Corey Butler Jr.
Posted: Saturday, December 27, 2008 11:06 pm

cbutler@faribault.com

FARIBAULT — Brendan Kennedy has put in his time.

And in less than one year, he will be graduating from Minnesota State University, Mankato with a degree in sociology and corrections.

It wasn’t something that came easy for the 23-year-old dyslexic, who would like to work with physically or mentally handicapped or learning-disabled children.

As a student of the Academic Skill Builders, a school and program founded by his father, Russ, a local businessman who is also dyslexic, he was at a crossroads at the end of his sophomore year in high school as the school was closing.

Should he go to a public school? A private school? A charter school?

There were many options for him in and out of town, but ultimately he decided to attend Covenant Academy, now Discovery Public School of Faribault.




“The amount of respect I got from teachers and students was unbelievable,” he said. “They gave us a lot of hope. They bent over backwards for a guy like me and I’m extremely grateful.”

Kennedy said the small teacher-to-student ratio the charter school offered as well as the ability of the teachers to personalize their teaching methods to students were big draws for him.

After two years at the school, he graduated top of his class, and went to college in the fall of 2004.

Jim Severson, who was a teacher at Discovery when Kennedy attended and now is the school’s director, said he saw the drive in him to succeed.

“Being at a smaller school, it’s easier to discover those students,” he said. “He had a plan.”

Kennedy said he felt he would have been lost in the shuffle at a larger school, but the ability to build close relationships with his peers and teachers helped him push through and work with his disability.

Because dyslexia makes everything harder for him, Kennedy said, college posed a challenge with more than 14,000 students on campus and classes with up to 200 or more students in them.

“I had to get close to the teachers,” he said. “It was really the only way I could survive.”

And he was able to, as well as be patient with his work and know he would finish it, as well as college. Those were lessons he learned at Discovery and Academic Skill Builders.

It’s important for students to find the right school for them, as it makes the difference, because not everyone is programmed for a large, public school, Kennedy said.

“They really create who we are,” he said of schools. “You need alternatives.”

With graduation mere months away, Russ is proud of his son for nearing the milestone. Kennedy’s sister, Allison, is also dyslexic. She is a sophomore at the University of Wisconsin River Falls.

“I have a tremendous amount of respect for him,” Russ said. “I know exactly what he’s experiencing.”



— Staff writer Corey Butler Jr. may be reached at 333-3135.