Our Team - Decoding Dyslexia Oregon

Board Members

Lisa Lyon, MPH, Founder & Interim President
As the parent of a 10th grade son who has dyslexia, Lisa feels passionate about increasing public awareness of dyslexia. She enjoys connecting with other parents and sharing resources to make their journeys with dyslexia a little easier and more efficient. Currently, Lisa coordinates the monthly lecture series and supports the development of new Oregon Decoding Dyslexia chapters.

Kelly Ravsten, Treasurer
Kelly is an Independent Consultant/Advisor who provides operational expertise, organizational advice and process improvement planning to organizations and individuals. Kelly is a parent of a child with dyslexia and is passionate about raising dyslexia awareness and improving resources and access to resources for students with dyslexia in Oregon schools.

Kara Clark, Secretary
Kara Clark has two children with Dyslexia and like so many families has had to educate herself to get her children the help they need. Kara has a passion for increasing awareness around Dyslexia and helping to create a supportive parent community. She believes parents are stronger and more effective when they can advocate for systemic change and provide emotional support to each other as part of a larger community. It became evident to Kara that there are immense inequities and socioeconomic barriers to obtaining intervention within our educational systems. Over the last two years Kara has focused on advocating for Structured Literacy as well as getting teachers the tools needed to provide evidence-based practices in order to ensure that all kids have access to literacy.

Cézanne Tyner
Cézanne Tyner is a former classroom teacher with a passion towards education success – especially with dyslexia. Her experience in teaching spans countries such as Kenya, Nicaragua, Romania and Japan. Cézanne has an undergraduate degree in Family and Human Services and a Masters in Teaching with an emphasis in English language arts and English as a Second Language.

She has been able to assume roles with public, charter, alternative, and catholic schools in Oregon and abroad. Cézanne’s love for education includes her learning and growing as well. She is a product of a Portland Public Schools education and determined to give back. Cézanne is a member of the Decoding Dyslexia Oregon Equity Council.

Dr. Scott Smith
Dr. Scott Smith has been in education for the past 40 years. Growing up in Eastern Oregon he struggled with school. His fifth-grade teacher told his parents he needed to find a trade because he would never be able to read or spell or write and attend college. Dr. Smith is a third-generation successful dyslexic.

His parents knew with the support that would not be the case. He obtained his Bachelors Degree from Western Oregon University, Masters from Lesley University, in Cambridge, MA and his Doctorate from Northcentral University in Prescott Valley, Arizona. He spent 26 years in elementary classrooms in Umatilla, Oregon, finishing his experience there as their Reading Coach. He then became an Assistant Professor at Eastern Oregon University in the Elementary Pre-Service teacher program. He worked as an instructional coach for the InterMountain ESD serving 18 rural school districts area of focus is pre-reading skills and reading instruction and dyslexia along with classroom instructional support. His book “Discovering Effective Reading Reading Instruction” (2019) he explains the hows and whys of Science-Based reading instruction. Scott contributes to Decoding Dyslexia as the Parent Support Coordinator for the Parent to Parent program.

Interested in joining our Board? Click Here for more information.

Staff

Diana Sticker, MPH, Founder & Marketing Director
Diana is a former research professional with a Master of Public Health from Johns Hopkins University. She and her daughter have dyslexia. Diana is passionate about creating systematic change that supports children with dyslexia and manages the marketing, communications and operations efforts and contributes to the legislative arm of Decoding Dyslexia Oregon.