Education vs. Incarceration

The Dyslexia Educational Network (DEN) is the world's first broadcasting company for dyslexia. DEN broadcasts worldwide at DyslexiaEd.com. Founder Robert Langston has dyslexia, is a parent of a dyslexic child and has authored of two books about his experiences with dyslexia in school and life.

Topic:

Dyslexia Resources for Parents

Dyslexia Resources for Children

Dyslexia Resources for Teachers

Dyslexia Resources for Educators

Video Transcript

Why its important you’re here. I know you’re probably seating there saying Rob you don’t have to tell me, I’m a parent I’m a teacher, I’m a grandparent… you know. I know why it’s important I’m here. I take care of kids. I make a difference in kids’ lives. And you do, but I got to tell ya, I didn’t know how important it was what you do until about – I guess it was almost 15 years ago now. About 15 years ago I got a phone call and the guy I was sharing the office with at the time, yelled into my office and he said ‘Rob you have Fulton County prison on the phone.’ I said ‘well tell them I’m not here.’ And he said, ‘no I think they want you to come down to the prison, right there in the middle of downtown Atlanta and do your program for kids. I was… I picked up the phone. I was like ‘this is Rob Langston.’ Sure enough they said ‘this is the Fulton County prison. We would like for you to come down here and speak.’ I said no. I work very hard to stay out of your prison. I am not coming down there. And they said, well Kroger food stores said you would.’ And at that time the Krogering for Kids program at the Kroger food stores was sponsoring me to the tune of a hundred programs a year in the school system. So now I’m thinking I can’t turn this down, right. So in order not to bite the hand that feeds me, I agree. I said okay I’ll do it. Let’s set a date. We set it, I write it on my calendar and I promptly forget it right. The day of the talk comes. I get in my car and I’m driving down to Fulton County prison. Now I hope none of y’all have an instance to even visit one of these institutions, but I’m telling you, I was about a mile from it and I was starting to be able to see it, cause it is ten stories tall. And I’ looking at this thing and I’m thinking ‘Rob what have you got yourself into?’ And as I get closer to it I realize the windows are not shrinking. All they have are little gun slats for windows to look out of. And I’m thinking ‘oh my gosh.’ And I pull into the parking lot, and I park my car. And the program I do for kids, I do a board breaking demonstration at the end. So it’s kind of a visual demonstration of breaking through their obstacles, right. And I want to give them that but I also thought this would be a good group to do this for as well right. So I pull up, I park my car, I pop my trunk – and back then I was just literally carrying around cinder blocks to rest the wood on – and I grabbed two cinder blocks out of the trunk of my car and grabbed two pieces of wood; and I walk in the front door of Fulton County prison and I said ‘I’m Rob Langston and I’m here to do my program... Join DyslexiaEd.com for full broadcasts and transcripts.