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Ellis Abel Learns.

Ages 4–18 · every county in America

You are not the only family fighting this.

Every parent of a neurodivergent child is handed the same maze and told to walk it alone. The same waitlists. The same meeting where you are outnumbered. The same district that says there is no funding, to you, in private, one family at a time — because one family at a time is the only way that answer works.

A mastermind is the opposite arrangement. Eight to twenty families in one place, meeting monthly, sharing what actually happened: which evaluator has openings, what the district already approved for someone else, which wording got an accommodation granted. Then the same thing at county level. Then state. Then national — one count, one ask.

40 circle types × 4,299 US metro areas, cities and counties = 171,960 local pages · sitemap

How it goes from your kitchen to Congress

  1. Step 1

    Your circle

    Eight to twenty families, monthly, local. Your venue, your rules, your members.

  2. Step 2

    The county chapter

    Every circle reports one number and agrees on three asks. This is who the school board talks to.

  3. Step 3

    The state coalition

    One delegate per county. Tracks bills, testifies, works with the structures families already have a legal right to.

  4. Step 4

    The national assembly

    State coalitions quarterly. One count. Federal priorities on IDEA, evaluation timelines, transition services.

Parent circles by profile and by need (30)

Autism Parent Mastermind — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Autism CircleAges 4-18Every autistic child is different and every parent is handed the same maze anyway — evaluation waitlists, an IEP meeting where you are outnumbered, a school that says it has no funding. The circle exists so you walk in with what nine other families already learned the hard way.ADHD Parent Mastermind — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.ADHD CircleAges 4-18ADHD is the diagnosis most likely to be treated as a discipline problem. Parents get told to be firmer. The circle is where you find out which local schools actually implement a behavior plan and which ones write one and file it.Dyslexia Parent Mastermind — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Dyslexia CircleAges 4-18Reading instruction is the most litigated corner of special education, and the gap between what research supports and what a school offers is usually where a family gets stuck. Parents in this circle share which programs their district will actually fund.Dyscalculia Parent Mastermind — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Dyscalculia CircleAges 4-18Math learning disability gets a fraction of the attention dyslexia gets and roughly the same prevalence. Most families are told their child is lazy at math for years before anyone names it.Dysgraphia Parent Mastermind — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Dysgraphia CircleAges 4-18Writing difficulty is invisible until a child is asked to produce a page and cannot. Parents here trade what worked: scribing, speech-to-text, keyboarding, and the exact language that got it into a plan.Dyspraxia & DCD Parent Mastermind — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Dyspraxia CircleAges 4-18Developmental coordination difficulty affects PE, handwriting, lunch trays, shoelaces and self-esteem, usually in that order. It is rarely the thing a school plans for.Tourette & Tic Parent Mastermind — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Tourette CircleAges 4-18Tics get punished as defiance more often than they get understood. Families here work on the school conversation, the peer conversation, and the sibling conversation, which are three different jobs.Sensory Processing Parent Mastermind — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Sensory CircleAges 4-18Sensory difficulty is why a birthday party ends in the car park and why a fluorescent classroom is unbearable. Parents here map which local places are genuinely sensory-friendly and which just say so.Twice-Exceptional Parent Mastermind — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.2e CircleAges 4-18A gifted child with a disability gets the worst of both systems: too capable for support, too disabled for enrichment, and often labelled lazy in the gap. 2e families need a different argument and this circle builds it.Speech & Language Parent Mastermind — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Speech CircleAges 4-18Speech and language needs are the most common reason a young child gets services, and the first thing cut when a school is short of staff. Parents here track local caseloads and hold the line on minutes.Nonspeaking & AAC Parent Mastermind — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.AAC CircleAges 4-18A child without reliable speech is not a child without thoughts. Families here work on device funding, school buy-in, and the ordinary refusal to presume competence that they meet everywhere.Intellectual Disability Parent Mastermind — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.ID CircleAges 4-18Families here plan on a longer horizon than most: school, then work, then housing, then a life that outlasts the parents. Doing that alone is heavier than it needs to be.Learning Disability Parent Mastermind — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.LD CircleAges 4-18For families whose child has a specific learning disability that does not fit a neater label, or several at once. The paperwork is the same, the fight is the same, and the isolation is the same.Anxiety & Neurodivergence Parent Mastermind — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Anxiety CircleAges 4-18Anxiety rides alongside most neurodivergent profiles and often becomes the reason a child stops going to school. Families here separate the anxiety from the profile, because the two need different responses.Neurodivergent Play Group — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-11.Play GroupAges 4-11A play group where nobody has to explain their child. No apologising for a meltdown, no explaining the stimming, no watching another parent's face. Children play. Parents talk. Both need it.Neurodivergent Parent Support Circle — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Support CircleAges 4-18The one that is only about the adults. No agenda about the child's plan, no homework. Parenting a neurodivergent child is relentless and the exhaustion is rarely spoken about in the same room where the fighting gets planned.Best Practice Exchange — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Best PracticeAges 4-18The working session. What was tried, what happened, what the exact wording was. Most of what families need already exists in someone else's inbox two towns over, and this is the meeting that moves it.IEP Clinic — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.IEP ClinicAges 4-18A working clinic on the Individualised Education Program: how it is written, what a goal has to contain to be measurable, and what happens when the school does not deliver what the document says.504 Plan Clinic — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.504 ClinicAges 4-18Section 504 covers children who need accommodations without special education services, and it is the plan schools most often treat as optional. This clinic works on getting it written properly and enforced.Parent Advocacy Training — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Advocacy TrainingAges 4-18Skills, not sympathy. How to prepare for a meeting, what to put in writing, how to ask a question that has to be answered, and when to stop negotiating and use a process. Every state has a federally funded parent center and almost nobody uses it.Sibling Support Group — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Sibling GroupAges 4-18The brothers and sisters carry a load nobody planned for them: less attention, more responsibility, complicated feelings they will not say in front of a parent. This group is theirs.Dads Group — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Dads GroupAges 4-18Fathers of neurodivergent children are chronically under-represented in every parent group, and the ones who come say the same thing: nobody had asked them how they were doing. This one is set up for them.Moms Group — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Moms GroupAges 4-18Mothers carry most of the coordination — the appointments, the emails, the phone calls during work hours, the meetings. This group is about that load and about the person carrying it.Teen Neurodivergent Group — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 13-18.Teen GroupAges 13-18Thirteen to eighteen is where support usually falls off and the stakes go up: exams, driving, friendships, disclosure, and what happens after school. This group is for the young people and the parents in parallel.Transition to Adulthood — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 16-18.TransitionAges 16-18The cliff edge. School supports end, adult services have waiting lists measured in years, and the planning has to start long before anyone tells you. Families here work three years ahead on purpose.Respite Co-op — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Respite Co-opAges 4-18Paid respite is scarce and expensive. A co-op is families covering each other on a rota — trained, insured where required, and mutual. Two hours of genuine rest changes a week.Early Years Circle (4–7) — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-7.Early YearsAges 4-7Four to seven is where families are newest and most alone: first evaluations, first school meetings, first time being told to wait and see. Almost everything in this circle is about not losing two years to waiting.Elementary Circle (8–11) — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 8-11.ElementaryAges 8-11Eight to eleven is when the academic gap becomes visible and the social one starts. Plans exist by now, and the question shifts from getting one to making it real.Middle School Circle (12–14) — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 12-14.Middle SchoolAges 12-14Twelve to fourteen changes everything at once: several teachers instead of one, moving between rooms, and a social world that turns sharp. Supports that worked in a single classroom fall apart here.High School Circle (15–18) — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 15-18.High SchoolAges 15-18Fifteen to eighteen is exams, driving, part-time work, disclosure decisions and the countdown to services ending. The parent's job changes from managing to coaching, and that handover is genuinely hard.

