Helping children succeed in school and in life is the goal of Vision To Learn, a national nonprofit organization that brings free vision screenings, eye exams and glasses directly to students.

For Colleen Ochoa Peters, a consultant for advancing student success at Vision To Learn, the impact becomes clear when children put on their glasses for the first time.

“It’s just so magical when a child puts their glasses on and then they take them off and they’re looking around and they realize what they don’t see,” Peters said.

She remembers one young girl at an eyeglass distribution event in Flint, Michigan, who was in about fourth or fifth grade. After receiving her glasses, the student looked across the gymnasium at the scoreboard.

“She was like, ‘Oh, that’s what that is,'” Peters recalled. “She had never been able to see that there were numbers on the scoreboard. Stories like that, which we encounter every single day at Vision To Learn, are what motivate us.”

Connecting children with vision care

Unidentified vision issues are common, according to Peter Silberman, chief growth officer at Vision To Learn. In a typical classroom, he said, about one in four or one in five children need glasses. In juvenile justice facilities, that figure rises to between 50% and 80%.

Vision impairment can also affect children’s experiences in school. Silberman said students who cannot see clearly are less likely to read at grade level and may become disengaged, withdrawn or frustrated.

“Kids often don’t know they can’t see,” Silberman said. “They may understand that their peers are making progress while they fall behind. You have a profound pipeline problem that’s eminently correctable.”

Vision To Learn was founded by Austin Beutner in 2012 and works with public and private partners across the country to connect children with vision care. In Detroit, its partners include Detroit Public Schools Community District (DPSCD), the Detroit Health Department and philanthropic organizations.

Kresge’s Detroit Program has supported the organization’s work as part of a broader focus on children, families and the conditions that help them thrive. A current $400,000 Kresge grant supports Vision To Learn’s work with DPSCD, the Detroit Health Department and the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services to provide eye exams and glasses to children across Detroit’s 66 Head Start programs, representing an estimated 2,400 students. The grant also supports efforts to develop public reimbursement strategies that could help sustain the work overtime.

For Phyllis Meadows, senior fellow with Kresge’s Detroit Program, that focus on early intervention is central to the partnership.

“Vision To Learn has been a valuable investment in advancing the early childhood health agenda within Hope Starts Here,” Meadows said. “The program also fills an important gap in access to preventive vision services for children in Detroit.”

The emphasis on younger children has grown as Vision To Learn and its partners consider vision as a critical component of kindergarten readiness.

Peters said Kresge’s support has helped the organization expand its attention to preschool and kindergarten students while continuing to serve older children.

“We’re now coordinating at the preschool, kindergarten level, so we can really do those early screenings too,” Peters said.

When people hear the term “kindergarten readiness,” they may think first about children learning letters, numbers or colors. Vision To Learn’s work adds another consideration: whether children can clearly see the teacher, a book or the materials they are being asked to learn from.

Direct impact

For some families, that connection between vision and learning becomes obvious almost immediately.

Vivian Shepard a mom to three daughters — Olivia, 9, Kindall,8, and Camile, 7 — saw changes immediately after all her girls received free eye exams and glasses through Vision To Learn. Before receiving glasses, the sisters experienced frequent headaches and struggled in school, but once they received their glasses, the reaction was immediate.

“Mom, everything is so big and clear — I can see everything now!” The sisters told their mom as they tried their glasses on for the first time.

The girls’ grades and confidence have improved since receiving their glasses, according to Shepard, and the program alleviated the financial burden for her family.

Silberman expresses that stories like Shepard’s reflect what Vision To Learn sees across the country.

“What we’ve seen is that it can be easier to move the dial on educational outcomes through health interventions,” Silberman said. “A healthy kid is much more likely to learn.”

He said that work also requires thinking beyond individual children to the systems that determine whether they receive care.

“Part of our job, as the organization that provides more than 100,000 eye exams to children every year, is to think through what systems changes we need to make to facilitate health care in schools,” Silberman said.

One such change has been Vision To Learn’s work with DPSCD to use an opt-out consent model. Rather than requiring families to sign and return a form before a child can receive services, eligible students can participate unless a parent or guardian chooses to opt out.

The change has dramatically increased participation.

“What we found is that we used to average about 50% participation with opt-in, when a family had to sign a form and return it to us,” Silberman said. “Under opt-out, we have a 98% participation rate. So, it effectively doubled the number of students who can participate.”

Silberman said Vision To Learn believes many of the families opting out already have an eye care provider. In most of the states where the organization bills Medicaid, he said, its records show that about 96% to 97% of the children it serves have not previously used their vision benefit, suggesting the program is reaching children who otherwise might not receive care.

Prior to partnering with Vision To Learn, Detroit Health Department data showed 98% of children who failed a screening did not receive follow-up care.