This testimony was found on Reddit. All rights goes to the unknown author only known as "Survivor". Located in Idaho the school seemed to use methods as they were used by the now defunct CEDU-chain which closed after some lawsuits.
Using a throwaway here, since my other account links to my real identity. I went to one of these schools back in the 90's. I was one of a handful of kids that survived one of these "schools".
At the time, I was 16 years old, and had never done drugs or drank alcohol. I was one of the only Jewish kids that went to an Episcopal school in South and was kind of a late bloomer. At 16, I looked more like I was 14 and was about 5'6 120lbs. I spent a lot of time playing video games. Specifically, Gemstone and Ultimate Online. After my parents divorced I skipped a week of school.
Around 5:00am, I woke up to see to shadowy figures on either side of my bed. Without my contacts, I couldn't see very well. One of the guys said "Your coming with us". I was so panicked that I didn't even reach for my camping knife which was in one of the drawers, adjacent to my bed. The two men grabbed me when I was wearing nothing but my boxers and I hit one of them in the nose.
I was fighting for my life and it took both of them about 20 minutes to get me upstairs which was about 30 feet away. At that point, I saw my mom and my dad and they said these guys were taking me to a new school. The "escorts" as they were called threw me into their rented car and I quickly locked all the doors before they could get in. Much to my surprise, these guys had left the keys in the car. I turned the keys and the car started. Although I couldn't see anything, I started to back the car up and turn it around.
Moments later, glass shattered all around me. One of the guys pulled me out of the car and I landed in the broken glass, cutting my legs, arms, and feet. The escorts returned with some of my clothes and dressed me. Little did I know, the nightmare had only begun. After I was handcuffed and taken to the airport, these guys returned their damaged car which someone had "broken in". I yelled for help at the airport, but my cries were ignored.
Physically and emotionally exhausted, I passed out on the airplane and woke up in Idaho of all places. I was driven to the northern part of the panhandle where I arrived at my new "school". Upon arrival, I was ordered to strip down to my boxers which I initially refused. After my clothes were removed, the staff member saw the cuts all over my body. He asked if I cut myself. At that point, I told him that the escorts had pulled me out of a window.
I refused to go with him to the dorm and asked to call my parents. He refused my request and about 4 hours later I was taken to a mental hospital where I stayed for 3 weeks under the "care" of a psychiatrist who oversaw all the "patients" at the "school" I was it. Rumor has it that this guy saw over 400 patients at a time. Some of the people at the hospital were bipolar or had other mental illlnesses. Others, like myself, had merely been uncooperative with the program.
In reality, I got the better of it. The other alternative was a 6 - 8 week bootcamp called Ascent, where students were forced to march through the wilderness, dig holes, and move heavy rocks from place to place all the while staff screamed at them and told them they were worthless. One person at a similar wilderness program was attacked by a bear.
When I finally arrived at the school, my clothes were taken away and as part of the program, I had to purchase wrangler jeans, and plane t-shirts. I had a patagonia fleece and they cut off the logo. I was put into a "peer group" and a "team". I would go through "prophets" with the peer group, one every couple of months. These basically involved telling a bunch of people who were either ex drug addicts, admitted child molesters, or mormons who thought they were doing you a favor all the stuff that was messed up about your life. There were weekly or biweekly "rap" sessions where these students and staff would scream at each other at the top of their lungs.
Most students went along with the program, but I refused to yell as the entire thing seemed insane to me. My privilege of clothes were taken away and I was forced to wear a jumpsuit, similar to what an auto mechanic wears. Kids who lost their clothing privilege were required to wear a jumpsuit even if it was sweltering outside.
The staff at this place was a medley of misfits although there were one or two normal folks who were just kind of out of place. Many of the staff were in their early 20's and were Mormons. One guy had tried to kill himself with a shotgun and had actually confessed to molesting children in the past. Other people were ex drug addicts or dealers. About 50% of the staff there didn't even have a college education and nearly everyone was unqualified to deal with kids, many of whom had serious problems.
