You're familiar with andrus? cool!
Yeah, Ive read up a little bit about the sanctuary model. When I was there, we had group levels 1-4 which had nothing at all to do with when you could be discharged, unless you were on group 4, which meant you had just come back from going awol. It was super different than the families we had at CEDU. Also, there was restraint, but if memory serves it was always one on one, although they dont do restraint any more anyways.
I remember being on group 4 for a day for something, but I forgot what. I basically had to stay on the first floor of the cottage and sit on the sofa by the staff room. Other than that, I could do whatever I wanted. I also remember a place in Dallas that my parents looked at when they were going to send me to CEDU called the Julia Phaller home that seemed almost identical in setup to andrus, especially since I would have still been able to go to my high school (arts magnet booker t.) and everything. (I went to hastings HS when I was at andrus. Before that, I spent 8th grade at their on campus school The Orchard.)
It was almost like a group home, except with a bit more structure. It was close to both downtown Yonkers and hastings, and right by the westchester bus line, which could take us up to white plains, or to one of the nearby metro north train stops which could take us right into the city if we wanted. If we werent visiting our folks on the weekend, we'd normally go as a house to flea markets at yonkers raceway, or run up to yonkers or white plains with a group of friends, unsupervised.
Seriously, if this person got sent to a place like andrus they could be a shit fuck of a lot worse off. I had more fun getting into trouble there... and still maintain it was one of the best things that could have happened to me... much much better than living with my mom, which would have driven me to slitting my wrists for real. Although Im not sure they are treating kids of teen years there, any more.
The campus was HUGE, and I would often cut class just so I could trot back up the aqueduct from HHS and hang out by myself in the woods. One of the house mothers said that she saw Berkowitz himself drive around in his little yellow bug casing the joint during the summer of sam. No idea if it was really him she saw, but it's a cute story. (Her husband freaked out and ran off after he saw the car. "OMG Its son of sam! Its son of sam!") But seriously, if you wanted to, you could hide LOTS of bodies back there. Lots and lots and lots. All of us spoke of that fact often, and would sometimes mount excursions to see if we could find a patch of the campus we had previously overlooked. Hogwarts for juvvies.
Im still on their mailing list, and one of these years Im going to get up enough money to go to one of their summer bbq reunions. Those things look really interesting because a lot of old folks will come who were there when andrus was still an orphanage.
Yeah.. JCCA. One of my andrus buds got sent up there and me and a few of the guys were going to go awol one night, steal a car, and bust her out of there. Never happened... we all fell asleep and woke up in our run away clothes... hehe. teens have such grandiose plans, that rarely pan out. She was fine, btw. Came back to visit us and hang out often.
