Residential Treatment Programs for Youth: CFS Staff Lead Efforts in Policy Reform
CFS Interim Chair Mario Hernandez, PhD
As reports continue to surface describing exploitation, mistreatment and abuse of youth and families in private residential treatment programs, CFS Interim Chair Mario Hernandez is helping to bring national attention to these issues. Since 2005, Dr. Hernandez, a member of the American Psychological Association’s (APA) Family, Youth & Children’s (CYF) Committee, has brought relevant issues to the attention of CYF, and serves as a liaison to several APA boards and committees.
Dr. Hernandez has taken the lead in helping the APA-CYF explore the mental health interventions provided by programs identifying themselves as “therapeutic boarding schools,” “emotional growth academies,” “residential behavior modification programs,” “therapeutic wilderness programs” or similar “specialty” designations. A web-based survey developed by Dr. Hernandez, with research and design support by Peter Gamache, is now being distributed nationwide to psychologists in order to learn more about current state licensing and monitoring.
“The growing number of unlicensed residential treatment centers for juveniles has brought increasing reports of questionable methods of discipline and treatment,” said Dr. Hernandez. “In order to take action to protect children from abuse and families from exploitation, it’s important to learn more about who is being served, how they are served, how often abuse and mistreatment takes place, and what the overall outcomes are for the programs and youth. The survey is an effort to learn more from psychologists who may have knowledge about these issues because of their professional involvement with youth, families and communities.”
The survey, sent from the APA State Advocacy Office, stems from issues raised from recent articles stressing the need for professional organizations to take a stand for adequate protections for children in these programs.
-
Exploitation in the Name of “Specialty Schooling” was written in 2005 and reviews issues that had been published to date regarding residential treatment programs not licensed or accredited as such, but continued to operate.
-
Unlicensed Residential Programs: The Next Challenge in Protecting Youth, published in 2006 by the American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, describes the range of mistreatment and abuse experienced by youth and families, reviews the licensing, regulatory and accrediting mechanisms associated with the protection of youth, or lack thereof, and outlines policy implications and provides recommendations for the protection of youth and families who pursue residential treatment.
CFS faculty Drs. Robert Friedman, Allison Pinto, and Monica Epstein were co-authors of the articles, which originated from work associated with the Alliance for the Safe, Therapeutic and Appropriate use of Residential Treatment (A START). Friedman and Pinto were leaders in forming A START, a multi-disciplinary group of mental health professionals and advocates seeking to promote protections for children and families, and the availability of information about these programs so that parents can make the best choices with and for their children.
“The survey should only take about 15 – 20 minutes to complete,” added Dr. Hernandez,“ and data gathered will benefit not only the APA, but also adolescents and their families who are in need of mental health care.”