Why were my parents cool with this? They didn't have a fucking clue. The staff would read all the mail that I sent out and if they didn't like what I wrote, they wouldn't send the mail. Also, I had no contact with my closest friends from back home. The staff withheld all letters from them. What about talking on the phone? My parents spoke with a "counselor" from the school once a week and spoke with me once every 2 weeks for 10-15 minutes. If I said anything that the staff didn't like, they would hang up the phone and simply tell my parents that I was trying to manipulate them.
I didn't leave the campus for a over a year. It was 7 miles to the nearest town and residents were finanically rewarded if they caught students. As a student, you weren't allowed to have any cash on you, which made it more difficult to escape. I started hiding small change and training in cross country. I read Tom Brown books in case, so I would have some survival skills in case I bailed.
The food we were fed was absolute shit. I have a very distinct memory about eating macaroni and cheese that was covered in flies. In fact, it was so bad that I started my own sustenance garden.
I could probably write a book about how fucked up that school was and it's sad that these places still exist. I left the place when I turned 18 and went to another boarding school for 6 months. Even though that put me a 6 months behind everyone else in my grade, it was worth it since it actually helped prepare me for college and I went to a top 30 school. I rarely talk about the past and few people know the full story
Source:
The original testimony on Reddit
Showing posts with label Idaho. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Idaho. Show all posts
Sunday, November 1, 2015
Sunday, September 13, 2015
Book: Dead, Insane or in Jail: A CEDU Memoir
All the CEDU schools closed around 2005 after a number of lawsuits were issued by parents and former students.
Also several students disappeared never to be found again. Some of the children were most likely murdered by a serial killer James Lee Crummel who had unrestricted accesss to one of the campuses. To this day there are families out there looking for their relatives.
CEDU was founded in 1967 by an owner of a furniture business, who after a brief stint at Synanon created the first school in California where the main tool for transforming the children into the products their parents ordered were attack therapy.
The founder died in 2002. The school were sold but closed only some few years later due to the lawsuits.
The book provides a good insight into how it was to be a student in these special schools. After the original schools closed the concept were transferred into other schools where some are open even today.
Sources:
Sunday, August 9, 2015
A sister about her siblings stay at Project PATCH
This testimony was found in a comment to an article in the magezine Craked. All rights goes the original author.
I know the name of the facility/cult. They go by Project PATCH. I know this because my sister suffered the abuse at that very facility. It is run by a Seventh Day Adventist group, and among the ranks are child abusers, including one man who was convicted of kidnapping and raping a kid there (one my sis made friends with at the time). His name was Ryan something, it's Google-able.
They stripped her of her clothing and gave her a sheet when she tried to run away. They made her work until her hands bled. She was chastised for weeping. The leader frequently had little girls sit on his lap and stared down the chests of the young teenage girls. Luckily, my mother figured out something was very wrong and pulled her out, but they fought. They fought to silence her, too. She has full blown PTSD and cries frequently. She thinks about it daily. The other torture victims she befriended included five girls, all of whom ended up in some form of prostitution and addicted to drugs.
My sister dissolved into tears reading this. I confess that I cried, too, but I also had some happy tears in there, because it's confirmation that we weren't crazy. My mother sometimes cries herself to sleep over the guilt of trying to do the right thing, and instead having inadvertently caused the daughter she loves so much so much pain and anguish. We've all been through therapy. And despite having a convicted child kidnapper and rapist on board, and being sued for everything they are worth, they still operate. It brings me to tears from time to time. The pain is so visible in my sibling's eyes. It kills me.
TL;DR---The place in the story is called Project PATCH, and my sister was a prisoner there for some months. Every allegation is true, if not somehow played down. A staff member raped a kid there and yet the place still stands.
Sources:
I know the name of the facility/cult. They go by Project PATCH. I know this because my sister suffered the abuse at that very facility. It is run by a Seventh Day Adventist group, and among the ranks are child abusers, including one man who was convicted of kidnapping and raping a kid there (one my sis made friends with at the time). His name was Ryan something, it's Google-able.
