Thought reform can take on many guises, depending on the target population. This program targets kids who have already been softened up by other programs, or who just "need a little toning up." I wouldn't regard it as a good program, nor even benign. It has both CEDU and Aspen influences in its lineage. That it is not as
physically abusive as many other programs is probably a given, however. My guess is this program effects a more
insidious revamping of minds which are still somewhat malleable.
New Summit Academy arose out of the ashes of another Costa Rican program, namely
Coronada Academy. The latter went belly-up due to financial reasons, and three or four of its key personnel started New Summit. It was a relatively smooth and amicable transition; students who were not able to finish up at Coronado just transferred over to the new program.
Coronado was
Saul Rudman's baby. Rudman was previously Admissions and Marketing Director at CEDU Middle School/Running Springs in the 1990s, Administrator at Northwest Academy - date?, Regional Director of Business Development at Idaho Educational Services (i.e., Ascent, BCA, NWA) in 2007, consultant to Cherokee Creek Boys School (CEDU spin-off) in 2007. He is currently at Brain-Works.Net, which is a marketing/PR firm which "specializes in visual communications and who pioneered Emotional Response Communications"; Rudman's area of expertise being education/government.
Lori Armbruster was also involved with Coronado as Admissions Director and Consultant Services Director (namely, selling the school to EdCons). She was CEDU's Director of Consultant Services for a number of years before
that. After Coronado she was at Monarch School for about four years (2004-2008); most recently, she's been running the Admissions Dept. at Second Nature.
The key personnel who were with Coronado, and who started New Summit, are:
Mario Duran - Clinical Director at Coronado, Personal Growth Director at New Summit; background psych, substance abuse counseling, and "mental milieu."[/list]
Heather Tracy - with Coronado as Academic Director since at least 2002, same function at New Summit, but now as Executive Director; pet project is Howard Gardner's "Multiple Intelligences Theory," which I don't know a whole lot about, but about which I've read enough to know that it is heavily tied in with the Human Potential movement.[/list]
Andy Myers - Experiential Education Director at both Coronado and New Summit; was previously (amongst other things) Assistant Director for the Costa Rica Program of the Academy at Swift River (a satellite program thereof).[/list]
I don't know whether the fourth co-owner -- Operations Director James Woody -- was with Coronado as well. I suspect not.