Meet Bonnie Cohen-Greenberg of BCG Learning Specialists

Today we’d like to introduce you to Bonnie Cohen-Greenberg.

Bonnie, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
I have been in the special education field, in many different capacities, for over 40 years. I received a Doctorate in Educational Leadership in 2008 and, in 1991, also took additional coursework from Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA to become certified to work with children with orthopedic and health impairments. I have presented in my community and throughout the country on a variety of topics and on five episodes of Connecting With Kids and Great by Eight television shows.

I thoroughly enjoyed college, graduate school, and my doctoral program. However, early schooling was not a happy time for me. Until the 6th grade, I attended an inner-city school that was on split sessions, due to the lack of space, forcing me to attend school for only half a day in overcrowded classrooms. The overburdened teachers did not know me, had little time to teach me, and as a result, handed me good grades. I moved to a top-notch suburban school district in 6th grade where the teacher saw that I was gifted verbally but had significant issues with gross and fine motor skills and spatial relations. I decided to work in special education to work with students who also learned differently, supporting myself through graduate school by tutoring. After receiving my master’s degree in Special Education in 1979 with additional course work in assessment and the teaching of reading, I worked as an educational evaluator for the City of New York in 1979, where I assessed students to determine whether or not they had a learning disability.

Afterward, I taught students with learning disabilities in a variety of public and private settings. However, my real passion came from working with students in 1:1 settings, and I decided to leave teaching and tutor full-time. I worked in private schools and with homeschoolers during the day and with public schools’ students after school and weekends. When my students got to the point where I felt they needed subject-specific tutors, I referred them out, in-servicing the new tutors on the specific needs of my students. It didn’t work! Although the tutors acted like they understood the students they were responsible for teaching, the parents came back complaining that their children’s needs (especially emotional ones) were not being met. Realizing that I needed to be more hands-on, I started recruiting tutors who had both subject knowledge and a deep understanding for students who learn differently to work with me. Now we have 118 tutors who work with me at BCG Learning Specialists.

Has it been a smooth road?
Establishing BCG Learning Specialists has not been a smooth road. In order to have tutors with a great deal of quality experience, graduate degrees, and a passion for working with students who learn differently, I needed to pay the tutors most of what I collected. There was little left for overhead, and I needed to use the compensation that I received through my own tutoring to fund the practice. However, I was happy as I was following my calling. We opened a physical learning center, outgrew it in three years, and then moved to a multilevel 2000 square feet office that we divided into smaller offices.

After several years, traffic had become unbearable; people were traveling from long distances (Gwinnett County to East Cobb, etc.) because of our uniqueness. In addition, I knew that I needed to raise our rates if we were to maintain our current space. However, I didn’t feel comfortable doing so because of the economic struggle that families were feeling in 2008. In fact, I was doing a great deal of work pro bono at that time. Therefore, we decided to become community-based. Some of our tutors traveled to a student’s home, others had private offices in professional buildings or home offices in the communities where their students lived. I moved my personal office into my home. In order to stay in touch with the families and remain an active case manager, I encouraged parents to meet with me at least monthly. Like all of our communication, there was never a charge for that service.

As we grew, I had to spend more of my time managing the practice, leaving little time for working with students. I was ready to go back to being a solo practitioner when my son (who had previously worked with students who learn differently) begged me to remain open. He knew this practice was my “third child” and didn’t want me to give up my dream. At the time, Eric was a professional musician who had been on tour for the past eight years. He came back to Atlanta, obtained a graduate degree in special education, and helped me modernize the practice.

So, as you know, we’re impressed with BCG Learning Specialists – tell our readers more, for example, what you’re most proud of as a company and what sets you apart from others.
BCG Learning Specialists is a private tutoring service for individuals who learn in their own unique ways. We use individualized approaches to maximize potential through evidence-based practices. We pay top dollar to hire the best professionals available to meet our students’ needs. All of our tutors have (at least) a master’s degree. We communicate often by sending out weekly email reports to parents and our students’ teachers at their schools. We never charge for communication by phone or email. Our director, Dr. Bonnie Cohen-Greenberg, encourages complimentary, in-person meetings each month. We tutor children from preschool through graduate school in all subjects in our offices, at the student’s home, at the tutor’s home, or at whatever public location is most convenient.

During the school day, we work with students in various private schools throughout Atlanta. BCG students have the same tutor or tutors each week for each part of their program. We customize each student’s curriculum based on his or her needs. We take into consideration psychological, speech and language, and occupational therapists’ evaluations, as well as school reports, teacher recommendations, and most of all, input from parents and students. BCG pays top dollar in order to hire the best specialists in a variety of subject matters who know how to apply research-based-techniques when teaching to the specific needs of students of all different learning styles. BCG treats our students and parents like family. We have no contracts. We only require 24 hours notice to cancel an appointment. We never charge for last minute cancelations due to illness. A student at BCG looking to improve in a certain subject or test can count on working with an expert in that specific area of learning who appreciates teaching to the particular needs of each student.

Where do you see your industry going over the next 5-10 years? Any big shifts, changes, trends, etc?
Business people, who are interested more in the bottom line than in educating students, are taking over the field. New franchises are constantly opening, and we can see them in many strip malls. These business owners often develop, with the help of educators, their own one-size-fits-all systems and hire the most inexpensive warm bodies that they can find. The tutors are not equipped to adapt the lessons to their students’ learning styles and needs nor can they prepare individualized lessons and choose or create materials. In many of these programs, students work with whatever person happens to be available and might have a different tutor each week or even switch tutors in the middle of a session. The students do not get a chance to develop a relationship with a tutor who knows them well enough to be able to motivate and inspire them. Most students will perform up to their potential when they are able to trust that their tutor has a genuine interest in them and their progress. In many cases, tutors do not necessarily work with the subject matter in which they are experts.

Group tutoring sessions are another trend. Often students with different abilities and needs sit at tables, all working on different material. In some places, there are groups of tables in the same room making it difficult for students to pay attention. Some have tutors walking around the room and others sit one tutor at each table. Many hire college students who only are capable of doing drill and practice or homework help rather than helping students increase their skills they can transfer to other situations and become independent learners.

Practices are cropping up specifically to help students score well on college entrance exams. In many of those practices, instructors are hired based on how well they scored on the test rather than their ability to teach. Without a background in pedagogy, they are unable to translate the material and concepts in a way that struggling students can relate to.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://bcglearning.com/
• Phone: 770-565-9979
• Email: dr.bonnie@bcglearning.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bcglearningspecialists/
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/BCGLearning/
• Twitter: @BCG_Learning

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