School/Life Balance
Testimonials
"Cheryl has been working with my now adult child for 5 months after a late ADHD diagnosis in her last semester of High School, and prepping her for Post Secondary. Cheryl has been extremely valuable from an academic, personal, emotional and mental health aspect. We highly recommend her expertise and approach for life altering success."
Parent of a Student Entering 1st Year University
​
"Cheryl has helped our teenage boys who are in high school and university, become self-aware and resourceful despite having a combination of ADHD and learning disabilities. With her compassionate guidance, they have developed skills that will serve them in academics and for the rest of their lives. She is an indispensable resource for our family.”
Parents of 3 Teenagers
​
'Our son has really has come a long way academically in high school. He went from being a "B" student in elementary school to straight A's. It's been really great to see his confidence grow and for him to be having so much success.'
Parents of Grade 10 Student
​
‘I didn’t have the confidence that I knew how to do the work, or thought I wouldn’t do well on it, so I didn’t do it. Now I am more confident that I can do it, and have less homework because I am getting the work done in class.’
Grade 10 Student
​
​
While working closely with our teenage son on high school academic success, we recognized lack of motivation and planning skills, struggles with time management and distractions were impeding on his success. These issues caused tensions in our family, with increasing difficulty for him to share his struggles with us. Knowing that high school academic achievement is a stepping stone for a successful future, we set out to find help.
Since our very first contact with Cheryl, she has been helpful above and beyond our expectations. She helped us understand that we were not the only ones with the executive function struggles. She developed our son’s trust and buy-in to address his issues with numerous practical suggestions and tips. Through regular sessions and follow ups with Cheryl, our son has managed to realize his academic potential, raise his marks, and significantly improve his planning skills and ownership of daily responsibilities, leading to increased independence and self-confidence. Even more importantly, Cheryl has helped everyone in our family feel happier, less worried and less stressed.
Currently, Cheryl meets with our son regularly to maintain and further build on executive functions and academic skills in preparation for university. Cheryl meticulously documents our son’s progress in mutually defined goals. She uses habits tracking and charting tools, which allow for visual representation of the importance of consistency and accountability for academic achievement. With our son’s permission, Cheryl shares detailed notes of the sessions with us. This has opened a wonderful and welcoming communication channel between us and our son, overcoming the communication barriers we previously had.
It is a pleasure and a relief to watch our son grasping executive functioning and reaching his academic success and independence with Cheryl’s support. Cheryl’s efforts are an extension of our parenting which reduces the stress of our family life. Cheryl is helping us prepare our son for a bright future ahead.
Parents of a 16-year old teenager, Burlington, Ontario
"Both of my children benefited from Cheryl’s approach to working with students. Between them, they have diagnoses including LD, ADHD and ASD, and Cheryl was more than qualified to support their needs. Cheryl has numerous certifications to support various special needs, as well as a variety of techniques to support skill development.
Most importantly, Cheryl gave them strategies for executive function and organization that they still use today! Her humour and patience made the sessions enjoyable, and we saw tremendous value in the investment. Their teachers also commented on their improvement while they had sessions with Cheryl."
Paula Presswood, Former Teacher,
Co-Founder Presswood Entertainment &
The Thoughtful Board
“Cheryl is a consummate professional who really ‘gets’ kids with exceptionalities. Her evidence-based coaching methods are so effective with the end goal of the student being as independent with learning as possible. She has been instrumental in helping our son identify his roadblocks to learning, develop the necessary tools needed to move beyond them, and to implement them on a regular basis to ensure continued success. Our son’s overall stress and anxiety levels surrounding e-learning (and school in general) have decreased exponentially. Cheryl is excellent at regularly communicating with parents after each completed coaching session. As parents, it was extremely helpful and appreciated to be kept informed about how our student was doing.
​
After a short time, we could see the results for ourselves as well. Our son now creates a weekly schedule and sticks to it. His assignments are handed in on time. The quality of his work has improved. He has more free time than ever before because he no longer needs to be up late cramming for a test, or finishing a project that is due the next day. These are just some of the amazing changes we have seen. If you are searching for that magical unicorn educator to support your exceptional student, look no further than School/Life Balance. You will not be disappointed. Cheryl really is the best of the best!”