Speedlearning Institute

This was a horrific experience. Significant portion of the class time was spent on learning how great it is to be positive and smile. Reading exercises made up only a fraction of the class time. I had to leave during the break in the post-​lunch session because it was a huge waste of time. A lot of people were rolling their eyes through the class, my neighbor said it was the strangest class she took in her life. I don’t recommend this to anyone.

This place is a joke. I went here through groupon 129 dollars for an 8 hour course figured I should learn a lot. Most of this class is completely irrelevant its mostly self motivation about how you should smile everyday and tell yourself that you rock!!! More then an hour of this course alone all your doing is literally standing up In your seat and jumping up in the air yelling ace’s. this was by far one of the dumbest classes I’ve taken through groupon. The little part of the course that does teach you how to read is a bit helpful but it’s not going to blow your mind if you ask me this place was a huge scam…

After attending the speed-​reading class I have instantly implemented the knowledge gained during those 6 hours. It does take some practice to completely master the skill, but every advice we have received is very helpful and valuable. There were 4 different teachers/​professors, each touching upon different aspects of the skill. So besides the actual techniques we have also learned some positive affirmations, how to calm oneself down when nervous and eye exercise. I had a great time and left the auditorium very inspired and motivated!

I went to this class a couple of months ago — it was an interesting concept, training your eyes/​brain to use more of your peripheral vision to increase your reading speed. We were given lots of exercises to do. And told that we had to practice at home in order to really get it down. I didn’t practice so I didn’t really get it down. But it was an interesting experience anyway. It was a long class though and it was expensive for what it was. The guy who presented was a little old school and he droned on and was repetitive for certain parts of it but he’s been doing this for a long time, he trained people in the government on these same methods and demonstrated it for different staff members in several presidential administrations. It was kind of a pain to get up to Columbia University where they held the class but I love the campus there. I don’t know whether to recommend this class or not because the method does work for some people but you have to practice it in order to really get it and I didn’t so I can’t say for sure whether it works or not. However, I would definitely say don’t go unless you have a deal coupon. But if you do go to the class, you can repeat it (I’m not sure if you can repeat it as many times as you want) but they said at the end of class anyone who attends is allowed to come back and take the class again for free.

So I purchased two discounted tickets for a speed reading course on one of the bigger coupon sites — original price was supposedly $ 695 each («Value» price) and I paid $ 129 each. I have always believed in speed reading as a real and valuable skill and I thought this would be a good opportunity for me to learn it. I dragged my gf along. The class was set for one of Columbia’s lecture rooms on a recent Sunday from 9a-​3p. Prior to the class I did seek more info from the organizer (who will remain unnamed here) and he assured me that it is a great class and I will be very happy and they have taught numerous executives and politicians etc. over many decades. Ok, so far so good I thought.
We got there to meet the instructor — he was a nice guy probably in his late 60’s or early 70’s. That said he did not strike me as a very effective or engaging speaker or teacher. We received a bound paper syllabus/​coursebook and a laser pointer each. There were probably 50 other students there, varying ages b/​w 18 to 50 or so. The class started with a YouTube video on «eye yoga» exercises. Ok – I thought that was kinda weird but it only lasted about 10 minutes so that’s fine I guess. Then the «teaching» began. And it was painful, boy was it painful. We went till about 1:30pm — most of the time (maybe 70%) the instructor was speaking, and I’d say 80% of what he was saying was along the lines of «You can do it, you can improve, you will get better, practice practice practice…» — i. e not anything meaningful about the actual technique of speed reading. Bummer. The other 30% he’d instruct us to flip to any page in the book and practice whatever rudimentary technique he just taught us. I think a lot of people were like me surprised and confused as to how unstructured and seemingly random the whole affair was. Oh and I almost forgot — somewhere in there they had us watch another ridiculous 15 minute YouTube video about «Tapping to success» or something like that — the vid had some lady on there tapping her face and head while repeating things like «I will be successful. I will put $ 50,000 into my bank account.» It was truly ridiculous.
It was a PAINFUL 4.5 hours. Then right before I couldn’t take any more and was going to walk about they let us go for lunch around 1:30pm. I did not return (neither did my gf).
Did I learn anything at all? Yes, maybe some very basic speed reading techniques — that could have literally been taught in 10 minutes or better yet I could find on the internet myself. I still do believe in speed reading, and I do believe that there are some effective courses out there. But this is definitely NOT one of them.
Save your money and more importantly save your time, skip this course. Even if it were free I would not recommend it to anyone.