County, state and federal voice (6)

County Chapter — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.County ChapterAges 4-18The county is the smallest unit with real power — school boards, health departments, parks, libraries, transport. A chapter is the standing group that shows up to those rooms with more than one family in it.State Coalition — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.State CoalitionAges 4-18Education funding, Medicaid waivers, waitlists and teacher licensing are decided at state level, and legislators hear from one parent at a time. A coalition of county chapters arrives as a constituency instead.National Assembly — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.National AssemblyAges 4-18Federal special education law, its funding level, and the enforcement behind it are national questions. An assembly of state coalitions can speak to them with the weight of counties behind every sentence.School Board Advocacy — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.School BoardAges 4-18The school board is the most accessible elected body in America and the least attended. Three prepared parents at a public comment period changes the temperature of a district conversation.State Legislature Advocacy — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.State AdvocacyAges 4-18Bills on evaluation timelines, waiver funding, restraint and seclusion, and teacher training move through state legislatures every session, usually with no parents in the room.Federal Policy Action — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Federal ActionAges 4-18Federal special education law promised a share of the cost of educating disabled children and has never been funded at that level. That gap is the single largest structural reason your district says it cannot afford what your child needs.

For groups that already exist (4)

Affiliate Your Local Program — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.AffiliateAges 4-18If you already run a support group, a play scheme, a therapy practice or a small charity, this is not a takeover. You keep your name, your money, your board and your way of doing things. What you gain is a state and national voice you cannot build alone.Keep Local, Grow Your Voice — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Local AutonomyAges 4-18Small local programs get absorbed or ignored, and both are losses. The ladder is built the other way round: the county chapter reports up, the state coalition speaks for it, and nobody upstream can tell a local group what to do.Shared Services for Local Groups — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.Shared ServicesAges 4-18The back office is what kills small groups: insurance, safeguarding policy, a website, a booking system, accounts. Sharing that across chapters costs each one a fraction and frees the volunteers for the actual work.Funding a Coalition — Ellis Abel Learns neurodivergent parent mastermind group icon, for families of children aged 4-18.FundingAges 4-18Grants are usually written for organizations of a size that most parent groups will never reach alone. A coalition can hold a grant that no single chapter could apply for, and pass the work down to the groups doing it.

The rules that make it work

Local groups keep local control

Your meetings, your members, your money, your name. Affiliation adds a count and a shared ask. It never adds a boss.

Nobody is diagnosed here

This is a working group of parents, not a clinical service. Families share what they did and what happened. Nobody prescribes, nobody treats, nobody assesses.

Experience is shared as experience

What one district approved is a fact worth passing on. What worked for one child is a data point, not a prescription. That distinction is enforced in every meeting.

The child is not the problem to be solved

The systems around the child are. Meetings are about paperwork, access, instruction and policy — not about fixing children.

One ask, said the same way

A group of forty saying forty different things is still forty individuals. The count only becomes power when the ask is identical.

The infinity symbol, not the puzzle piece

Neurodivergent people are not missing a piece. The language and the symbols used here follow the community that lives it.

If you already run a group

Keep running it. Nothing here asks you to merge, rename, hand over your members, or share your money. A local group that has been meeting for six years knows things no state organization can generate. What it usually does not have is insurance, a booking system, a policy template, or anyone sitting in the state capital when a bill moves. Those are the parts worth pooling — and any group can opt out of any part of it.

Affiliate an existing program · What local autonomy means here · Shared services

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