Heather Harding at CEDU (From:Youthrights.org)

This story was originally written on a webpage created to provide statements for a GAO hearing in 2007. The address is cafety.youthrights.org and it waits for your statement if you believe that your stay at a boarding school included unfair treatment or even abuse. All rights and credits goes to the author Heather Harding, who posted the original story on cafety.youthrights.org

My name is Heather Harding and I give full permission to use my statement.

Cedu Survivor June 1989- Dec 1991

I attended CEDU school in Running Springs, California from June 26, 1989 until December 7, 1991. I was 14 years old when I arrived and graduated the program 3 days after my 17th birthday.

On the morning of June 26, 1989 I was abruptly awoken by a bounty hunter standing over my bed and telling me to get moving. He was recommended by the school and/or the educational consultant that handled my case. I arrived to the campus, was toured, and then taken to the administration building to say goodbye to my father and supposedly sign away my rights to tell anyone outside what happened inside. Legal action was threatened regularly if ANY information was divulged to the outside or people inside that had not gone through the experience yet. I was too young to know that this was illegal.

The Program:

The program consisted of seven 24 hour emotional growth based "propheets", one 3 day workshop, one 6 day workshop, three wilderness trips (a 3 day, 5 day and 14 day trip), 30-36 hours of physical labor (work crews) per week and 12 hours of "group" therapy (raps) per week.
The basic layout went as follows: (meals excluded for simplicity)

• Monday Wednesday, Friday: You would have 4 hours of work crews in the morning and a 4 hour rap in the afternoon.
• Tuesday, Thursday: You would have work crews for 4 hours in the morning and 4 hours in the afternoon.
• Saturday: Saturday work crews where the entire campus would be cleaned top to bottom for 4-6 hours
• Sunday: 2-4 hours of cleaning with free time in the afternoon

Work crews changed every 6 months. The first six months you would chop wood with a cross cut saw and sledge and wedge. The second six months you would work on the farm taking care of the animals. The third six months you would maintain and add to an upper and lower ropes course. The last year of the program you would do miscellaneous chores. This was supposed to be the major time for classwork, yet I only attended one class during that entire time which was about an hour long and we talked about PeeWee Herman getting caught in an adult theatre.

Every evening after dinner there was "free time" called floor time where people would share personal stories and "smoosh". If you had been in trouble you would also fulfill your punishment at this time called dinner dishes.

Dinner Dishes: You are assigned an area to clean by an upper school student after dinner (pot and pans, upper level, lower lever, etc.) Bans were enforced where you could not acknowledge any other person, could not smile, be touched, talk, sing and could only be speak if spoken to by an approved peer or staff. The detail usually lasted 1-2 hours with Deep meaningful conversations or personal beration for whatever you did to get into trouble. This was the lightest punishment anyone would receive, usually for leaving your snow boots in the closet overnight or something similar. It was also mandatory during harsher punishments like a Table or Full Time.

Table and Full Times: This was a harsher punishment for breaking an agreement on accident or deliberately. It consisted of your regular rap cycle Monday, Wednesday and Friday. During your regular work crew times you would be doing "work assignments" or "work details". These consisted of hard labor that usually had no real purpose. Many people would work at digging a hole that is 6 feet deep just to fill it back up. The point is to see how "You dig holes in your life" or "run yourself into the ground". During any other free time you were restricted to sit at a table in the dining room with a hard wooden bench and would have to work on writing assignments which were usually harsh and defamatory. You were on a ban from the entire school except approved upper school students and faculty. You were not allowed to be touched, smile, sing, laugh and could only speak when spoken to. You were escorted everywhere by the upper school student who was running your table. Tables could last several weeks. Full Times were longer tables that could last between 1 and 3 months. People on tables were an easy target in raps and usually suffered extreme defamation and verbal abuse at the hands of their peers and faculty. If you tried to run away from the school a Full Time was an absolute once the police or bounty hunter picked you up and brought you back. If you refused and continued to not participate the school would recommend a 21 day.

