Archive | February 2014
28/02/2014  

234. Montana Academy

The first thing students experience when they arrive at the boarding school is that they have to take all their clothes off. Their days are filled with forced labor and little treatment.

A former student states on Facebook:

I was on complete social isolation for two months if it helps at all. I was not able to talk to anybody except for the therapist. The punishment if I broke this rule? NO FOOD. I fuckin hate MA for a lot of reasons, mainly it wasn’t a rehab, it is a behavioral modification facility. One AA meeting a week and fucking retarded Todd is not going to keep anyone sober. Every single person I know who went here either relapsed, killed themselves, or have dissapeared off the face of the earth. I used heroin for 4 months after MA before I checked myself in to a real rehab. I lived with one good friend of mine from MA after we both relapsed in another rehab, and I sponsor another MA relapser from my time. Therapeudic boarding schools are useless as long as they force people to do anything. You have to want to get sober and I don’t think that FORCED PHYSICAL LABOR is the way to make this happen, and yes I am saying that I was forced to do physical labor. I even have pictures of it if you would like to see. I am thinking about just driving up there in the middle of the night with a truck and helping those kids escape. They do not deserve to be treated like they are and there many better places for them besides MA

2020 update

The facility is mentioned in an article where the students were the subject of isolation practise which is not allowed in the state of Montana’s prison system but allowed in so-called private treatment facilities. Read: Former students describe isolation, physical punishments, ‘cuddle puddles’ (The Missoulian)

Sources:

27/02/2014  

233. Monarch School

A school where the teenagers have no access to television, phone conversations with their families and friends back home and where they are subjected to marathon therapy sessions against their will is hard.

Friends of students even create petitions to have them back.

It is safe to say that Monarch School is not a fun place to be as a teenager.

Sources:

25/02/2014  

232. Mission Mountain School

The Mission Mountain School existed from 2001 to 2008. The target group was teenage girls suffering from minor problems. The employees “treated” the girls with forced labor, isolation and manipulation.

It wasn’t a fun place to be as a teenager.

Sources:

23/02/2014  

231. Stanislaus Military Academy

Logo found in the media

Marketed as an alternative school for at-risk teens being run by the local school district, the school soon became target for an investigation after two students died. 16 year old Tyler Grave and 16 year old Alexandria Flores made the decision to take their lives after they had been enrolled at the military school.

The district and the police saw it as an option for those students who didn’t attend school on regular basis. They forgot to ask themselves if the truancy might be based on an illness or just because the normal school wasn’t inspiring enough. Clearly it is obvious that some student should have been offered counseling or long-distance school over the internet taken from their homes if they couldn’t be around other people or just handling noise and other disturbances badly.

In Denmark many students have been offered hearing protection to wear in classes because even a quiet class can become too much for students suffering from various emotional problems.

There is no one-option for every at-risk student. People need individualized treatment. For those two teenagers this realization became too late. Maybe they rest in peace.

Being offered a solution which only adds to the pile of problems is no picnic. It is safe to say that for some students Stanislaus Military Academy weren’t a fun place to be during school hours.

Sources:

21/02/2014  

230. House of Barnabas

The last known location of the program was in Montana. Hopefully it is closed now and the website is down. They moved their program when they couldn’t run the program with the standards required by the law.

In 2001 the House of Barnabas, a Christian residential program for troubled boys that was illegally operating without licensure in Wyoming, moved its program to Montana where it was exempt from licensure requirements.

Two months later the program director drove a resident to an airport in Wyoming and left him there without money or a ticket to go home to the East Coast. Wyoming Child and Family Services was called; the youth reported that he had been involved in a sexual encounter and was expelled “because he would not repent.” Today this program that did not meet Wyoming’s basic safety and health standards still operates in Montana.

It didn’t sound like a fun place to be as a teenager

Sources:

19/02/2014  

229. Star Meadows Academy / Hope Ranch

Old website when it was up

This girls home was located near Whitefish, Montana. The girls were forced to wear a farm like uniform and subjected to a very Christian program. The owners had their problems with creditors and the girls who had been at the program believed that the owners wanted them to be there even if all problems were fixed to the owners could continue to milk the parents for money.

A former student wrote:

I would never, in a million years, put my daughter through such a terrible program…. I am 22 now, and am still trying to get past many of the issuse that my stay at Hope Ranch have cause in my life… My relationship with my parents is beyond repair and I always find myself associating with people who my parents strongly disapprove of…. If your relationship with your daughter is a struggle… look at yourselfs as well as your interaction with her… Hope Ranch will NEVER be an option for my child because I wouldn’t risk losing her the way my parents lost me…. as far as I’m concerned… they gave up their rights as parents, the day that they sent me to Hope Ranch.

It doesn’t sound like a fun place to be as a teenager.

Sources:

17/02/2014  

228. High Peaks Wilderness Program

In 2002 11 teenagers were rescued by the authorities near Roosevelt, Utah. The operation placed the teenager in danger. The teenagers were sent back to their parents.

However, the program relocated to Montana and continued their business there. What was illegal in one state was legal in another.

It doesn’t sound like a fun place to be a teenager.

Souces:

10/02/2014  

227. Explorations wilderness program

The Explorations wilderness program is located in Trout Creek, Montana.

The program is marketed as a wilderness program. It is not known how parents bring their children to this program but some kind of approach the program uses instill a kind of anger in the children. Fact is that two runaways attacked a woman and she was unable to return to her normal work as result of this attack.

The two teenagers got years in prison for their act so the minor problems they were sent to the program to have fixed turned out to become much worse and now their future is gone.

It is safe to state that it cannot be fun to be at this program as a teenager. Otherwise such anger would never have been the result.

Sources:

09/02/2014  

226. Clearview Horizon

Clearview Horizon has been used when parents dislike the sexual orientation their child has. One prisoner of the past is the daughter of an extremist Amy Contrada. The daughter feel in love with girls and the mother’s response was to send the daughter to Clearview Horizon

Not being able to love those who you want cannot be fun for a teenager.

2020 update

The facility is mentioned to have hired Michele “Mickey” Manning who infamously worked for Spring Creek Academy where a preventable suicide took place. It is also stated in the article that several girls tried to commit suicide as result of the treatment they got at the facility and two other girls needed treatment at the local hospital. Read: Former students describe isolation, physical punishments, ‘cuddle puddles’ (The Missoulian)

Sources:

08/02/2014  

225. Chrysalis school

The Chrysalis school is located near Eureka in Montana. It was founded by people who also were around when the Montana Academy was founded.

Former students have been threatened with lawsuits if they speak negatively about their stay, so it is safe to say that it is not a fun place to stay as a teenager.

Sources:

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