Our 9-year-old daughter has had such a positive and enriching experience at Stowell Learning Center. From the moment she started, we noticed a boost in her confidence and a new excitement for learning. The progress she's made--academically and emotionally--has been truly remarkable. A huge thank-you to Miss Sarah and Miss Natalie, who have both been incredibly patient, encouraging, and dedicated. They take the time to really understand her needs and tailor each session to help her grow. Their warm and supportive approach has made her feel comfortable, motivated, and proud of her accomplishments. I absolutely love Miss Sarah's "get to work" attitude and my daughter loves Miss Natiles fashion choices. The environment at Stowell is welcoming and uplifting, and our daughter always looks forward to her sessions. As parents, we appreciate the clear communication and the genuine care they show for her success. We are so grateful for the positive impact this center--and especially Miss Sarah and Miss Natalie--have had on her learning journey. We highly recommend Stowell Learning Center to any family looking for a caring and effective place for their child to thrive. read more

I can't say enough about Stowell. I came to the lobby when my son was in 5th grade and I must have interviewed every mother grandmother in the lobby. The front desk knew I was serious and determined and a no fuss mother who wanted answers. Finding a solution, giving me answers and showing me the steps was comforting. I had learned about the center from a speech therapist. She suggested it and said you are the only determined mother who will drive an hour one way daily. Two hours round trip! I did! I drove so much and was exhausted. Needless to say thank you Stowell as I write this with tears in my eyes. My son can read, he is graduating from high school in eight weeks and currently has a 3.74. It has been four years since he has been there but looking back I don't regret all the money, time spent. Seeing your child thrive is priceless!!! Thank you to Kaitlyn!! Thank you Everyone else! It is a great operation! read more

I'm so so sorry but my son time and effort were wasted at this place to understand why parents feel this way. Our son now needing more intensive interventions because of the experience of more harm than good was experience at Stowe ll Learning Center. If you have a son or daughter that has a true Learning Disability with a complex of Dyslexia this place wont be the place to address your son or daughter progress. More so a place such as a cognitive school such as Foundations Cognitive School or The Johnson Academy. The Johnson Academy is the only school in Orange County dedicated to offering a California State Standards curriculum in tandem with academic, auditory and language based therapies. I encourage all parents looking for help for their child when an IEP or 504 plane in the public schools or private schools dont work for your child. What then? private tutoring at home or in a office building isn't working out in the long its a wast your time and hurting your child your child. Parents look for places such as school that your child can attained while receiving their exact and correct help with their learning disability. Many people and private business target in making profits off of these innocent kids who suffer from such as a learning disability such as DYSLEXIA. These companies that say they know how to help dyslexic students dont. Nor do they have the correct training nor have the correct employees with the correct training to know how to the help these special students whose brains function differently. Parents be open minded to follow your instinct and search for what you believe is right for your child not what others will tell you what is right for you child. lots of money and time can be spent doing the wrong therapy, counseling, or treatment. Learning disabilities inflict pain. Children are complex and possess strengths in a variety of areas. But, for 13 years (kindergarten thru 12th grade), their self-esteem is based on academic success. Your child may express reluctance to attend school, moodiness, or tell you "I'm not smart." Often, children with learning disabilities specifically in reading will do anything to avoid reading aloud at school or pretend to have forgotten an assignment to hide their weaknesses. The key to success is to get help as soon as possible. It is never too late. read more

They are nice, but the program did not work / help at all for my son. I wouldn't suggest people look elsewhere unless they have money to burn. read more

When I first attended an information session at Stowell Learning Center, Irvine, I was struck by how many other parents shared similar struggles regarding their childrens' learning difficulties. I was impressed that SLC had been around for so many years and had helped so many individuals, but would they be able to help my daughter? That was my biggest question. Now that we've been attending SLC for about 16 months, I can say yes, we have seen great improvement with K's reading, writing, and learning overall. We feel so fortunate to have Sarah as our lead clinician, as she not only has a wealth of knowledge and experience, but she also has a great rapport with K. Sarah finds ways to make learning engaging and fun, which is not always easy when tackling new and difficult tasks. She is always on top of things and keeps us informed and updated with any changes in K's program. We are very pleased with the progress that K has made since attending SLC and know that Sarah is a large part of K's success. read more

Brendan has really reached my son and always finds ways to help him work on his mental flexibility, which has always been a struggle for him. Julian can challenge our son is ways that really push him to improve while always helping him feel successful. We have seen huge improvements with our son's capabilities and his self esteem since beginning the program and we are grateful! read more

We were referred to Stowell by a friend and have been very impressed with the staff. Our son has difficulty with auditory processing and reading comprehension. We went through the evaluation and found gaps in a few underlying skills. Don P. has been fantastic. He is genuine, passionate, and caring. My son looks forward to going and has made improvement over the few months. We have noticed our son is less stressed and able to relax himself. We look forward to the continued progress. read more

