Vision To Learn Celebrates First Two Years Providing Vision Care to Kids In Connecticut With Community Supporters

• Vision To Learn provides vision screenings, eye exams and glasses to children at schools in low-income communities.
• In Connecticut, Vision To Learn has helped over 20,000 students since launching in 2022, including 4,000 provided with glasses
• Support for the program comes from Dalio Education, CT State Department of Education, Hartford Foundation for Public Giving, Connecticut Community Foundation, and CT Sun

Vision To Learn’s work at Lake Street School completes a effort providing vision care to every student in need in Vernon Public Schools. Seven schools were visited, with over 3,100 students vision screened. 858 students were provided with eye exams, and 787 with glasses.

“For students with vision issues, a pair of glasses is as important as school supplies like books, pencils, and computers,” said Vernon Public Schools Superintendent Joseph Macary. “Vision To Learn’s program is simple, yet powerful, and we are already seeing the positive impact on our students’ learning.”

Vision To Learn’s effort in Connecticut has found a large unmet need among students in the state. About 35% of students provided with a vision screening by Vision To Learn needed an eye exam, 85% of students who received an eye exam needed glasses and more than 80% of them did not have them.

Dalio Education provided seed funding for Vision To Learn’s Connecticut region, and recently matched grants by CT State Department of Education and Focusing Philanthropy, for a combined $1 million in new program funding for Connecticut.

“I know how much this work matters because I personally rely on eyeglasses for everything, and I have a grandson who wears eyeglasses too. I feel tremendous gratitude to Vision To Learn for providing not only the eye exams but also the glasses for the children who need them; after all, how can they succeed in school and life without them,” said Barbara Dalio, Founder and Director of Dalio Education.

“The Connecticut State Department of Education has been a proud partner and supporter of Vision To Learn since it launched in Connecticut in 2022,” Education Commissioner Charlene M. Russell-Tucker said. “We know from the research that vision programs that offer children eye examinations and eyeglasses help improve academic performance and student success. We look forward to continuing our collaboration with Vision To Learn as we strive towards ensuring every child has the tools they need to achieve their full potential.”

Connecticut is also the site of Vision To Learn’s first WNBA partnership – with the CT Sun. Vision To Learn’s mobile clinic is decorated with CT Sun team colors and team mascot Blaze, to the delight of school children.

“The Connecticut Sun Foundation is proud to partner with Vision To Learn in Connecticut, to help students see clearly in class, and on the basketball court,” said Morgan Tuck, Connecticut Sun Director of Franchise Development.

Experts estimate three to four million children across the country go to school every day unable to see the board or pages of a textbook clearly. About one in four children will naturally need glasses. Children who need glasses and don’t have them are more likely to be misdiagnosed with behavioral issues in kindergarten, be labeled “slow” learners by 5th grade, and to drop out of high school. Unfortunately, in low-income urban and rural communities, most children who need glasses don’t have them due to financial constraints, language barriers, unresponsive health bureaucracies or the simple fact there are no eye care professionals in their neighborhood.

Over the last decade, nonprofit charity Vision To Learn has worked to address the “glasses gap” by providing vision screenings, eye exams and glasses to kids where they are most days – at their neighborhood school. With a fleet of mobile clinics staffed with trained and licensed eye care professionals, Vision To Learn has helped ensure nearly 2.9 million students across the country received vision screenings and provided more than 440,000 with glasses, all at no cost to the child or their family.

The impact of providing glasses to children at schools is shown in a study published in JAMA  Ophthalmology by researchers from the Center for Research and Reform in Education and the Wilmer Eye Institute at Johns Hopkins University.

The researchers conducted the largest and most rigorous study in the U.S. about the connection between glasses and academic achievement by comparing students’ standardized test scores before and after receiving glasses from Vision To Learn. Thousands of children from more than 100 schools in Baltimore participated in the study. The children who received glasses did much better in school and the impacts were greater than more costly measures such as lengthening the school day, providing computers, or creating charter schools. The children who showed the biggest gains, the equivalent of an additional four to six months of learning, were those who are often the hardest to help—students in the bottom quarter of their class academically and students with learning differences and disabilities.

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About Vision To Learn

Vision To Learn, a non-profit charity, was founded in 2012 by Austin Beutner and the Beutner Family Foundation. Vision To Learn serves the needs of the hardest-to-reach children; about 90% of kids served by Vision To Learn live in poverty and about 85% are Black or Latino. Vision To Learn has provided nearly 2.9 million children with vision screenings and more than 440,000 with glasses, in 16 states and the District of Columbia. It has also identified more than 50,000 children with more complex vision and medical issues – all at no cost to children or their families. For more information on Vision To Learn, please visit www.visiontolearn.org.