Treatment Abuse, Behavior Modification, Thought Reform > Hyde Schools
Advice to Parents Considering Hyde School
Anonymous:
An acquaintance of mine recently told me about this website and the detailed discussion of the Hyde School. I'm a parent of a student who left Hyde at the end of the academic year (in good standing, I should add). I've now taken some time to read many of the postings on this website. Unfortunately, many of the postings seem like an exchange between a couple of angry, impulsive adolescents who are trading insults. I wouldn't pay much attention to these barbs.
But, if you can wade through the postings on this site you'll also find quite a few very thoughtful comments and observations that, in my opinion, capture Hyde's culture very accurately. Yes, some students and families benefit from their Hyde experience. They are very vocal supporters. And, I wholeheartedly agree with those who say that Hyde can be a very, very destructive environment. It's true that the seminars can harm people greatly (in addition to providing some participants with a "growth" experience). If you enroll at Hyde there's a very good chance that some staff and alumni parents will confront you in a very condescending, patronizing, and finger-pointing way, accusing you of not examining your own issues or digging deep enough. You will feel pressured to expose very intimate information about your lives to complete strangers. You can expect to witness seminar participants "lose it"; sadly, the seminar facilitators typically are teachers and alumni parents who have virtually no formal training in the handling of incredibly sensitive matters like these. The consequences can be tragic, although they aren't always. During my years with Hyde I've observed seminar participants scream, yell, threaten suicide, and bolt from the room while other participants and staff merely watched, not knowing quite what to do. I sincerely regret that I exposed my child to this experience. My partner and I eventually recognized our mistake -- late in the game, unfortunately -- and we've moved on. We feel so much better having divorced ourselves from Hyde. My child is functioning SO much better in her current school, which is so much healthier than Hyde in so many ways (the staff at the current school treat students and parents in a very humane way and stay in very close touch with parents -- just the opposite of our Hyde experience).
At Hyde I met some wonderfully sensitive, caring parents and staff. Unfortunately, they were overshadowed by the many staff and alumni parents (the latter volunteer to staff mandatory seminars) who often come across in a very patronizing, insensitive and arrogant manner. That behavior is very common at Hyde and seems to be the "norm." (I encourage you to read HydeFan's postings on this website. That's the style of communication I found to be very common at Hyde -- confrontational, defensive, accusing, with occasional flashes of insight and fair-minded reasoning. If you're not comfortable with that style, Hyde may not be for you.) It's also true that the turnover among staff (many of whom are very, very young and inexperienced) and students is high.
There are a number of schools for struggling teens that are so much more constructive than Hyde. I encourage you to look for them, perhaps with the help of a well informed educational consultant. My partner and I have met many parents who rushed into Hyde because they felt desperate to find a school in the middle of the year, usually while in a crisis state. Often these parents were new to the boarding school world and didn't know how may alternatives to Hyde exist. Hyde's enrollment seems to benefit greatly from the pool of desperate parents. Too often parents don't have the time to consider various schools and carefully examine their strengths and limitations. I've encountered many parents who discovered over time that Hyde is a very poor fit for their child and family and, eventually, looked for a more wholesome environment. There are lots and lots of parents who found a more appropriate school post-Hyde. Taking the time to talk with other parents who have conducted the search can be very helpful.
Good luck.
Troll Control:
Thank you for posting. Your comments are truly insightful.
What I find most interesting is that this theme cross-cuts the entire "industry," not just Hyde. There are a few well-intentioned staff and teachers that do their best to help kids, but simply cannot do so within the framework of the "program."
Unfortunately, these employees are usually ostracized and denigrated by the "true believers" (usually the management) and are "squeezed out" of their jobs, usually to be left with the impression that I got: this treatment modality simply does not work and can be very damaging to the developing mind. This is precisely why one deosn't see "professionals" working at places like Hyde.
Any educated mental health or education professional sees right away that the "program" is bunk and these types of places make a living marketing hope to desperate parents.
In any case, thank you once again for your comments and good luck with your daughter.
Anonymous:
I had both a son and a daughter at wilderness programs/schools and they both had at least one professional available to the participants. Do you mean to tell me as big as Hyde is, (at least 180 students)they do not have any professionals on staff?
Anonymous:
--- Quote ---On 2005-10-10 15:03:00, Anonymous wrote:
"I had both a son and a daughter at wilderness programs/schools and they both had at least one professional available to the participants. Do you mean to tell me as big as Hyde is, (at least 180 students)they do not have any professionals on staff?"
--- End quote ---
You may find this hard to believe, but during our two-year experience with Hyde they did not employ even a single mental health professional on staff -- not a single one. After we were at the school for several months we discovered that an enormous percentage of kids at Hyde struggle with things like depression, anxiety, eating disorders, substance abuse, and so on; we hadn't known that when we started. We quickly found out that Hyde views everything a kid does that's problematic as a "character" and "attitude" issue. Mental health doesn't enter into the equation. We spoke with many parents who had the same reaction we did (although some parents like Hyde's approach). That's one of the reasons many thoughtful parents leave the school. They realize it's terribly shortsighted to treat kids this way. (Hyde did bring in a professional from the outside to run groups for kids in recovery.)
If you think your kid has any mental health issues at all that affect his/her behavior and need to be considered, I recommend you find a school that is sensitive to those needs. Hyde is not. Period.
Antigen:
For a long while, we had a former therapist from CEDU posting here. You might be able to find his story; he posted as "former cedu therapist", if memory serves.
He had a lot to say about the difficulty in having actual educated psyche professionals working in a LGA style environment. The staff, he said (peer staff, graduates, I guess?) bullied and cowed the therapists and never let them have any meaningfull access to the kids.
If there is a God, he is a malign thug.
--Samuel Clemens "Mark Twain", American author and humorist
--- End quote ---
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