They stripped her of her clothing and gave her a sheet when she tried to run away. They made her work until her hands bled. She was chastised for weeping. The leader frequently had little girls sit on his lap and stared down the chests of the young teenage girls. Luckily, my mother figured out something was very wrong and pulled her out, but they fought. They fought to silence her, too. She has full blown PTSD and cries frequently. She thinks about it daily. The other torture victims she befriended included five girls, all of whom ended up in some form of prostitution and addicted to drugs.
My sister dissolved into tears reading this. I confess that I cried, too, but I also had some happy tears in there, because it's confirmation that we weren't crazy. My mother sometimes cries herself to sleep over the guilt of trying to do the right thing, and instead having inadvertently caused the daughter she loves so much so much pain and anguish. We've all been through therapy. And despite having a convicted child kidnapper and rapist on board, and being sued for everything they are worth, they still operate. It brings me to tears from time to time. The pain is so visible in my sibling's eyes. It kills me.
TL;DR---The place in the story is called Project PATCH, and my sister was a prisoner there for some months. Every allegation is true, if not somehow played down. A staff member raped a kid there and yet the place still stands.
Sources:
- The article with the comment
- Factsheet of the program (Fornits Wiki)
- Any info on Project PATCH or Cove Creek? (Fornits Home for Wayward Web Fora )
Thursday, October 23, 2014
RG at Rocky Mountain Academy,
This testimony was found on the Surviving CEDU blog. All rights go the original author known as RG
I went to RMA in 1984 and graduated in 86. I was 16 at the time I went up there and had a decent idea what the program would be like from what my parents said. Although, who could possibly have imagined that a place like that existed. If you haven’t been in a place like that, you just can’t imagine it.
My parents took me to a high school placement counselor in Atlanta who told me she wasn’t sure she had found a place for me at that time. Then a month or so later, my parents said they were sending me to a wilderness school in Idaho where the counselors were really nice and they didn’t allow any violence between the students and they had group sessions where you could talk about your feelings. (Doesn’t that just sound really great??) I knew my parents. I could fill in the blanks.
My parents and I took a flight to Sandpoint, Idaho. When we arrived, we got in a rental car and drove to Bonners Ferry. A boy named Bailey showed me around the school and we took a short walk in the woods. Afterwards, the staff went through my bags, checked the seams of my underwear for, drugs, apparently, and strip searched me. Bailey was a good guy and ended up being my dorm head for the first few months while I was there.
I have no mixed feelings about the program. Sure I did some great things while I was there. I had some good experiences, learned a lot and made some good friends. I was 18 when I left, and, yes, I was a lot more mature, then, than when I arrived.
RMA,CEDU, et al were the product of a self-indulgent furniture salesman’s idea that what’s right for a drug addict strung out in the gutter is right for a teen who’s having trouble coping with school or growing up. The program was run by a bunch of abusive, self indulgent, narcissists/sadists who loved staying on top of us students as close to 24/7 as they could–prying into every aspect of our personal lives, subjecting us to theirs, and expecting us to smoosh with them, WHAT THE HELL? I liked smooshing with girls, but I can’t say I ever did it with a guy unless someone, often a staff member, wanted me to. Well, there was always something you were expected you to be doing. Don’t get me wrong. I think being close to your friends is wonderful, but that just never seemed natural to me. If it did to you, great!
In raps, the staff expected that we all had all these things that we felt bad about. I copped to a few things I actually felt bad about and, apparently, they just weren’t extreme enough for the drug addict, ex-con, ex-gang member, etc. staff. The stuff they expected, most of which, I hadn’t done, and the few things I had, I didn’t feel bad about, but that would be actual honesty. They wanted their usual, sick, over the top stuff. I’d never lit anyone on fire, prostituted myself, or had sex with animals, for instance. (I still haven’t, incidentally.) People who do interrogations seem to say if you push someone hard enough, they will give you information (of some sort or other).
