A simple diagnosis changed this woman’s life and a new bill aims to help others like her

IDAHO FALLS – The day Dayna Berg discovered she had dyslexia was a welcome relief.

The 36-year-old Firth woman was a freshman in college and had fought and struggled her whole life to get through school.

She grew up in Modesto, California, and from the time she was in kindergarten, doing the most basic things, like learning and writing her letters, was difficult.

“I couldn’t read until I was in fourth grade,” Berg tells EastIdahoNews.com. “I had speech problems too … and I was one of the slowest kids in the class. I just thought I was dumb.”

Berg attended special ed classes from the get-go and kids made fun of her because of it. Berg responded by beating them up. She became known as a bully and was always in trouble. Teachers regarded her as a problem child.

Her dad passed away when she was 10, something she describes as “the best thing that could’ve happened” because people finally showed her some compassion.

“For the first time in my life, I felt like I was loved and worth something,” Berg recalls.

That feeling of acceptance gave her a reason to work harder and Berg says that same year was the first time she got an A in school.

“My teacher gave out awards at the end of the school year and she (gave the most improved award) to me,” says Berg. “It was the first time I’d ever been recognized for something and that really changed something in me.”

In sixth grade, it was her goal to get all A’s and B’s, but for someone with dyslexia, that was a monumental task. She worked her tail off and was able to achieve her goal.

The following year, she told her teacher she wanted to test out of special ed. She was shocked when she heard the teacher’s reply.

“That’s impossible. You’re stupid,” the teacher said, according to Berg. “She actually said those words to me and so I took that as a challenge.”

In that moment, Berg decided she was going to prove her wrong. She battled her way through every homework assignment and eventually tested out of special ed.

She was a straight-A student in eighth grade, but it wasn’t easy. When no one else needed to study or work as hard, Berg often did homework until 2 a.m. just to keep up.

“Through sheer grit and determination, I said I was going to do this, and I did,” Berg says with pride.

Berg was a senior in high school when she first heard about dyslexia and realized it might be the source of all her struggles. It was through a TV show that it was brought to her attention.

“I was watching ‘The Cosby Show’ and Theo (a character in the show) was in college and he found out he was dyslexic. When he was talking to his parents, he went through the symptoms, like reading a test. He couldn’t understand the question and he couldn’t understand the answers. I was standing up from my chair, pointing at the TV screen, saying ‘Yes! That’s me! That’s what I do!’ I could totally relate with Theo,” she remembers.

Still, Berg put off getting tested for dyslexia for several years and continued trudging along.

During her first year of college, understanding the material was much harder and she was failing test after test. Now ready to learn the truth, she went to the reading center, got tested and officially confirmed she was dyslexic.

“The person who diagnosed me was awesome. She sat me down and she said, ‘Dayna, you’re smart. You just have a different brain and these are the things your brain is really good at,'” recalls Berg. “In four months, I went from a fourth-grade reading level to a 16th-grade reading level.”

From that point on, getting through homework assignments was never a problem. She outperformed the students in her department and went on to graduate with a 3.5 GPA.

Dyslexia is an issue she’ll deal with for the rest of her life but she now has the tools to help her be successful. Today, Berg has a son who is also dyslexic. She recognized the signs when he was in kindergarten and because of her personal experience with it, got him tested when he was in first grade.

Understanding dyslexia and improving access to resources

Data provided by Decoding Dyslexia-Idaho, a state-sponsored chapter for a national nonprofit aimed at increasing awareness of and access to educational resources for dyslexia in public schools, indicates dyslexia is a genetic condition that affects 1 in 5 people worldwide.

Amber Jacobson, who runs a clinic in Victor for dyslexic students, says the condition has a wide-ranging spectrum, which means it can manifest itself in different ways. Kids with a mild case, for example, don’t typically find reading enjoyable and would be prone to daydream when a book is in front of them.

“What I see kids doing the most is inserting sounds and letters where they don’t need to be and deleting. So, if the word is ‘snap,’ they would say ‘sap’ (every time they see that word). Slow, labored reading that’s just exhausting is another red flag (teachers in the classroom) might encounter,” Jacobson says.

Jacobson says kids with more severe cases have a hard time with words that rhyme and get certain letters — like b, d, p and q — mixed up.

Dyslexia is much more common than people realize, Jacobson says, but in Idaho, it isn’t even recognized as a learning disability. She cites numerous reasons for this, most of which stems from a lack of education about it.

“When teachers are going to school to become teachers, they don’t teach (how to recognize dyslexia or deal with it in the classroom),” Jacobson explains. “Really, it comes down to (the fact) that it’s too expensive to train teachers (about it) and it’s hard to do in a classroom setting.”

Robin Zikmund, the founder of the Decoding Dyslexia Idaho chapter, says many school districts refuse to even use the word “dyslexia” when talking to parents of students who struggle to read.

“What teachers and people in the school system tell parents about struggling readers is, ‘They might grow out of it,’ or ‘Wait until they’re in third grade.’ That’s the worst thing you can do for a dyslexic kid. You want to catch it early and start them on a program asap so they can be at grade-level reading,” Berg says.

Berg also points to a study of Texas prisoners in 2000 that determined 48% of inmates were dyslexic. Many of them never graduated from high school because they didn’t have access to resources. Had these people got the help they needed in elementary school, she says they wouldn’t have felt a need to act out or cause trouble and might not be in prison today.

“The hard truth is that we are more willing to spend money to put illiterate Americans in prison than we are on teaching them to read,” Zikmund writes in a datasheet given to EastIdahoNews.com.

The lack of resources for dyslexia in Idaho prompted Zikmund and a team of experts to draft a bill requiring dyslexia screenings for K-5 students and professional development for teachers. The bill passed the Senate unanimously last month.

The House initially refused to hear it because of related legislation proposed by State Superintendent Sherri Ybarra that ultimately died.

After a lot of back and forth, Zikmund’s bill was finally presented in a House hearing on Friday, which you can watch in the video player above. The revised bill passed unanimously in the House. It was sent to the House floor Tuesday morning and will have to be approved by the Senate again before advancing to the Governor’s desk.

Zikmund anticipates the bill ultimately being signed into law.

“I don’t see a need for any more pushback from here on out. I think we’re definitely on our way and will have it all wrapped up in about two weeks,” Zikmund says.

After dealing with her own struggles and finding resources to help her son, Berg has come to realize there are many dyslexic kids who now feel like she once did — that they’re dumb. And they have parents who aren’t helpful because they don’t know anything about it.

Berg wants those in this position to know they’re not alone and she’s hoping lawmakers will pass House Bill 731 so that resources become more widely available.

“My son is lucky because he has me. But the whole thing I’m fighting for with Decoding Dyslexia Idaho is to help all those other kids out,” Berg says.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE BILL IN ITS ENTIRETY.