Wines Receives Award for Dyslexia Training

Midwestern State University's Mary Wines is the recipient of the International Dyslexia Association's Robert G. and Eleanor T. Hall Memorial Fund Scholarship, which is granted by Educators Publishing Service (EPS). Wines serves as the university's director and instructor for the master's program for special education students specializing in dyslexia.

Wines will be presented with the award November 8 at the 64th Annual International Dyslexia Association Conference in New Orleans.

Over the past five years, Wines built the five dyslexia courses within MSU's Special Education degree program and has trained teachers to become Certified Academic Language Therapists. She works with other learning centers in Texas to award graduate credit for each center's therapists in training and makes sure that all course work aligns with the International Multisensory Structured Language Education Council requirements.

Wines serves on the Senate Bill 866 State Technology Committee in the field of dyslexia. This committee was charged with developing a plan for integrating technology into the classroom to help accommodate students with dyslexia. The committee produced a living document on the useful technologies to support students with dyslexia as well as a methodology for providing technology to these students. Every public school in Texas received this document. She is member of a panel of experts under the Senate Bill 866 Committee relating to the education of public school students with dyslexia, the education and training of educators who teach students with dyslexia, and the assessment of students with dyslexia attending an institution of higher education.

Wines also serves on the National Academic Language Therapists Association Board of Directors.

Wines earned her Certified Academic Language Therapist and Qualified Instructor training at the Luke Waites Center for Dyslexia and Learning Disorders of Texas Scottish Rite Hospital for Children. She earned a master's degree in Special Education from MSU, and for five years has taught about dyslexia and special education in higher education.

For more than 50 years, EPS Literacy and Intervention has been the leader in developing and publishing programs to help struggling students, including those with dyslexia and other reading difficulties, as well as providing materials that support on-level students so they can continue to meet their goals. Robert G. Hall established EPS in 1949. He and his wife Eleanor, were early members of the Orton Dyslexia Society (ODS), now known as the International Dyslexia Association.

The International Dyslexia Association is a nonprofit, scientific, and educational organization dedicated to the study and treatment of dyslexia as well as related language-based learning differences.