21 day: Many kids were taken from the school and put on a 21 day in an attempt to get them to cooperate. It is a harsh wilderness experience ran by an affiliated program like Ascent or Outward Bounds. I did not experience one so I will not make a personal comment, but if you did not succeed at the 21 day and come back the CEDU, Provo Canyon in Utah was usually suggested by the school to your parents. I knew many many kids that went on 21 days, one in particular that did 3 consecutive 21 days... (a 63 day)

Propheets: There were seven 24 hour propheets based off of chapters in Kahlil Gibrans book "The Prophet" They propheets get their name because we were "learning to put feet under the prophet" Supposedly learning "tools" that would later help us succeed in life.

Here is list of the propheets in order through the program

• The Truth
• The Childrens
• The Brothers
• The Dreams
• The I want to live
• The Values
• The Imagine

The basic outline of propheets were the same during the 24 hour period, but the intensity and harshness increased with each one. Basic outline: Your "peer group" enters a secluded building away from the rest of the school at around 5pm. All the windows are covered so you never know what time it is. The kids would sit in a semi-circle of hard chairs with one of more faculty at the front in plush arm chairs. Dirt lists are written and disclosure circles start. A few emotional growth based exercises and bio-energetic exercises are done with the attempt to weaken you. These exercises are usually harsh in nature and the faculty will take personal experiences from you and berate you with them. (example: If you were molested by an uncle... they would yell something around the lines "Yeah, you deserved it didnt' you..... You asked for it because you are a whore". Most were physical and emotionally humiliating. A certain song designed for each propheet would be played repeatedly for hours on end. Around 2 or 3am, a rap is started. You would only be allowed to wear a short sleeve shirt, sweatpants and socks. The room was kept at around 50 degrees all night and faculty would come up behind you and slap their hands really loud if you were to fall asleep and make you stand behind your chair. This rap would end around 6 or 7 am where you would have some meaningless uplifting exercise, eat a small breakfast and take a nap for 1 hour or so. The rest of the propheet (about 6 hours or so) was designed to "build you back up". The next day exercises were usually soft in nature. Unfortunately, the emotional trauma, physical exhaustion, and malnourishment would defeat any feel good moment. You would exit the propheet around 5pm the next day and re-introduce yourself to the school and share your newfound personal wisdom.

The Workshops were similar with harsher exercises and lasted 3 days or 6 days. These experiences were pinnacles in the program. You would get your next set of issues to deal with in each propheet and expand on prior propheets.

In my 3 day workshop they made me lay on the ground, bite on a towel while keeping my head on the ground and pull up as hard as I can while they played the rocky theme song several times. My meniscus disc in my jaw joint was displaced anteriorly and posteriorly. They would not let me see a doctor for several months until my parents demanded it. Scar tissue developed on the joint making it difficult to do the surgery and the doctor hit a main nerve and half of my face was paralyzed for almost 3 months. During this time the school only allowed me 2 eye drops per day.

The belief was that I really didn't have a physical injury. They told me to "take care of my feelings" and everything would be ok. My physical wellness was neglected for almost 5-6 months. I have had 2 other surgeries for this injury after leaving CEDU.

This is only the tip of the iceberg that was CEDU school. This is only an outline of a few key ingredients. Day to day you were berated and I personally lived in fear of doing anything because any faculty at any time could make it "out of agreement". An example: I used to yelled at for having curly hair (which I was born with!?!?!) One faculty decided that if my hair was curly I was "off"... if I was "off" I had done something out of agreement. I would be a sitting duck in raps for all the school to attack. Punishments were typically ludacris and irrational. I was put on a table just before I graduated only because I had not been on a table yet. The staff also liked to put you in lose lose situations that would end in work details or worse.

17 years have passed since I graduated from this program. I left with no high school education and started college at an 8th grade level. I did receive my high school diploma somehow from CEDU which boggles my mind. I was later told that the state had approved the program and that I got math units for chopping wood and english credits for floor time. This is ludacris! My parents paid an extremely expensive tuition for me to be physically and emotionally abused while doing free labor. And the worst part, to this day they don't know what I actually went through while I was there. I wasn't allowed to tell them while I was there and now, they just don't want to hear it. I am just coming to terms with what happened at CEDU.

Again, My name is Heather Harding and I give full permission to use my statement.

CEDU war a large organization and very much founded the term "Therapeutic Boarding School". The first CEDU school was opened around 1968 and all the school closed in 2005 due to some lawsuits.

References:
Datasheet about the boarding schools from the Fornits Home for Wayward Web Fora
The original statement on Youthrights