We are so thankful for Sarah, she has truly taken our daughter to the next level. She is patient and firm, always challenging her, yet in a positive and fun way. She also communicates very well, always on top of our schedules, questions and concerns. Additionally, Sarah, Jessica, Lauren, and team all have helped our daughter with her abilities and building her confidence tremendously. Stowell Learning Center has such a great caring team who truly cares and strive the best for your child to learn to their best ability no matter what their learning challenges can be. Lastly, I wanted to say "Thank You" to Jill for finding this center and help all those in need. read more

We feel SO LUCKY that we found this place! Our son was diagnosed at 3 with a speech/language delay, and language processing issues. Thus began his special education experience, starting with a language based preschool and speech and occupational therapy services once he got into elementary school. We saw progress with these services but saw our son struggling with homework in third grade. Fourth grade was a struggle from the beginning and we knew we needed to get him some help, but didn't know where to start. I also knew that getting a tutor wouldn't help him, and that his issues went way beyond not understanding the homework. By sheer coincidence I stumbled upon Stowell Learning Center after a good friend who knew how stressed out I was about this forwarded me an email she received about a homework help seminar. When I arrived, I was given a book called "At Wits End" that was written by the owner. I politely accepted, but knew I wouldn't read it. While the seminar really was specifically about helpful homework strategies, I didn't really know who Stowell was, or what they did. So, I signed up to go to their information night, about a week later. During that time, I just so happened to flip through the book I was given and quickly realized they were describing my son. I couldn't believe it - all of these bizarre things I had noticed him do while he was working, like dropping random words when he read out loud, things I thought only he did, were being talked about IN THIS BOOK! So, I read the book cover to cover in no time, and couldn't believe there was someone who not only knew about these behaviors, but could explain why they were happening, knew how to fix them AND they happened to be located about ten minutes from my home! The information night reiterated a lot of what read about in the book and just confirmed that this was exactly the help we were looking for. I signed him up to get tested by them about a week later. He got tested, then my husband and I met with them later that afternoon to discuss the results. (My husband was also surprised by all of this, and I wanted him to be there just to make sure he was hearing all of the same things I was, since it almost seemed too good to be true.) The test was three hours long. When we met to go over the findings, I couldn't believe that the staff learned so much about our son in those three hours. They picked up on all kinds of behaviors and issues, some very subtle that we knew about but weren't really being addressed by his teachers. We were so impressed! These strangers, who didn't know us and just met out son, really had his learning issues thoroughly summed up and understood in the short time they spent with him. Even more unexpected was their casual attitude about the whole thing. We never knew this kind of help even existed and here they were saying they have been working with and helping kids just like our son for 30 years and know they can FIX these problems permanently! We couldn't start fast enough. Although this therapy is extremely expensive, we knew we had to try it. We have been going to Stowell for 6 months now and have seen some amazing changes in our son. After 7 years of speech therapy, his speech was cleaned up in about 5 months. There are sounds he was never able to make, such as "R" always sounded like a "W" along with other letter combinations - th, sh, etc. Now he can make all of those sounds. There are so many words that are sounding so normal after hearing him mispronounce them his entire life! He is also so much more aware of everything, including himself. It is this kind of self awareness that has made it possible for him to focus, when he was always so wiggly and distracted before. We see his stamina in this department constantly improving, making it possible to concentrate and better understand schoolwork. Overall, he is more aware of everything and engaged with his surroundings. This has been life changing for our son. For the first time, we feel like we are getting him exactly what he needs and the peace of mind that comes with this is priceless. We still have a ways to go to get him caught up but we are very hopeful that this will happen, as we continue to see him grow, improve and progress every day with this kind of help. We are ever so grateful for the staff at the Irvine location. Everyone has been so wonderfully supportive and amazing to work with. They are all so professional and truly care about him. He loves going too! He adores the staff who manage to make everything fun and positive. He notices the difference in himself, which does amazing things for his confidence. I can't say enough about this place and the wonderful people who work there. I know there are so many kids/families out there in need of this help, I know what it has done for us, so I try to share this information with everyone I can. read more

