There's a problem in the Jefferson County public school system that's coming into sharper focus.

Children who need glasses are getting their eye exams, but not taking the next step of getting glasses.

Well, a new pilot program looks to change that.

You know, last year in D.C., we had 9000 children fail their vision screenings and only about 10% of those had any follow up.

And so this is just a foundational, fundamental, you know, we can do all sorts of learning interventions.

But the truth is, if they can't see, they're not going to do well in school.

And so Dr. Sing-Off has been amazing.

I reached out to him in my work with with him through the health department, and he absolutely was interested, told me about the foundation, the work he and Dr. Bashir involved in the foundation, and said, I think this is something that we can help to address.

Jesse has a very robust program where they're screened children, even though the screened children, but children don't really get glasses.

And we all know if you don't have glasses in elementary school or middle school, you're just not going to perform.

Not only that, there's significant social impact.

You are labeled disruptive or you're not smart enough not knowing that you can't really read as a child.

So when she reached out to me, you know, we looked at the problem.

We figured out this is mostly inaccessibility problem.

We found basically every single class, four or five students and every single class that needs glasses.

So you're thinking, imagine a class of 25 or 30 kids like, you know, there's four or five they're not seeing.

You know, they can't read the paper in front of they can't see the book or like think about what that does for, you know, even stress on our teachers.

You know, trying to try to teach someone that can't even see what you're doing on the board and still manage the rest of the class.

So it's definitely have a positive impact on.

Our our goal is screen the children, find the prescription, try to get them glasses within a day or two so that they can enjoy reading, writing and learn.

It made me sad because without glasses I was different than everybody else when I did have glasses.

Everybody was very see, since the.

Six.

Time I just about anything because I couldn't see.

I see two, four, six.

I'm just like, I'm not counting in order like what's going on.

Me feel like disappointed because I can't read because I can't see.

So you realize when you listen to those stories that impact that you will make as a group.

These are community.

Problems.

We already have two more schools scheduled that we are going to the week after Thanksgiving.

So the goal is to probably go through every elementary school, probably through 2024.

We will be through every elementary school, then Woodstock, duckling, middle schools and beyond.

We'll just do this in a circle fashion so that we can keep on coming back serving once we have taken care of the big needs right now.

Very good.

What a fantastic program to continue into 2024 and those running it hope to take it to all schools in the Louisville area, both middle and possibly high schools in the future.