Fornits

Fornits Home for Wayward Web Fora
An open discussion about the troubled parent industry

They used to use water purification tablets?  Shit, those things don't even work that well.  That's fucked up.

I was at that assembly.  Charles Cates did not tell the students not to tell their parents.  He told them not to tell their parents a faulty version of the story.  That was the whole point of making the announcement.  He wanted to dispell rumors before everyone got on the phone to tell their parents "locals are coming onto campus raping girls".  You may not like Charles Cates, but he is not stupid.  He is not going to tell the student body not to tell their parents.

No, trust me: Charles Cates is very stupid.  I don't normally make a practice of insulting people so directly, but that man is a fool.  He sent out a letter to the parents telling them about the lawsuit before the word really got out to everyone.  Well, Charles speeded that process right up, now didn't he?  That is one example out of many, many, many more, but if you ask any of the parents who have had dealings with him, he is not only stupid, but incompetent as well.  I mean, for Christ's sake, he mispronounced Samara's name in Assembly every week even though she had already been there like two years.  If that doesn't show a great deal of stupidity (or maybe just senility), I just don't know what does.

As someone who was a student at HLA very recently (including while the riding program was in place), I can tell you that it is definitely not any fun at all.  If it is more fun now than it used to be, then I can't imagine what you all had to go through.  Let me just say that if you were to ask any current student at HLA if they think it is at all enjoyable to be there, they would not only tell you that it is not, they would also tell you that it is a terrible place to be, and that nobody wants to be there at all.  It is understandable for people to resist when they are first sent away to a therapeutic environment, or sent anywhere for that matter, but the fact is this: if the students felt that the school was helping them, there would surely be a few of the older students who would admit that going there was for the better after all, and there would not be so many people who have so many horrible things to say about the place.  Open your eyes!  It is a glaringly obvious problem when none of the students have anything positive to say about the place that is supposed to have saved their lives.

P.S. - The school has only been open for 12 years, and there are already at least hundreds of people who went there and are now a part of the fight to close it down.

Ed Clark works as an Earth Element counselor in conjunction with two master's level counselors.  He does not have a group unto himself.  The irony of you making these comments about his qualifications (which on paper are poor), is that he is great working with the kids.  He has very good insight, he is very bright, and is able to balance firmness with gentleness quite effectively.



This is not to say that you do not make some very good points about what HLA claims to have and what they actually have.  In this case, however, it is just ironic because Clark is very good with the kids.

Alright, I am not one to bash people, and I am not going to make an exception now, but I need to clear some things up.  First of all, Ed Clark being "very good with the kids" is subjective.  From my extensive personal experience with Ed, I will say that I think he is a good person with good motives, but I don't know if he is really very good at what he does.  I have seen him give out a ten-page writing assignment to a kid because the kid was out of dress code.  Now, a zap would have been adequate, don't you think?  Ed is a nice guy, and I don't think he is out to exploit or damage people like some of the others at HLA, but I don't know if he is really the right man for the job.  I would advise asking others besides me, because I have my opinion and others have theirs, but consider what I have said here.  I don't think Ed is the only nice but unqualified person there, either (um... Matt Klein anyone?).

Okay, what do ya want to bet that the five are in this group

http://www.ridgecreek.org/staff.htm
Mark Keith
Gary Pennell
Machael Ramsey
Ken See
Bill Ingram
Mark Borah

Come on. Someone bust out with the names and what
forms of abuses they were using.

I am puzzled at this; the six staff you listed are six very decent guys.  Add Lenny Wade to this list and you've got the round-up of credible, trustworthy RCI employees.  I'll tell you two really good people that worked there that are no longer listed on the website: Carrie Bryant and her husband Blake Bryant.  Blake was one of my instructors during my little excursion, and he helped me a LOT.  He really cared about us, and Ken See did too.  There are some who simply did not.  I will leave it up to those people who have more extensive Ridge Creek experience to explain who those people are and what they did to prove their apathy toward the well-being of the students.