I cannot say enough good things about Stowell Learning Center in Irvine. In short, Jill Stowell and her team get to the root issues causing learning difficulties. Many of us have had our kids assessed. In our case we had a full speech therapy assessment done with follow up reviews over a 3 yr period and a full psych/educational assessment. But the tricky part is "What now?" Can the deficits be treated or should our daughter go through life compensating for these deficits. She struggled and we struggled with her. I'm writing as a mother of a soon to be 10 year old 4th grader who in broad terms has a language based learning disorder. In specific terms, she struggles with working memory, executive functioning, a slower cognitive processing speed etc. She really struggled with schoolwork and has had to put in 150% effort, often doing homework for 1.5 hours. She wonders why she is "so slow, I can't get it, why she can't remember facts and that other kids get to play but not her". On top of that, we were living in Shanghai where everything was competitive and stressful. We moved to Irvine last year and was looking for what services would best address her struggles. I was NOT convinced that she needed to be in speech therapy for the rest of her life. Though I was grateful for the intervention we received in Shanghai in speech therapy, the pace of her improvement did not match the increasing demands of each academic year. I was blessed to have been introduced to Stowell Learning Center through a contact. My daughter was assessed in September 2013. The assessment painted an accurate picture of what I had been observing at home and gave me more insight as to "Why"she was struggling so much. One of the KEY areas was that her auditory processing capacity was 4 years behind her peers. No one told me this before :-) She was then put on a program; a combination of listening/comprehension, reading, sound therapy and maths concepts. The sessions are NOT tutoring. ie she does not do homework there. Her sessions of listening and repeating the sounds, sentences, differentiating/discriminating sounds and words etc are all targeting the areas of deficits. The programs are not one size fits all. They are tailored to the child's needs. The Irvine staff are professional yet caring. Opening lines of communication to the teachers and advocate for the children's needs. They are incredibly supportive and approachable. So, it's our 5th month of going 3 afternoons a week. Yes, it is time consuming. But well worth it. What do I see in our daughter? I am seeing a transformation in her. She is more comfortable in her own skin. Her confidence has grown. She now knows that she is not stupid, as her test scores are showing that she is going from a C student in some subjects to a B+ and A-. We don't put a lot of emphasis on scores per se. As long as she does her best, we are happy. But test scores are showing that she is not only learning, she is retaining the information and can reproduce what she knows. She understands that she learns differently. When we started at Stowell, in her reading and comprehension tests each week, she was getting 9/20. 2 months into Stowell, she was getting 14-15/20. 5 months in, she is now getting anywhere between 18-20/20. She is understanding the material in its context more and more. She will always have to work hard but now she is seeing the rewards of her hard work. Rather than just constantly working hard. I need to say too that she goes to a great school that accommodates for her learning style, provides the support she needs and there is good partnership happening between Stowell, the school and home. We are each doing our part in supporting and training her. Cost? It's costly but again, worth every cent. We have made some lifestyle choices to give her the opportunity to learn and grow at Stowell. We see it as a necessary investment in her life. I have seen the effectiveness of the training she is receiving at Stowell Learning Center and the changes in our daughter. I know there are other kids and families who struggle like we did and I would love to see the kids go through the changes that I have seen in our daughter. I highly recommend the book "At Wits End" written by Jill Stowell. You will see that this company is serious about helping kids and that Jill has done the hard grunt work constantly learning, getting trained up herself and asking the questions "can this be remedied and how and is there a better way?" for 25+ years. The information nights are really worth going to. SLC have helped 100's of children with a variety of learning styles and challenges and I am grateful that my daughter is one of them. read more

Stowell Learning Center has been such a blessing to my son - and our entire family. He is extremely bright but struggled academically. Our older son attended Stowell Learning Center 15 years ago and achieved wonderful results. As such, we knew we could trust their services again for our younger son. Kwonta and Eli care for my son personally. They guide him and encourage him. They are providing him with skills that are going to stay with him for life. It's wonderful to see him flourish at school now. His final grades this year were a 3.4! We couldn't be happier! Thank you, Stowell!!..for giving my son his confidence back and preparing him for a successful future!! read more

Stowell has helped my son with his learning and confidence, helping him to feel like a serious student. He absolutely loves Tony, who has been a teacher and a mentor to him. We came in skeptical but are very grateful for the incredible progress that he has made -- now reading at grade level and more importantly, enjoying reading! Thank you, Tony and Stowell! read more

My family is so blessed to have found the Stowell Learning Center. My son has had trouble with anxiety since he was three years old. We thought he would have anxiety problems his entire life but Stowell Learning Center was able to identify that he actually had an auditory processing deficit of 3 years. He was exhibiting anxiety because his auditory processing system was so far behind. He has been at Stowell for 6 months and his auditory skills have improved 3 years and he is no longer behind!! His anxiety has almost gone away! We now have a confident, happy child! Thank you Jill Stowell, Lauren, Irene and Kristina! read more

I cannot say enough about this great learning center. My son has been going for 6 months and the difference is amazing. He feels confident and empowered -- such a huge gift! If you have any concerns, or just want extra support for your child, this is the place! They have free monthly information nights that you can attend if you are curious about the work they do. You will not regret it. read more