“I felt at a loss when I was diagnosed,” Hong Vu, a third-year Adult Nursing student at De Montfort University Leicester (DMU), said about her dyslexia diagnosis in 2016. “Growing up, I was always made to think dyslexia was a cover for being slow, so when I received my news, I was crushed.”
Hong is among the 6.3 million people in the UK that have dyslexia according to government statistics and, like many students before her, hadn’t been diagnosed until university. Having struggled with the academic side of her course, the 27-year-old is now gaining more confidence in her writing ability and is hoping to show people that dyslexia won’t stop her from pursuing her dreams.
Dyslexia is commonly associated with the misspelling of words and jumbling of letters; however, difficulties processing information, managing time, organising tasks and memory are also common symptoms. People with dyslexia often have other conditions, including dyscalculia, ADD (attention deficit disorder) and ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity).
Hong said: “All the knowledge, the practical skills, everything, was all clear in my head. I never had any issues with my placements, but when it came to my academic writing, I couldn’t get down onto the page everything I knew.
“I was encouraged by my course tutor to get a test with the university’s Disability Advice and Support team (DAS) team. This was around the same time I had been diagnosed with depression, so being told I was also dyslexic was a real shock to the system. I really spiralled.
“I wasn’t taught much about learning differences at school, and I think that’s the same for a lot of people. I felt like I didn’t want to burden my tutors after finding out about my diagnosis because I thought people with dyslexia need a lot more help than other people. I didn’t want to be known as that person.”
DMU provides a range of services and guidance for students with a wide range of learning differences. Students can book appointments for screenings and one-to-one sessions through My Gateway, the university’s online booking service.
Despite dyslexia being scientifically proven not to impact an individual’s intelligence, the learning difference frequently carries an unjust stigma.
It’s something that DMU’s award-winning Disability Services Manager, Tina Sharpe wants to address; particularly within the nursing student community, which has already been under significant pressure due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.
In the last academic year, approximately 50 per cent of DMU’s nursing students had a specific learning difference, including dyslexia and dyscalculia. The DAS team has been working hard to provide these students with one-to-one support and study skills workshops to help make assignments more understandable.
It has adapted its popular monthly workshop to cater for distance learning in response to government guidelines and Covid-19 restrictions. Virtual workshops covered note-taking, time management, referencing and course expectations.
Tina said: “In general, the vast majority of our students have never had any form of test or diagnosis for any conditions, but they’re aware that they struggle to learn in a traditional manner. Sadly, and we have seen this a lot, these students put an awful amount of pressure on their mental health if they don’t feel as if they are academic.
“For many, learning is a matter of self-worth and students can get very disheartened if they think they’re not good at it. We’re here to provide students with alternative methods of digesting information through one-to-one specialist help and a range of study skills and time management workshops.”
For Hong, the one-to-one study skills and time management sessions have helped with ways she can tighten her academic writing as well as improve her mental health.
“The study skills session helps me understand aspects of assignments that I don’t want to ask about in front of my classmates. They have some very strong dissertation templates but Adult Nursing has a rather different template design. However, my study skills mentor has been really good at adapting to my needs and I feel more confident now about it compared to when I started the year.”
The university’s DAS Support team was first formed in 2015 and has grown considerably during its six years in existence. The service provides Disabled Students Allowances’ funded one-to-one support, which can be booked with tutors through emailing the DSA admin team. During these sessions, students can break down assignments and talk through problems.
One of the team’s core members, Pria Patel joined the university in 2016 providing additional support to students as a note taker in lectures and has since gone on to become a Disability Officer and now Lead Specialist Study Skills Tutor.
Pria is responsible for creating and managing a team of specialist tutors and her team have recently started providing training to the university’s academic staff in making resources more accessible and helping more people on campus learn about some of the challenges students with dyslexia experience.
“Our main purpose is to show these students that having a learning difference isn’t a hindrance and that they can still do really well at university. Everyone learns in a different way; you have visual learners, those that can absorb books and others that find that difficult.
“We have recently started doing workshops to help our academics make their PowerPoint presentations and resource sheets more accessible to students with dyslexia. We want to show everyone at the university what they can do to ensure that any student with a learning difference isn’t left behind, and the feedback we have received so far has been very positive.”
The stigma attached to dyslexia has, according to both Tina and Pria, stopped many students from coming forward for screening. The pair believes it is notably higher for students in some communities, who perceive the diagnosis as a weakness.
First-year Mental Health Nursing student Belinda Fumai, much like Hong, was diagnosed with dyslexia during her time at university and was initially afraid to tell her family about her learning difference.
“There is a lot of pressure to be academic in many African communities that live abroad because, unfairly, you’re seen to be representing your entire continent,” Belinda said. “We are a proud people, so to ask for help can be frowned upon, but I was glad when I got my diagnosis because I finally felt like I understood why I sometimes struggled.
“I still get teased a little when deadlines are approaching because my family think I might use it as an excuse, but I’m stronger now, and I know dyslexia doesn’t define me.”
Originally from Zimbabwe, Belinda joined DMU in 2017 and studied Youth Work before deciding to stay at university to study Mental Health Nursing. As one of her strategies to retain information, she used to speak out the information she learned aloud.
Following her assessments and one-to-one sessions, the Student Finance England DSA team awarded Belinda a laptop as part of her support, with specialist transcription software that accurately enables Belinda to convert her speech into text, a practice that has helped improve her note-taking. The specialist laptops are one of the common ways in which the DSA team supports students with learning differences.
Belinda said: “It makes a big difference to my confidence. As a lot of my classes are online, I felt reluctant to ask questions that I might have done if we were taught one-to-one, so having that time with my tutor means I can go through anything I don’t feel comfortable with.
“The study skills workshop has enabled me to understand referencing better, examine what is being asked of me and break down long assignments into more manageable tasks.
“I’m not uncomfortable telling people I have dyslexia anymore either. You either take me for what I am, or I just leave you alone.”
The British Dyslexia Association hosts useful advice and information including symptoms to look out for in both adults and children.
For students that may be unsure if they have a learning difference or have noticed symptoms, DMU’s SpLD Officers can discuss potential access to support services and specialist equipment. They can be contacted at SPLD Dysquery@dmu.ac.uk. They can also help students apply for the Disabled Students Allowances’.
Posted on Tuesday 17 August 2021