List of Sites Opposing "Specialty Schools" "Therapeutic Boarding Schools" Bootcamps and the Like

It's only a partial list.  It might grow.

S.A.F.E.T.Y. = Survivors and Friends for the Ethical Treatment of Youth

Definition of an abusive program
Any drug treatment program, therapeutic boarding school, wilderness program, mental health facility, etc. for youth that uses coercion, total milieu control, intimidation, peer bullying, deprivation and control of basic human needs (food, water, shelter, medical care, and social interaction) to extract a desired behavior.

We are concerned about the rapid growth of private enterprises [for-profit businesses--ead] that do harm to young persons for monetary gain without legitimate professional staff or even professional guidance. False imprisonment and torture is frequently used to modify behavior of children. Sometimes the only qualification necessary to be a drug treatment "expert" is to have been a drug user. Out of control angry teens may be given power over other teens. Public detention centers, jails and mental hospitals are more accessible to the public and therefore, even though much trauma can occur and they have many problems, they are open to public scrutiny.

The Straights Dot Com (theStraights.com)

Watchdog for  juvenile synanons (more popularly known as juvenile therapeutic  communities) We  shall tolerate no treatment program where children can not talk,  in private, with their parents.

The folks at The Straights have teased out the interrelationships between Chuck Dierdrich, Synanon,  Daytop, Phoenix House and so on.  Rick Ross has a large clipping file on the Straights.

An Expose on Drug Free America

The Better Fight

Tranquility Bay is associated with the Worldwide Association of Specialty Programs (WWASP), which has had its facilities in Samoa and Mexico shut down. The New York Times said "it has a reputation as the harshest of them all" referring to Tranquility Bay's reputation in the network of behavior modification schools. I attended Tranquility Bay in 1999, and am very interested in seeing that the kids there now are not subjected to any form of mental or physical abuse.

International Survivors Action Committee  writes "Thousands of children are currently in privately owned "behavior modification"             programs.":

            

ISAC is a unique watchdog organization, focused on exposing abuse, civil rights violations and fraud perpetuated through privately-owned facilities for juveniles.

Everyone involved with ISAC volunteers their time.

ISAC is comprised of survivors of abusive programs and many of us are the parents of teenagers.

We believe our personal experience with these facilities provides us with the unique ability to detect signs of abuse that others miss.

ISAC is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. Donations are tax-deductible.

ISAC's mission: To ensure through research, investigation, and publication that all children maintain their dignity, are treated with respect, and their civil rights are not abridged.

The Eighth Step

Lineage:  Alcoholic Anonymous didn't quite work for Charles E. Diderich, so he founded Synanon, which declared itself a  religion in 1974..  Synanon begat the SEED,  SEED begat Straights Inc,   

There's also an online journal, a e-zine, called The Troubled Teen "Help" journal.

The Trebach Institute

The Trebach Institute in association with Survivors of Straight, Inc. have seen a common pattern of abuse in many of these diverse newage treatment programs,  and other patterns of abuse, and sometimes greed, in some more traditional, medically licensed programs.  The major purpose of this conference is to re-examine the destructive role that certain highly approved treatment programs have had on the children they were supposed to help. Thus we are turning conventional logic on its head and purposely coining a new phrase, treatment abuse. There are good reasons for doing so.

Bootcamps, "tough love" programs, programs that focus on berating and belittling participants, don't have the desired effect.

Highly publicized anti-violence programs like Scared Straight, D.A.R.E., and boot camp-type interventions won't change troubled kids' violent behaviors and may even encourage them, according to a new report from a U.S. government panel of experts.

"These programs can cost money and yet not produce any outcome the community wants -- and there's also the possibility that the programs might actually harm some youth and the community," said panel chairman Dr. Robert C. Johnson, director of Adolescent and Young Adult Medicine at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey.

Posts about the abrupt closing of Brown Schools / CEDU:

"This is a relationship-based program, and they closed this like it was a factory," a counselor at one of the schools told the Spokesman-Review newspaper in Spokane, Wash.

Brown Schools operate 11 boarding schools and educational facilities in Idaho, Texas, Vermont, Florida and California, according to its Web site. Facilities in Austin and San Marcos were sold to Psychiatric Solutions Inc. in 2003.

• RMA closing;
• CEDU shut down #1
• CEDU management notes
• A partial list of sites critical of "troubled teens" facilities
     
• Brown Schools, Parent of CEDU, Declares Bankruptcy;
• More on CEDU closing immediately
   
• A Parent's Plea: Don't Close CEDU
   
• An Alumni Pleads: Don't Close CEDU
   
• Bankruptcy Trustee Finds $1.5 Million Too Late to  Keep Schools Open
   
• CEDU Closing: Parents Out Prepaid Tuition, Employees Lose Retirement. McCown Deleeuw Still Solvent
• King George's Head Thinks on Feet, Keeps School Open
• CEDU Closing Stuns Struggling Teen's Len Woodbury

 

Comments

[Bill]

A.A. is still the only proven program for long-time sobriety. There used to be the attitude that A.A. was for drunks only, but that attitude has softened and substance abusers of any kind are welcomed.

One of the problems with N.A. and C.A., as related to me by a client with a history of heroin addiction, is that there are few, if any, individuals with a long period of sobriety in meeting groups. She made it back with A.A. after relapsing a number of times in N.A. She said that the old-timers in A.A. were supportive and gave her hope that there was a future.

[Sue]

I am looking for a short term therapuetic program in New York. My son is acting out after mistreatment from his teacher towards him in school. I am scared that he is going to the wrong way. He is not intersted in anything. He does not pay attention to school. He is faling his classes and he was diagnosed with Depression. I don't know what to do , I tried all what I know and nothing improved. He is monitored by a psychiatric and a therapist, but i don't feel that he is improving. do have any advice on what to do or how he can be helped and put back on track.

[Ann]

Does anyone have any information on a Southern California Scared Straight Program? Any information on this program or something of this nature would be a great help. My son will be 16 in March and he is an Angry, Defiant creep of a kid.

Thanks.