The People Guiding Our Work

Perry Flynn is the 2026 President Elect of the American Speech Language Hearing Association. Perry is a Board Certified Specialist in Child Language and Fellow of the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association.

He is the Consultant to the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction in the area of Speech-Language Pathology, a Professor in the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders at the University of North Carolina Greensboro and a Member of the Special Olympics North Carolina, Board of Directors. He is a Professional Association of Therapeutic Horsemanship, Certified Therapeutic Riding Instructor.

Sandie Barrie Blackley is the co-founder and Chief Knowledge Officer of Mind InFormation LLC. Her inspiration for helping struggling readers started at home: "I realized that my very bright son, a third-grader at the time, was having difficulty learning to read. I had been trained in the Orton-Gillingham Approach in graduate school but hadn't had much occasion to use it, so I dusted it off and used it with my son. After the first few lessons he asked me why no one had ever told him this was the way sounds and letters worked. It was a startling question and one I have been trying to answer ever since."

Sandie is a speech-language pathologist with more than 30 years of experience in private practice. She is Visiting Assistant Professor of Communication Sciences & Disorders at University of North Carolina Greensboro, and founder/owner of the Language & Learning Clinic, PLLC, a private practice in Elkin and Greensboro, North Carolina, specializing in communication disorders, including disorders of reading and written language. In 1998 Sandie was honored with the Clinical Services Award by the North Carolina Speech, Hearing & Language Association (NCSHLA), the award for the state's most outstanding clinician. She is a Fellow of the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association and a past president of the North Carolina Speech, Hearing and Language Association. She was appointed by Governor Hunt and served two terms on the North Carolina Board of Examiners for Speech-Language Pathologists and Audiologists.

Chad Myers is the co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Mind InFormation, LLC. Like Sandie Barrie Blackley, Chad was inspired by personal experience: "I am the oldest of three kids. In elementary school my brother and I were in the gifted classes. Our younger sister, who is every bit as smart, or smarter, was held back in second grade due to a reading disability. I got to see the detrimental effect on her confidence and academic progress. Happily, with years of hard work, my sister was able to read at grade level, graduated with a masters degree in special education, and is now the best writer in our family!"

A skilled entrepreneur with experience in designing and building online platforms around Web 2.0 principles, Chad was CFO of a Singapore startup in the online distribution of user-generated mobile content, and was Adjunct Professor of Entrepreneurship and the Executive Director of the Rudolf and Valeria Maag International Centre for Entrepreneurship at the business school, INSEAD in France and Singapore, where he also got his MBA.

Dr. Jill Fromewick is the Executive Director of Sparrow Research Group, a program evaluation and user experience (UX) consulting firm dedicated to the practical application of research findings.

She is guided by a fierce commitment to advancing health and equity, and aims to drive research that improves processes and strengthens impact. Jill has lived in Asheville, NC for 20 years and loves to bike, hike, and travel with her 10 year old son. Jill's son went through the Lexercise program and she is passionate about sharing this resource with all families. Jill received her Doctorate of Science in Social Epidemiology and Social Policy from the Harvard School of Public Health.