Safety & Success

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Therapeutic Boarding School: A Positive Environment for Struggling Pre-Teens
Sending a child to therapeutic boarding school is never easy, particularly when the child is a 10- or 11-year-old girl. While going away to school isn't the answer for every child, for some it is the only answer.

"By the time parents are considering a therapeutic boarding school, life at home has often become so difficult, and relationships so damaged, that removing the child from the environment is the best way to give everyone a chance to heal," said Robbi O'Kelley, MSW, LCSW, CADCII, the executive director at New Leaf Academy, a therapeutic boarding school for girls ages 10 to 14.

Obsessed with Technology: How Parents Can Protect Their Children Online
The purpose of technology is to improve our lives. And though some children and teens have struck a healthy balance between "screen" time and real-life activities, many have found that technology is actually making their lives worse.

Experts believe technology overload is leading to increased anxiety, distraction at school, poor grades and sleep deprivation among pre-teens and adolescents. Teachers have expressed concern that texting and "Internet-speak" are leading to a decline in spelling and grammar skills as well as social and interpersonal skills.

Strategies for Creating an Effective Home Plan
Since the day your daughter left for boarding school, you’ve anxiously awaited her return. You’ve attended every workshop and family therapy session, you’ve made changes at home – and though the whole family waits in nervous anticipation, you’re ready to come together as a family again.

When Going Away is the Only Way
There's no question your teenage child is dealing with peer pressure. It goes with the territory. But peer pressure can take many forms, both positive and negative. Certainly, every parent fears the gang banger giving drugs to their child or the rebellious "cool kid" persuading their child to smoke, but peer pressure can also come in milder forms like wearing mismatched socks to imitate the popular girls or taking certain electives to be in class with friends. Because most peer pressure happens at school, it can be beyond a parent's immediate control.

Most experts advise that the best way for teens to deal with negative peer pressure is to walk away. But how can a child walk away if he still goes to the same school or lives in the same neighborhood as the bad influence? If you are worried about the impact of a negative peer group, sometimes getting your child in a safe educational environment away from home offers the best chance for change.

Strategies for Creating an Effective Home Plan
Since the day your daughter left for boarding school, you’ve anxiously awaited her return. You’ve attended every workshop and family therapy session, you’ve made changes at home – and though the whole family waits in nervous anticipation, you’re ready to come together as a family again.

There’s just one important step left: creating a home contract that lays out the rules, expectations, privileges and consequences that will govern your daughter’s behavior at home.

Therapeutic boarding schools like New Leaf Academy in Oregon bring about profound changes in struggling pre-teens, in part by setting clear rules and enforcing them with consequences. Home contracts give parents the opportunity to take the structure their child has grown accustomed to at school and tailor it to the home setting.

“Home contracts help parents put structure in place before their child comes home,” explained Cathryn Perkins, a therapist at New Leaf Academy in Oregon. “Because everything is spelled out in writing, there are fewer misunderstandings, fewer arguments and less boundary-pushing.”

Parenting an Angry Teen: Four Steps for Fighting Smarter

Teenagers experience emotions more intensely than adults. Whether happy, worried, angry or sad, teens’ reactions can be exaggerated, and may elicit a similarly dramatic reaction from their parents.

Although disagreements and conflicts are bound to arise, there are ways to fight smarter rather than harder, according to PJ Swan, M.Ed., LPC, CADC, the clinical director at New Leaf Academy of Oregon, an all-girls therapeutic boarding school.