On 2005-04-11 06:44:00, Anonymous wrote:
"Could you please name some alternative boarding schools that are good? I haven't found positives anywhere on this forum"
Well, the problem with that is the first question you have to ask is, "Good for what?"
For myself, one of my biggest problem with this industry is that I firmly believe that one-size-fits-all facilities that claim to treat every "troubled teen" problem---or claim to treat this problem to one set of parents and that problem to another---don't work.
Here are my positive recommendations. They won't be what program advocates want to hear, but they're the most effective positive solutions for each kind of problem that I know.
-------------------------------------------------
There are four distinct classes of "troubled teen": 1) seriously mentally ill teen--may have any of the other problems, too, but the mental illness should govern the choice of placement; 2) juvenile delinquent teen; 3) drug addicted teen; 4) teen with lesser problems such as family animosities, anger, casual sex, casual drug use, bad grades, learning disabilities, wrong crowd, and so forth.
Here are my recommendations, but while above I've got the most serious problem that should govern the placement (if the teen has multiple problems) first, below I've discussed the kinds of placement I think are appropriate in the order that made sense to me while I was writing this post. The recommendations are split out by category number.
Category 4:
For a child that just needs some time and distance under other responsible adults because of the normal adolescent friction with his or her parents, a traditional boarding school is a good choice. This is also a good choice for a teen that has fallen in with a rough crowd where the teen agrees that a change would be good---maybe the teen wants to change groups of friends but the realities of the teen social caste system make that easier said than done. A boarding school can give that teen a fresh start---especially if the problems like bad grades, sex, and casual drug use are being driven by local peer pressure. Also, if sex is the problem, a traditional single-sex boarding school may not eliminate the problem, but by reducing opportunities it may limit the problem enough that nothing disastrous happens before the teen grows into an adult and can make his or her own decisions with the same degree of judgement as any 18 year old. A traditional boarding school is also an excellent choice if the teen just wants to get out of the house because of domestic friction between the teen and step-family-members.
For traditional boarding schools, I'd judge them by whether they're accredited, their graduates' ACT and SAT scores, their graduation rates, and/or any features appropriate to your particular teen's talents. If your teen is academically mediocre but excels at one of the fine arts or athletics, the facility that speaks to your teen's most likely aptitude for his/her professional career will be different from the pure academics. If your teen has an exceptional academic talent in a particular area, like math or science, a good boarding school for you will be entirely different from the appropriate one if your teen has the talent to make it to Juliard.
If your teen has one or more serious learning disabilities, obviously you want the traditional boarding school with the best experience teaching to the learning style that works best with that particular kind of problem. ADHD requires modifications to teaching style, classroom environment, and student-teacher ratio, not a lockdown.
A category 4 child is probably best off in a traditional boarding school supported by outpatient therapy as needed.
Category 1:
For a teen with a major mental illness, an entirely different kind of facility is appropriate and it *shouldn't* take non-mentally-ill teens, such as juvenile delinquents. If you want testimonials on alternative facilities for seriously mentally ill children, go check out the parent testimonials section of the message boards at the Children and Adolescent Bipolar Foundation---google CABF.
Category 2:
For a teen with no mental illness whose problem is serious juvenile delinquent behavior, so serious that family members, neighbors, or the house itself is at risk from violence or serious theft---use the legal system and juvenile detention. They provide some educational services to the incarcerated youth and are better at providing a "wake up call" without doing further trauma damage than any of the boarding schools out there.
Just as public school in some areas is better than some of the private schools in those areas, public detention (juvie) is better than a lot of private prisons. The quality of public detention is so much more reliable than that of private prisons that putting your young juvenile delinquent in private prison is a needless risk. Save your money to help him/her learn a trade or profession when he/she gets out if the wake-up call has worked--you're likely to get much more bang for your buck that way.
Category 4 again:
For a teen whose problems are delinquency but not serious enough that you feel you just have to get him/her out of the house for good, try the *real* Outward Bound. It has a very good track record. Its imitators aren't nearly as good and can be outright harmful. This is a case where substituting cheap imitations (or even expensive ones) can be harmful to your family and your child. I don't believe they will take kids against their will, so your fallback in that case would need to be either applying normal parenting strategies while waiting to see if the problem gets better or worse, or using the legal system and juvenile detention.
Category 3:
For an actually drug addicted teen, a *short* course of rehab and then a change of environment and outpatient therapy---either the parents move *or* a traditional boarding school, is the best option. The short course of rehab breaks the immediate grip of the drug and deals with any withdrawal problems. The change of environment takes the recovering addict out of the places and situations where he used to use drugs---which the research shows are powerful prompts to use drugs again. The outpatient therapy supports the ongoing recovery process. Repeat short courses of rehab as needed. There is really no shortcut in addiction treatment, I believe, over taking the short rehab over and over again until it takes.
If anyone else knows of actual studies that show better outcomes from long rehab over multiple courses of short rehab when and if relapses happen, please post cites.
The truth is that genuine addicts (not just casual users called "addicts" by ideologues because of the particular drug used) always have a certain risk of relapse. As long as you break the immediate grip of the drug, which is what short rehab does, then each time outpatient therapy has about as much chance of keeping the addiction in long-term remission as the patient would have coming out of long-term rehab (and you'd have to continue outpatient therapy after long-term rehab, anyway). When you get an addict out of rehab, short or long, it's always a case of providing whatever supportive outpatient care you can, crossing your fingers, and praying. You don't get any noticeable edge from keeping the addict in rehab twice as long and hiring people to pray over him in relays. :-/
I know of know studies that would suggest that long-term rehab, and the necessary ongoing outpatient therapy or support group participation, is worth its increased cost and time over short-term rehab. With either long or short term rehab, you have to pay for outpatient therapy or continue with support group supportive care afterwards, you have substantial risk of relapse, and if you get a relapse, you have to put the addict right back in rehab---pretty much over and over until you get a remission. The additional cost of long-term rehab, over short-term rehab, is a waste of money for what you get---or, rather, what you *don't* get.
With addictions, there are no guarantees. Better off the same time in rehab split over a lot of short courses than one long rehab---because each time your addict comes out of rehab is one more chance for remission to "take."
---------------------------------------------------
See, the problem is, we *do* give positive recommendations about what to do in the various cases. It's just not what Program fans want to hear, so they tend to blow it off and say we don't make any positive recommendations.
My recommendations are positive *and realistic*.
I'm not making empty promises about the probable outcomes that are too good to be true, so a lot of people won't like what I have to say.
1) The truth is a major mental illness is for life no matter what you do. Ongoing treatment helps a lot, but doesn't cure.
2) The truth is a lot of juvenile delinquents grow up to have more trouble with the law, no matter what you do.
3) The truth is addicts relapse more often than not, no matter what you do.
4) The truth is that most pain in the butt teens grow up to have about the same range of outcomes as teens who aren't as big of pains in the butt, and that their outcomes are mostly dependent on what *they* decide to do---you can't improve that range of outcomes, but you can *certainly* worsen it by sticking them in some private prison that traumatizes and damages them.
The truth is that if your teen is a wounded bird, there are no miracle cures.
But there are better and worse choices for how to make the most of your teen's chances---and the better choices are NOT "one size fits all."
And the programs that accept multiple categories of child deliver "one size fits all" no matter how loudly they protest that they individualize the treatment to the child.
Nobody out there has magic fairy dust to fix your child if you just clap your hands and say, "I believe in fairies!"
The number one piece of advice all consumer advocates give for avoiding scams: If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
Timoclea
