Throughout his long career as a learning consultant, Mike Haykin has worked with children—adolescents and young adults—to discover their talents and strengths, so they can find their unique place in the world. Sounds simple, but it’s not. A young person’s development and growth can be stymied by any number of factors, ranging from learning styles and learning disabilities to mental illnesses and substance abuse issues. And in some instances, kids might be enrolled in a school or a program that just isn’t the right fit.
Compounding matters, kids are seen through the lens of their parents, friends or schools who set the expectations for who they want the kids to be. The disconnect between the reality of who a kid is, and the false expectations placed on that kid, can result in disastrous outcomes. This is where Mike Haykin steps in. He works as a consultant with schools, parents, and young people who are struggling to develop career paths, independence and their own social network.
While Mike has a finely honed set of skills for working with kids and their families, he’s also smart, relatable, and has a powerful intuition that helps him circumvent or navigate a crisis. Each young person he encounters is accorded respect and given a chance to thrive. He is able to assess what is more likely to work, even when other programs and resources have failed.
Mike is different from other learning consultants because he knows what kids are going through; he’s been there! Born in Omaha, Nebraska, Mike moved to the Pacific Northwest when he was a kid. Raised by a psychiatrist father and a stay-at-home Mom, he had four siblings. His own personal journey through education and, later, finding his own career path took an unconventional route.
He recalls that he checked out of education at a very early age, skipped his first full day of school in the second grade, and actually dropped out of school at fifteen. He remembers the suffering he experienced of being forced to sit in a classroom when he could be doing a whole bunch of other things. He knew school just wasn’t working for him, but he didn’t know what to do about it. His own experience in school made him especially compassionate of other kids who had similar experiences.
There are many things that interfere with a kid’s experience in school, and the consequence of that interference is a lot of frustration and fatigue. Many support systems have been designed to respond to a kid’s surface behaviors: what a kid is doing wrong by acting out, getting into trouble, or underperforming.
What do you do when a child isn’t doing well in school? Even when parents get support for their children, there is a tendency for them to worry if they are doing the right thing. When a kid isn’t doing well, the surface behaviors distract educators and parents from what is really important. Conventional support systems tend to treat the surface behaviors without delving into a kid’s individual experience to understand what is going on in the first place.
Mike has cultivated his knowledge of strategies, techniques, and interventions for over forty-five years. He has seen what works. He has also been able to discern the different pieces of a program and types of resources that are relevant and can support a kid. To some extent, he acts as a matchmaker by drawing among multiple professionals, programs and resources to create the best fit for a kid’s particular situation.
Above all, Mike keeps his focus on the young person. What a kid has already experienced in life is a major determining factor in defining who that kid is. “I let them know that I value who they are and what their experience is.”
Known for working with difficult or challenging cases that don’t fit the normal paradigm for learning, Mike has three categories of clients: other learning support professionals who consult with him because he has a high level of experience and is well known in the field; families comprise the second category of clients; schools and educational departments seeking to enrich their academic/learning programs comprise the third category of clients.
Each individual he deals with is both similar to others, but different because each individual has a unique profile. Here is one scenario. A student has difficulty learning through reading. Mike will come up with a plan that enables the kid to gather information in ways other than reading and then as a result, the kid becomes better at gathering information through reading. The program includes learning through other forms of media—film, audio (podcasts)—that help a kid become more efficient at processing information.
One of the most challenging scenarios Mike has worked with are the ones who have severe substance abuse problems. Young people with substance abuse problems are the most difficult to get to participate, so they can be helped. “You lose people to that,” Mike said. “Substance use is as corrosive and damaging as anything out there.”
The next hardest case is a young person whose parent does not have any value for who the kid is and only sees who they want the kid to be. Kids recognize that they are not necessarily who their parents want them to be, and it’s painful for them. “The kids are told they are a failure and a disappointment. These kids are considered to be performance objects. Those cases are hard and involve complex, multigenerational issues.”
Every family situation is different, but there are three common factors that will support every young person. “Listening.” Mike notes that listening is essential. “It always goes back to deep listening.” A second factor is having a parent or family member who really believes in a young person and sees all of the possibilities for individual growth. The third factor is not putting false ceilings on kids by being a naysayer. “The naysayer will say, ‘No way in hell will they be able to do x,y.z….’” Putting false ceilings on young people is one of the most important things not to do. “It limits a person,” Mike said.
Looking back at his own journey, Mike emphasizes that early on, he could distinguish the subtle as well as the not-so-subtle differences among kids. One of his first jobs was driving a large school bus to transport kids with special needs. The diagnostic categories ran the gamut: deaf, developmentally disabled, blind, emotionally disturbed, behaviorally disabled…He drove them to different schools throughout Seattle and dropped them off. He remembers enjoying the experience, which was ironic because he hated his own experience in school and never thought he would work in education.
