LearningRX Complaints: Falsified Test Results

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• I have trained and tested for Learningrx. Testers do not
  Get paid more for better test results and training
  Is not to the test. They also have test results on
  Over 25,000 students. Many franchisees are
  Parents of kids that had learning difficulties. They
  Have very high morals. When one franchisees results
  Were questioned, the franchisee was terminated.
  The writers of the wj3 know exactly how
  Learningrx uses the test and approved the
  Use for measuring results within a 3 month period,
  (Not a year)

  Also, pretty suspicious of the comments
  Since they are all written within a couple days
  Of eachother. Maybe the commenters
  Are trying to sell something else?

• We placed our daughter in Learning Rx to improve her reading, math, and language skills, and it was the worst decision we have ever made for her.

  I do believe the director honestly tested her, but she was dishonest about the center's experience with children with autism or Asperger's syndrome. Our daughter struggled through the rhythmic activities and cried at nearly every session. Whereas her test scores at Learning Rx jumped tremendously, she showed no improvement at school.

  I should have realized the only guarantee was an improvement on their test scores, not in her actual learning skills. When we expressed our concerns regarding our daughter's performance at school after completing the program, the director said that we would see improvements later, and it could take up to year after completing the program for the training to take effect, which never happened.

  I can see where some of the activities may enhance a learning skill, but it cannot help learning disabilities or severe learning problems as the director promised. I regret wasting several thousands of dollars at Learning Rx. Since then, I have found a language program at a local university to help my daughter, and it has been far more effective and costs only a couple hundred dollars.

• I only comment that Tanya Mitchell is the daughter of Ken Gibson (the founder) and a Vice President within this company. Why does she pretend to be just a trainer and assessor for 'this company'? This is not at all straightforward and is a problem.

  Tanya says 'they' in reference to Learning RX. Does Tanya have high morals for talking as if she is not an executive for the company and that 'they' includes herself, her father, her sisters, brother, uncles, and whoever else is there at the home office. (Tanya, you have test results on over 25,000 and these only matter if you make sure the testing is accurate.)

  Hey, she did give her real name. That much it good. You can google her and find who she is.

  It does not surprise me that people say that tests have been falsified. When guarantees are made around test result improvements, when center directors hate to go into final reviews with parents without good test results, when trainers are incentivized based on test result improvement there is going to be pressure on test results, even if assessors are not incentivized themselves. However, most people in this company would be offended to hear that a single test result was ever falsified. The people I have met are all good people. I guess the question is whether good people under pressure are doing bad things.

  People I care about work at this company.

• Hi Laura,

  Would appreciate if you can share the contact of the language program provider and website in which you seek help from.

• I am also a trainer in NJ and test results are definitely falsified. I've been asked to remove certain results from the test initially and make note to not show these areas on the final test results. If the final test results didn't come back showing the improvement we wanted to see, we would lie to the parents and say the test results were lost by corporate and we needed the student to retest-sometimes coming in the next day to do the test again. Parents pay a lot of money for this and I think something needs to be done so you get honest results.

• I have put three children through the program and couldn't be happier. I trust the center as well as the people who run it because I see the results in my children. Results that can and can not be measured. My child who could not read now reads, her memorization skills are excellent and she is excelling in school. My son now completes Math in 30 minutes where it took him 2 hours before.

  I know there are always opposing opinions, however our experience was fantastic. LearningRx was the right answer for us.

• I also saw my center ask kids to come back to redo portions (or all) of final testing because a result was not as good as they wanted or expected.

  There were a few problems I saw: I never saw the redo of a low initial test score, only for final tests because the results weren't good enough. If a kid was doing poorly on a final test (for example, because she was distracted), the test was to be stopped and the the parent told she's not ready for testing and to bring her back another day. Yet, I would have kids just as distracted on initial tests.

  Retesting within a couple weeks is a problem. The test is the exact same test. Even if a kid cannot remember the exact question, they remember how the test works and they can try a new strategy. Let's say the test in on processing speed, but a different strategy gets you 3 years better test result. Is this really improved processing speed or is it improved logic or is it remembering the test? Finally, people without credentials are allowed to do the testing (with permission).

  Ask the director these questions about testing:
  1. How many kids have been through this center for training? [Wait for the answer.]
  2. Can I see ALL of the results for ALL of these students, including supplemental tests? [If you see no negative results, you are being shown doctored or selective results. In fact, if you don't see __big__ negative drops in some tests, you are being shown doctored results. If you don't see results that make you wince, you aren't seeing the whole story. I believe the mom on December 13th above who says her three children saw great results. I saw good results, too. You aren't hearing the whole story though.]
  3. Do you ever stop or redo a test? initial? final?
  4. Do you ever have students that don't show results in real life? [Again, if you are told that everyone does well, you aren't getting the whole story. Also, some kids get test results and hardly any real life results that a parent or teacher can see. You might even be blamed for not seeing them.]
  5. Is there a conflict of interest? [I suspect you'll be told that there is no conflict because trainers cannot test their own students. True for my center, but I heard the director say multiple times that it was very difficult to do a 'celebration' for a student who has poor test results or who lacks real life results. Centers are under tremendous financial pressure. Lots of centers closed during my time with the company. My understanding is that many centers are just doing okay as businesses.]
  5. Do you have completely independent testing results done by an independent professional for students who have been trained at this center? [The answer will almost certainly be no.]

