Teen shaping bill on testing for learning disabilities

New law would mandate testing for a variety of conditions in students' early years

Published: March 1, 2013

By Dwain Hebda
Associate Editor

Dwain Hebda

Mary Katherine Keller, standing in the state Capitol, is helping shape legislation ordering learning disabilities testing for school children.

Dwain Hebda

Mary Katherine Keller, standing in the state Capitol, is helping shape legislation ordering learning disabilities testing for school children.

An Arkansas Senate bill proposing early childhood testing for learning disabilities is getting an overhaul, thanks to the efforts of a determined young Catholic.

Mary Katherine Keller, a member of the Cathedral of St. Andrew in Little Rock, is lending her considerable enthusiasm and expertise to SB33, sponsored by Sen. Joyce Elliott of Little Rock.

“Sen. Elliott and I met and talked for about 90 minutes,” Keller said. “She told me the bill is undergoing significant changes. It’s very promising.”

Such statements might not raise an eyebrow coming from a fellow legislator, a childhood development professional or even a special interest group lobbyist, but an 18-year-old, newly graduated from high school, is a different story. In fact, Keller’s is a story almost in a class by itself.

Ever since she can remember, Keller, the only child of Carl and Janet Keller, has battled a learning disorder known as dysgraphia. According to the National Center for Learning Disabilities, a student suffering from dysgraphia struggles with handwriting, organizing thoughts on the page and has difficulty with syntax and grammar.

Keller’s situation was complicated throughout her elementary years at Christ the King School in Little Rock, when her high IQ (she could read by age 3) routinely masked her disability. Her behavior was more consistent with — and regularly misdiagnosed as — someone simply bored from not being challenged academically.

By the time she entered Little Rock’s Mount St. Mary Academy, her disability masked her intelligence. Thus, she would simultaneously score off the charts on her ACT yet have a “D” in English class. Now, a perceived lack of effort became the running theme of countless parent-teacher conferences.

“I remember one classmate saying to me, ‘If you’re supposed to be so smart, how come you’re so stupid?’” Keller remembers.

Keller had no idea what caused writing to be such a struggle and she struggled with depression and poor self-esteem.

“I had dreams of the colleges I wanted to attend, but it was so unattainable, I knew there was no way it was ever going to happen,” she said.

She didn’t realize at the time her feelings were typical of a person with a learning disability.

“The risk for juvenile delinquency, drinking, drugs, promiscuous sex and suicide are all much higher for teens in this category,” she said. “Their chances for post-secondary education go down the tubes and that brings on long-term problems and implications.”

Ellitott’s bill would test all youngsters in the state for learning disability during primary school. Keller, who wasn’t tested until age 16, remembers the resulting diagnoses as “a blessing, the best thing that ever happened to me.”

But, as she told Elliott, such would never have happened had she been given the kind of testing that SB33 originally called for, which basically assumed what identified one would similarly identify all conditions.

“In terms of testing and solutions, the original bill only really talked about dyslexia and everything else was put under a heading of ‘other conditions.’ These conditions aren’t the same and so I’m trying to emphasize the need for specific testing for different disabilities,” she said.

Keller acknowledges the bill represents only one half of the solution. In her case, even having a proper diagnosis didn’t result in her getting the support she needed academically until she transferred to Little Rock’s e-Stem Public Charter School.

“For me all it took was one person to make a radical difference in my life, the same way that one bad teacher can make a radical difference in a person’s life,” she said. “Normal is just a setting on a dryer and my goal is through testing and awareness, teachers will begin to understand students’ differences and learn how to help these kids.”

Keller’s outlook on her own future has changed completely. She has applied to several colleges and is pondering a career in medicine. Lately she has been bitten by the political bug and looks forward to shepherding a more comprehensive SB33 through the lawmaking process on behalf of other youngsters.

“I don’t have a grudge against anyone,” she said. “I feel blessed that I was a student at Mount St. Mary and I couldn’t be more grateful for the experience. Even the unpleasant parts were important. It made me a better advocate for other kids.”