Vision To Learn Helps Students See at School in Rural Mono and Inyo Counties


​School-based mobile eye care provider Vision To Learn provides rural students in California’s Eastern Sierra with free eye exams and glasses since 2015


More than 1,400 kids provided with glasses to-date


​MAMMOTH, CA – For students in Mammoth, CA, getting an eye examination is no easy matter. The closest optometrist’s office is in Lake Tahoe, a nearly three-hour drive away. This leaves families with no easy option to bring their children for their recommended annual eye exam.


​Since 2015, Vision To Learn has worked to bring vision care directly to children, in Mammoth, Bishop, and smaller communities in California’s Mono and Inyo Counties. The nonprofit charity uses mobile vision clinics – an optometrist’s office on wheels – to reach students in communities where poverty or rural distance makes it difficult for many students to get the glasses they need to succeed in school.


​“More than 3 million children across the country go to school every day without the glasses they need,” said Vision To Learn Founder Austin Beutner. “When children go to school hungry, we feed them. We make sure they have the books and school supplies they need. Why not glasses? Every child in every school, everywhere in the country, should have the glasses they need to succeed in school and in life.”


​A new cohort of students will be provided with glasses at a celebration at Mammoth Elementary School (1500 Meridian Blvd, Mammoth Lakes, CA) on Wednesday, May 27, at 10:00 am PDT.


​“Vision To Learn has been a life saver for our students,” said Nurse Colleen Moxley, Health Coordinator at Mammoth Unified School District. “Without this program, many of our students who need glasses to do well at school would go without. Everyone is excited when the Vision To Learn team comes to town.”


​Since 2018, Anthem Blue Cross has supported Vision To Learn’s effort in the Eastern Sierras.


​“Anthem Blue Cross is proud to support Vision To Learn’s work in the Eastern Sierras. The organization is uniquely suited to provide access to critical vision care for students in rural communities,” said Denise Ornelas, Program Manager, Anthem Blue Cross.


​Since 2012, nonprofit charity Vision To Learn has provided vision screenings, eye exams and glasses to kids where they are most days – at their neighborhood school. With a fleet of mobile clinics staffed with trained and licensed eye care professionals, Vision To Learn has helped ensure almost 4 million children in 18 states across the country received vision screenings and provided more than 790,000 with eye exams and 660,000 with glasses, all at no cost to the child or their family.


​The impact of providing glasses to children at schools is shown in a study published in JAMA Ophthalmology by researchers from the Center for Research and Reform in Education and the Wilmer Eye Institute at Johns Hopkins University.


​The researchers conducted the largest study in the U.S. about the connection between glasses and academic achievement by comparing students’ standardized test scores before and after receiving glasses from Vision To Learn. Thousands of children from more than 100 schools in Baltimore participated in the study.


​The children who received glasses did much better in school and the positive impacts were greater than more costly measures such as lengthening the school day or providing computers. The children who showed the biggest gains, the equivalent of an additional four to six months of learning, were those who are often the hardest to help—students in the bottom quarter of their class academically and students with learning differences and disabilities. https://sierrawave.net/vision-to-learn-helps-students-see-at-school-in-rural-mono-and-inyo-counties/