On 2005-10-13 13:19:00, Desparate Dad wrote:
"Thanks to all that have posted in my request for information on the Anchor Academy in Havre, MT. I have found this site very informative. I have found the following:
1: People seem to like to generalize and have input even if they have no personal experience (shich is what I have asked for)
Are you talking about physically
being in the program? Is that what you're looking for? You know, just becuase someone wasn't at THAT place, doesn't mean they don't have bad memories of being held down in a revival tent and being told how worthless they are if they don't believe the words on the bible pages that are (sometimes literally) shoved down their throats.
2: There seems to be an overabundance of attacking another's beliefs instead of respecting a differing point of view
Why don't you respect a differing point of view then?
3: A lot of people with nothing better to do than sit and condemn an entire industry (that, I admit, is fraught with abuse) when theree are examples of success and some good programs out there.
Success as a result of the program, or success as a result of the kid just wising up and taking on his/her own life? Success as a result of thinking for themselves, or "success" because they've just been beaten down so much that they don't fight anymore? What is your idea of "success"?
By success I mean teaching a youth how to survive and behave in a manner that is acceptable to society (at least a part of society that I want to participate in).
Oh! There we go. The society that
YOU want to participate in. Well what if the kid doesn't want to participate in that part of society? Maybe the kid is fine. Maybe he needs to be out in the
real world, instead of some cloistered fabrication of someone's design in which
you believe.
How does anyone
learn about the real world
in that environment?
That teaches a youth to respect others and their property as well as themselves and not degenerate to a point of self-destruction. That believes in God (as I do) and the principles that the Bible teaches....Morality, service to others and doing good for good's sake.
Why can't you teach this yourself? And so what if your kid doesn't believe in God as you do? You're going to "program" him into believing?
THAT statement ALONE is why some people around here are really pissed off. Many around here consider that brainwashing.
This is where Al Quaeda is coming from in their argument, too. Would you seek "treatment" for your son tomorrow, if he announced he was going to study Islam?
4: That there are a few people out there that are willing to look at an individual program/facility with an open mind and judge it on it's own merits
This is true. But what about those of us who have
been in the earlier atrocious programs? What would you tell a victim of a pedophile priest when he tells you that he no longer trusts priests?
I agree - there are probably decent places within "The Industry" - but damned if I can understand why you people
have these kids and oust them when they just get too damned "difficult".
5: I have seen an entire facility condemned because the director worked in the past at a school that had problems without finding out what his position was at that school...was he responsible or the abuses that were suffered there? Does that mean that everyone that worked at Enron was guilty? or that every Catholic priest is a child abuser? Does it mean that every person that lived in Germany during WWII is guilty of participating in the Holocaust? Brother Dennis worked at a Roloff school.....does that identify his standards now or then? Or does it mean that he found employment in a less than desireable facility? But then, I haven't researched Roloff, so I don't know for a fact what kind of place it is.
Well, read, then maybe you'll understand.
But also - isn't it people like you who take
one look at your kid's friends, and deem them worthy or unworthy based on hairstyle, tatoos, piercings, clothing style or tobacco preference??
I appreciate Pastor, who tried to help make calmer heads prevail and bring a sense of calm, investigative thinking and research to this forum, only to be personally attacked, have his belief system berated and generalized beyond any sense of realism by people who can't spell, don't research or think before they speak. I, for one would want to RUN from those that choose to bring gasoline to a fire instead of trying to find out what started the fire in the first place.
The research has been done. This is the basis on which most of us speak.
