Getty-Dubay Italic was introduced in the United States by literacy teachers and calligraphers Barbara Getty and Inga Dubay in the early 1980s. In 2021, Inga Dubay’s son, Jonathan Dubay, developed an extensive typeface family that expanded the possibilities of the original system.
Sample pages of Handwriting Success, 2020. The Official Getty-Dubay® Italic Fonts Information.
It is a three-step progressive system comprising basic, precursive, and cursive writing. In addition, Getty-Dubay Italic offers optional models that have different letter joining options for letters such as m, n, e, and r.
From preschool to second grade (5–8 years old), students are taught the unjoined basic style. The writing is slanted and based on oval shapes, formal traits common to all three stages of the system. Third and fourth-grade students (8–10 years old) first learn the precursive style, recognizable by its unjoined entry and exit strokes. Finally, the cursive style is taught, where lowercase letters are joining, but uppercase ones are not.
