretend that it caters to the learning disabled.
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