|
Our Teen Help Experience
By: Cathy Reiner (and Cliff)
Seattle, Washington
206-722-3143
Hi Lon,
I'm a longtime reader [of Woodbury Reports] who first put our then-almost 16-year-old
daughter at a ranch in Southern Utah two years ago, which was based on behavior and consequences. It didn't work for her.
For more than 6 months she was in rebellion.
During this time we learned of a Teen Help parent support group in Seattle,
started attending their meetings and subsequently went to a parent Discovery Seminar, also called a TASKS seminar. It was open
to the public, though most people there had kids in a Teen Help program -- these programs are now called World Wide Association
of Specialty Schools or WWASP. It was a wonderful experience.
It soon became apparent that the WWASP approach was family unity, that
you couldn't "fix" the family unless you worked with the family as well as the child. We liked the seminar and have since gone on to
take the two more advanced seminars, Focus and Family Visions.
Last March we moved our daughter to the Spring Creek Lodge program WWASP has
in Montana. It proved to be a strong and loving program staffed by dedicated people who really cared about our daughter and about
the kids. The school is strong on academics and she has really pulled herself up. We have spent time at this school watching
it in action, and we have also visited two other schools in the program, Cross Creek Manor in Utah and Casa By The Sea in Baja Mexico.
We have watched and gotten to know many of the staff members, sat in on groups and classes and feel VERY good about the way the operations
are run.
Our daughter is now a loving, strong and articulate young woman who is thankful
she had the chance to go from being a runaway street kid to a powerful young adult. She has thanked us for sending her there and
readily acknowledges that she could be dead, if she hadn't been "sent to the program."
|