  I have seen parents feel guilty for not giving their kids brain training (because they couldn't afford it or didn't have time). I have never seen the director feel guilty. This is backwards.

• I am sorry you all have such a problem with Learning RX, however I can say the learning RX that I am going to has not been anything but AWESOME to me and my son. I am amazed at the progress that my son has made and I would do it again in a heart beat. For a boy that struggled in all subject now wipes through them like they are easy for him. His grades are honor roll and that is with him going in to middle school. I can see a deteremined child that has come a long way and deserves to feel accomplished and I am thankful for Learning RX to help him with that.

• Melissa has given us a data point. Is she saying that LRX does not falsify any test results because the results were not falsified for her son? Is she saying that LRX gets good results for all student because her son got good results?

  If a student works hard and is determined, he or she will get the best results. If a student doesn't want to be there and doesn't work hard, results will be worse. If a student doesn't engage, results will be less. When results are less, there will be more temptation to falsify results.

  I saw some students get excellent results, some students get good results, and some students get poor results. I saw testing mucked with for those who got poor results. Interestingly, it was not so much that mucking with test results was required to meet the guarantee. It was usually because presenting poor results to a parent is hard for the director to do.

  Any center that talks about it like everyone gets results is not telling you the truth. It just cannot be the case that all students give effort and all students get results. Yet, I saw this claim being made all the time. Yuck! I hate sales!

  There is no way that the home office can ensure that results are authentic, correct, and ethical. They would have to do secret shopper kinds of things which would be very costly for travel and expense. I doubt very much that is happening. It would be even harder to detect centers retesting students because of poor results, because they only know things after results get entered into the computer (what they call HUB).

  If you think LRX can get your good results for your hardworking, determined student, you are probably right. If a trainer can motivate your student to be hard working, you'll probably get good results. But the student who doesn't give effort is wasting your money. LRX is an expensive program at $5000 for a 12-week pro program and $10K+ for a 24-week pro program. Think of it as burning a 100 dollar bill every time your student doesn't work.

• In my previous comment, I said Melissa when I should have said Melinda. Sorry, Melinda.

  By the by, I asked the website owner to be able to post an entire page on what I know about LRX (good and bad, because there is both), but they want me to just post comments here. So here is my next installment of what I know. I'm trying to be extremely fair to both parents and LRX, but if someone thinks I'm not being wording things accurately, I'd love to interact on things. It is important that we make accurate statements that convey the full picture so parents can decide.

  I have been thinking about the question of whether LRX teaches to the test. This comes up here and elsewhere on the Internet. I think the answer is both yes and no. Let's start with background information.

  The test that LRX does is called Woodcock-Johnson. It is a commercially available test that is purchased and used by LRX in all of its centers with permission from the seller. The test is normally supposed to only be administered by professionals with specific degrees and specific training. I recently spoke with someone who was certified in the exam and it was an extensive process of ensuring that the test was administered consistently and accurately. LRX has permission to bypass all of these safeguards within their business. [This would make a good next post.]

  There are seven or eight tests used in the initial assessment that are renamed by LRX as Long-Term Memory, Short-Term Memory, Visual Processing, Auditory Processing, Word Attack, Logic and Reasoning, and Executive Processing Speed. Some centers do other tests and all centers do supplemental tests when a student signs up for the program.

  Why does testing matter within LRX?
  1. It is the basis for the 'guaranteed' claim. In a shorter program, LRX guarantees a 2-year gain in at least one skill. In a longer program, LRX guarantees a 3 year gain in at least one skill. Notice that the gain is promised in *any* skill, not the most important or the one most holding your child back. [This would make a good next post.]

  2. It is one way that parents know that they spent their money well. It is not the only way, but many parents want external, objective evidence that improvements were made. This is the reason directors want testing to show good results: parents will see these results at the end of the program.

  3. Centers vary quite a bit on the average increases in test results. But this difference is not based on how profitable the center is. The most profitable centers are more profitable because they are better marketers, networkers, and sellers, not better trainers. The least profitable centers are not less profitable because they get lower training results, but because they lack the ability (or market) to get people in the door (marketing) and into seats (sales). However, if a center gets very poor results, it would cause problems with the home office so testing matters this way too.

