‘The reason why I think people who are dyslexic seem to do well in life, having struggled at school, is that we tend to simplify things’
Sir Richard Branson has said dyslexia should be recognised as a sign of potential in an effort to combat the stigma around the learning difficulty.
Mr Branson, who dropped out of school at 16, said his dyslexia was “treated as a handicap: my teachers thought I was lazy and dumb, and I couldn’t keep up or fit in.”
But he pointed out that Albert Einstein, Henry Ford and Steve Jobs are considered to be dyslexic.
In an article for The Sunday Times, Mr Branson wrote: “The reason why I think people who are dyslexic seem to do well in life, having struggled at school, is that we tend to simplify things.”
A YouGov survey to be unveiled at the launch of his charity Made by Dyslexia shows just three per cent of people consider dyslexia a positive trait.
“It is time we lost the stigma around dyslexia,” he wrote. “It is not a disadvantage; it is merely a different way of thinking.
“Once freed from archaic schooling practices and preconceptions, my mind opened up. Out in the real world, my dyslexia became my massive advantage: it helped me to think creatively and laterally, and see solutions where others saw problems.”