Now a little about my situation.....so you don't think that I am the type to run amok..My son, now 16, effectively left school in the 8th grade. He reads at a college level, comprehends at a college level, does math at a 9th grade level without ever doing any studying, so he's not an idiot. He got into drugs and started skipping school....no consequences I could mete out would have any impact on him. I have had him in 3 inpatient programs and 3 outpatient programs and according to the last one "He could teach this stuff. He knows what to do, he just won't do it" The only program that effected a change in him in any way was the Catherine Freer Wilderness Program in Albany Oregon. When he came back from that, I had my son back for about 8 months...life was great....we talked, did family things, spent time together, etc...and he admitted taht he NEEDED the structure that was provided there. I couldn't provide the 24/7 supervision that he needed for an extended period of time until he was able to internalize the self-discipline needed to maintain. He was aware that boarding school would be a last resort andhas know it for over a year. I live in Washington State which is, besides beautiful, one of the worst states in the country for parental rights when it comes to dealing with children. Here they have a program to help parents with children that are out of control called "At Risk Youth". It brings the courts into the home......there is a list of behavior standards that the parents put together for their household....the child is made aware through the courts of these standards....when a child doesn't follow the rules, they are taken to court and dealt with through sanctions such as community service, house arrest, warnings (innumerable times) and finally, detention time. My son, in the past year has been in detention 22 times..for times ranging from 1 day to 30 days for refusing to go to court and running away for 12 days, doing drugs and stealing form me (once again). Over the past year and a half, he has stolen over $5K in goods and cash, refuses to participate in any family functions except vacations. We love him dearly, he loves us, but only thinks of himself and what he will get out of his actions, not what his actions are doing to him, his 5 yr old sister or the rest of the family. He has very low self-esteem because he has not been able to complete anything in his life (except Catherine Freer....he left all the other treatment programs) adn doesn't feel he can. I will do whatever it takes to help him succeed and accomplish/complete something in his life....except the ruiniation of his life.
I appreciate everyone's input....this is one forum that gives all forums a bad name....and is a waste of the internet.
I abhor any form of child abuse, but applaud any effort to teach children the kind of values that this wonderful country was founded on....family, God, discipline, patience, work and ethics.
Maybe the kid is tired of living up to your expectations. Maybe he wants to have a drink and a joint with his friends on the weekends, and his low self-esteem -as you call it- stems from knowing he's going to have to face "failing you".
How has he come to be so smart, when you consider him so dumb? Just because his choices in recreation aren't jibing with yours?
Yes, I'm playing devil's advocate here. But the fact that he's been "in trouble" tells us nothing. I've known kids "in trouble" for taking a beer at a party, and having no effects from it, and not having their lives affected, but since they got CAUGHT, they got "in trouble" - to where the punishment doesn't fit the crime.
Yeah, I guess a lot of us here are a little sensitive when that is the case - and in a lot of cases, that's exactly it.
IF your kid
TRULY has a problem - then treat the problem.... preferably by a professional. Forget all this "low self-esteem", and "not living up to their potential" crap. Who are you to judge that anyway? What do you know what his "potential" is? Maybe he's quite happy (when you step out of his way) and will figure things out on his own.
As for the A.C.E. education program...I know 2-3 dozen families that utilize the same program to educate their children at home....and they all graduate from high school at a level that public schools could only dream of achieving. They are all, respectful, intelligent, kind and trustworthy children/young adults. Most graduates are attending colleges and maintaining grade levels of 3.7 or above and don't seem to be falling into the self-depracating lifestyle that we find in a lot of college students. The families that I am familiar with are from Baptist churches, non-denominational Christian, evangelical Christian, Lutheran and even a Catholic family....Yes, they are all church going people and good people. People that I would, and am, prouod to call friends.
Thanks."
I can't say anything about the cirriculum, because I don't know anything about it. What I do know is that there is an established cirriculum here in FL for home-schooled students, and a TON of paperwork for the parents to fill out and abide. Homeschool isn't a "self-taught" cirriculum - it's supposed to be a guided cirriculum, as in a regular school.
The fact that you want your kid to adhere to a Religious cirrculum isn't bad per se, but you really have to keep your finger on the pulse of what kids
needs to be learning in order to be competitive in the real world. IMHO, "academics" should not involve religious training at all. Religious training is an aside.
And that's my 4 cents.