  Now that you understand why testing matters, the question arises whether LRX trains or teaches to the test. The following are the similarities between the assessment and the LRX procedures that would be similar for all centers and give me pause:

  1. Compare Attention Speed with the Executive Processing Speed test. In the test, a student circles two images when they appear together in a specific order. There is a third image to distract. The student goes through and circles as fast as possible. Compare this to the Attention Speed procedure which has the student scanning a sheet of numbers and circling a specific number or pair of numbers asked for by the trainer. It is true that the procedure is different (numbers vs images), but all the skills translate directly to the assessment. The LRX trainer teaches its students to go as fast, not worry about being neat, and practicing this over and over. So, I would say every LRX trainer worth her salt is teaching her students how to do speed tests like this. A parent should not be surprised that large processing speed improvements are very common in the program.

  2. Reasoning Cards with the Visual Processing test. In the test, a student has to pick which pieces make up a puzzle. It is really a visual discrimination test that starts easy and gets harder. The test is about seeing things accurately and being able to rotate them in your mind. LRX does these visual thinking cards that teach many skills, but certainly those required for this assessment test. For example, there is a card where the student has to decide which piece fits into a puzzle. Another card asks the student to decide which of two pieces fit. In addition, there is a procedure using tangrams which is also requiring a student to put shapes together to match an image. A parent should not be surprised that large visual processing speed improvements are very common in the program.

  3. Auditory procedures with Auditory Processing test. For example, one procedure has the student reverse the sounds in a word and give the new word (the procedure is called "switch"). This is exactly what is done on the Auditory Processing test where the student is asked to reverse 'tap' to get 'pat' or to reverse 'pots' to get 'stop' or whatever. Another example is that there is a procedure (called "drop") where students drop a sound from a word to make a new word or nonsense word. The assessment does this exact same thing. A parent should not be surprised that large gains in auditory processing are common in the program. (There are pieces of the assessment that don't appear in the procedures, namely rhyming which almost all students do well.)

  4. Reading lessons and drills with Work Attack test. All students do the first lessons in the reading program, even if they are in the general training program. Reading students do the entire program. There are lessons throughout the reading program that teach the sounds of the English language and how those are spelled. After this, the student is drilled to ensure he knows those sounds/codes quickly and easily. It is important to note that the program doesn't focus only on those sounds in the test. However, if a trainer is also doing assessments, s/he *could* make sure that the specific codes that the student needs to know on the test are emphasized and mastered. Also, since a trainer gets bonuses based on test results, s/he has a motivation to do so. However, being able to do something and being motivated to do so doesn't mean everyone does this. In fact, I think the trainers in my center were blameless in this respect. A parent should not be surprised that large word attack gains are very common after the program.

  5. Speed Math procedure with Math Fluency test. The Speed Math procedure is very similar to the Math Fluency test, but this assessment test is only a supplemental test (unlike all of the others above). There are differences, but the differences are not major. The surprise is that larger increases in Math Fluency don't happen by training this procedure. [One thing to note is that handwriting speed is going to limit this and any other speed tests given on the assessment. If your student writes slowly or precisely, then you are going to get poor results. Is this an indication of a slow mind? I'm not sure. This applies to any processing speed test like the Executive Processing Speed test above.]

  There are other possible overlaps. I have seen trainers practice numbers reversed as a mental activity during procedures. This is the Short-term Memory/Working Memory test in WJIII. If a trainer does this, then it is pretty much identical to the assessment. It is a legitimate mental activity that is a challenge for students, but doing this would mean the trainer is training to the test, whether intentionally or unintentionally.

  Any LRX person who says that he doesn't teach/train to the test means that they don't take the specific questions from the test and teach only those few things to their student so that they will do well on a test. However, as the above demonstrates, overlaps between the procedures and the assessment do exist and they are significant, not minor. Also, these are built into the program by the home office, not accidental or because of bad franchisees Most importantly, these similarities make it extremely likely that the guarantee will be met for almost all students. [The whole guarantee thing is also worthy of another post.]

  This is why the guarantee is much less meaningful than it might otherwise be. Much more meaningful would be increases in a test that is not administered by the center itself and a test that has different A & B versions that are used before and after the program (not identical tests which is what LRX does). In the area of reading, there are better tests than WJIII, so those should be looked into as better indicators of progress.

  Go all the way back to the first comment by Tanya Mitchell where she says that training is not to the test. Now you understand all that she is not saying, besides skipping the fact that she is the daughter of the founder of the company and the daughter of Ken Gibson. In a post endorsing the integrity of the company, she lacked integrity. Go figure.

  Anything you disagree with or wonder about my wording, please post and let me know. I'd love to have a dialogue on this topic. I am writing in this teeny tiny window, then editing. If I catch anything in the follow-up reading, I'll correct it in my next post.