Toward the end of his first year of driving a school bus, the principal of the school that had the behaviorally challenged kids approached Mike and said, “Hey, when you finish your teaching degree, let me know. I've got a job for you here.” Funnily enough, Mike wasn’t going to school. Mike later had coffee with that principal who convinced him to give college a try. So, he went to college and found that he could actually enjoy learning.
His first job post-secondary education and then working with kids K-6 who had severe behavior anomalies gave him a longitudinal perspective—that is if you don’t help kids discover their strengths, passions, purpose, meaning, then these kids are spending most of their lives being “fixed” by someone. “Kids are put on a planet and can do everything by about the 2nd or 3rd grade, so it becomes about what they did or did not do. Kids become performance objects, and their value is diminished.”
The core learning components of reading, processing information, and development are relative to time. The kids who are taking more time to do these things are singled out, and that affects the view they have of themselves. The kid might be missing bits and pieces. There might be holes in learning skills vocabulary, reading and the time it takes to process information—that ensures they are seen as incompetent, but they are really capable people.
The language of disability has to be used to legally access 504 plans that are put into place to give kids special accommodations. For example, if a kid needs to have extended time, say for test-taking, then the kid has to have been given a diagnosis for a qualifying disability. The designation can carry a stigma. Kids lose the contact and connection with what engages them and what they enjoy doing.
Purpose, passion, meaning—what engages a kid? Mike emphasizes, “There needs to be as much time spent discovering and building on strengths, instead of only working on areas of deficits or weaknesses. If you’re going to build self-esteem, it has to hang on something.”
When you have a track record of excellence as Mike does, parents and educators sing his praises, spreading the word. His clients come largely through referral by word-of-mouth. “The sole focus of my work is to look beyond the surface behavior and focus on the subjective reality of the young person. When you can do that, you can understand what to do, and know the types of support that makes sense.”
Mike knows kids want to be valued for more than their productivity or the ability to perform well in school. Kids want to be seen and heard for who they really are. Returning to the experience of the kid, Mike listens to what is said, but he is also considering what is not being said, that is the deep listening that goes beyond words. “One of my favorite activities is to ask a parent what you think your child thinks,” Mike said. “Just listen. What are you listening for? The body language, the silence, the communication, both what is said and what is unsaid.”
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About Mike Haykin
Professionally, he has dedicated his career to developing programs in schools and healthcare settings to help youth, young adults and their parents and/or guardians. For 23 years, he served at the Seattle Academy of Arts and Sciences (SAAS) in a variety of roles, ranging from developing and directing the Learning Support Programs, to leading the Counseling Department, to supporting the administration as an Assistant Head of School. Most recently, Mike developed and launched the high school Options Program at SAAS, a program that provides intensive and individualized support for students with diverse learning needs.
Mike began his career working in the national dissemination grant, Project HELDS (Higher Educations for Learning Disabled Students) and wrote grants to service students with disabilities in Community College settings. He has served as a public school special education teacher, where he transformed a self-contained behavior program into a successful inclusion program. He has also helped establish Elementary Counseling Services at 6 public schools and Study Skills classes in various Middle School settings.
Beyond program development, Mike has had experience in providing assessment and consultation services in hospital settings. He has taught university and college counseling courses, provided extensive professional development and parent education presentations, and consulted with multiple social service settings. In addition, he has served on many Board and advisory committees, including his current service to Sharing The Stage.
Mike has coauthored several books, including Leadership in Behavior Support, Meaningful Work, and Administrators Desk Reference of Behavior Management.
Mike received his master’s degree from the University of Washington with an emphasis on Counseling. He received his undergraduate degree from Central Washington University, specializing in Special Education and he completed an administrative certification Program from Gonzaga University.
His latest project, in conjunction with the educational company Peopling Me, is a series of 20-minute instructional videos that offer guided practice to parents, schools, and other learning consultants. Peopling.me is a pioneering online platform dedicated to enhancing interpersonal relationships by expanding knowledge and understanding. The first Peopling Me videos featuring Mike Haykin are projected to be released in the Fall, 2025.
In his spare time, Mike enjoys flyfishing, rockhounding, gem cutting, travel and most important—his new role as a grandparent. As a biological father of one and stepfather of two, he understands the complexities and nuances inherent in blended families with diverse cultural identities.
And most recently Mike has served as a Subject Matter Expert giving testimony to improve access to behavioral health services for K-12 youth, to improve hospital discharge for transition-age youth who have complex behavioral health needs, and to improve resources for transition-age youth. For more information about Mike Haykin, please see his website: https://www.haykinmikeconsulting.net
Patricia Vaccarino
Patricia Vaccarino is an accomplished writer who has written award-winning film scripts, press materials, articles, essays, speeches, web content, marketing collateral, and ten books.