Psychologist lectures on coping with learning disabilities

Sarah Goetz Staff Writer

“I want to capture...the experience of having a learning disability or struggling with learning, what that experience does to an individual...and things that can be done to help that impact not overwhelm an individual,” said internationally known author, lecturer and Harvard Medical School Psychology Professor Robert Brooks.

This evening, April 4, Brooks will deliver the seventh annual Steven Hirsch ’71 and Susan Hirsch Disability Awareness Lecture. The lecture will be at 5:30 p.m. on the second floor of the Students’ Building; a book signing will follow.

The lecture, entitled “The Power of Mindsets: Nurturing Resilient Children and Young Adults with Learning Disabilities at Home and in School,” will address the importance and transformative effect of establishing resiliency and an optimistic outlook in students who have learning disabilities. Brooks will also address the significant role that parents, professors and other adults may have in giving young people self-esteem and hope.

The Hirsch lecture series, made possible by a donation from Steven and Susan Hirsch, is designed to provide both direct and indirect services to students with learning disabilities, attention deficit disorder and psychiatric conditions. “One of their goals for the gift was to increase awareness about the existence of learning differences in a college community like Vassar,” explained Belinda Guthrie, Associate Dean of the College and Director of Equal Opportunity. “We have tremendously capable, talented and bright students with all different types of learning styles and needs,” she noted.

Guthrie said that in order for students to truly thrive at an institution such as Vassar, there must be a more widespread awareness among faculty, the student body and the general campus community.

She also stressed that the classroom environment and the way material is taught can either “create barriers or create opportunities for students who have different learning styles and needs.” Guthrie and the Hirsches decided that the best way to accomplish this was to establish an annual lecture series on these themes.

Brooks’s lecture will focus on the importance of the mindsets of students with learning disabilities. He will address the differences in the way that resilient, hopeful and motivated students view themselves and their world versus the outlooks of students who are more pessimistic.

“I talk about a resilient mindset…and about how a number of students with learning disabilities do not have the most optimistic outlook, that some of them have a negative mindset of themselves,” Brooks said in a phone interview. He hopes to share with his audience some of the characteristics of this mindset and discuss how to foster it at home and in school.

His hope is that people who attend the lecture “will have a greater appreciation of the possibility of creating environments where students can become much more hopeful, optimistic and resilient, where they will be more motivated to learn.” Brooks also wants his audience to understand that students can change their negative mindsets, often with the help of a “charistmatic adult.”

“I always emphasize…how one person can make a world of difference in the life of another person...one encounter—one thing a professor or parent says—can have a lifelong impact,” said Brooks.

Early in the day Brooks will address faculty members on some of the tools they can use to strengthen learning and motivation in the classroom, particularly for students who have learning disabilities.

Brooks has authored numerous books engaging topics related to self-esteem and relationships. In addition to his position at Harvard Medical School, he has served as Director of the Department of Psychology at McLean Hospital and has a part-time private practice.

Brooks has received many awards for his work, including a Gubernatorial Award for Distinguished Public Service, which he won for his service to a state commission against drugs.