DPS School Board President Otis Mathis Talks about His Grammar

DETROIT - Reading and writing are fundamental tools in education, but the president of the Detroit School Board says a learning disability has been a life long challenge for him.

"You survive. You made it. Now, you're telling me people with disability can not be leaders," said Otis Mathis.

The president of the Detroit School Board is taking his licks for being unable to write a sentence that makes sense. His e-mails were published in the Detroit News and Detroit Free Press.

"Do DPS control the Foundation or outside group? If an outside group control the Foundation, then what is DPS board row with selection of is director? Our we mixing DPS and none DPS row's, and who is the watch dog," Mathis wrote in an e-mail.

As a child, Mathis was placed in special education.

"So, of course, they put me in special ed. My parents fought to get me out, but it set me back a half a year," Mathis said.

Mathis, a U.S. Navy veteran, is a math wizard. In high school, he took four years of algebra, two years of geometry, trigonometry and calculus. He aced the college math exams, but he never had success writing sentences.

A Wayne State professor told him he had a disability with which he would have to deal.

"She told me that... the way you talk, you don't even write the way you talk. So, there's a disconnect in your brain... When that signal goes to your fingers to write, something happens," said Mathis.

Elected to the school board in January 2008, all the other board members voted him in as president in January of this year. It's a two year term.

DPS Emergency Financial Manager Robert Bobb told FOX 2 he's only concerned with Mathis' ability to get the job done, and he believes he's doing that.

Mathis believes he's a role model for kids who are dealing with a learning disability.

"I hope I am," Mathis said.