I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve told this story since I left: This man came to visit the campus as people did sometimes. We were usually told, “This is John visiting from Burbank.” and not much more. I don’t recall his name, but he was introduced by one of the staff members as his friend, so-and-so. I spoke to him, briefly. He asked me a few questions about the school. I don’t recall much of the conversation.
The next day I was indicted in a rap by one of the staff. Why do you think? Had I said something I shouldn’t?
Here’s how the indictment went:
That guy who was here, yesterday…He had something to say about you…
You can imagine what this was like. I had just met this guy and had no idea what this was about. But obviously, I was going to have, possibly, a whole room full of people screaming at me about it—and that was eminent.
Of all the students here he could have picked out, he said you were one kid we should keep an eye on. He said, “If anyone here is going to commit suicide it’s him.” And he’s someone who knows these kinds of things.
Well I remember being shocked at how totally off base that accusation was. Unfortunately, my “Who is this guy? He doesn’t know me from Adam.” argument didn’t seem to hold any weight. In fact, I think I said exactly that!
The thing was, in raps, if someone pointed the finger at you, you were the victim. You were either the victim of whatever they came up with and you needed to run your feelings about it—or you were their victim until things turned away from you. You could argue in your defense, but if you did, it was just for your own sake. It just didn’t seem to matter. Generally, it made things worse for you. There were times, like this one that I thought I totally debunked the claim against me, and it just never made any difference. It was the helplessness that, even now after 25 years, writing this, thinking about that situation, I just found myself fantasizing about beating up the rap coordinator and ending everything, and then having everyone go home.
Some students just cried. I just don’t seem to cry easily. Sometimes when the heat was on for a really long time, I would try to, hoping I could get them to move on to someone else. A couple of times I actually did it, at least a little. It did seem to focus things elsewhere.
Usually, the focus would turn to someone else, and sometimes what happened to them would be a lot worse than what they had just been getting at you for, but you would be glad the heat was off of you. We all got it. I felt bad when it was someone else’s turn, but that was the way it was. It was nice when it was over, and, especially, when a rap was finally over, and you could go outside and have a few minutes to yourself, calm down, and relax for a while.
So what do you tell a 17 year old kid who is, supposedly, troubled and having a hard time—especially because of the school he is in—that things will be fine; he should just work hard and enjoy his life, take up a new hobby. How about, “You’re going to commit suicide some day?” and then have a whole lot of people yell at him right after you say it for twenty minutes or so?
I remember being told by a staff member in one of the workshops, the story of a former Cedu student who was doing a lot of drugs, was so totally out of his mind on drugs that he put a single bullet in the cylinder of his revolver. And then he spun the cylinder, put the gun to his head and … well, apparently, he went to Cedu afterwards to tell the story.
I kept up with Bailey for about six months to a year after I graduated. I don’t know whether he filled the cylinder or not, but I miss him.
CEDU closed in 2005 to avoid lawsuits
Sources:
I went to RMA in 1984 and graduated in 86. I was 16 at the time I went up there and had a decent idea what the program would be like from what my parents said. Although, who could possibly have imagined that a place like that existed. If you haven’t been in a place like that, you just can’t imagine it.
My parents took me to a high school placement counselor in Atlanta who told me she wasn’t sure she had found a place for me at that time. Then a month or so later, my parents said they were sending me to a wilderness school in Idaho where the counselors were really nice and they didn’t allow any violence between the students and they had group sessions where you could talk about your feelings. (Doesn’t that just sound really great??) I knew my parents. I could fill in the blanks.
My parents and I took a flight to Sandpoint, Idaho. When we arrived, we got in a rental car and drove to Bonners Ferry. A boy named Bailey showed me around the school and we took a short walk in the woods. Afterwards, the staff went through my bags, checked the seams of my underwear for, drugs, apparently, and strip searched me. Bailey was a good guy and ended up being my dorm head for the first few months while I was there.
I have no mixed feelings about the program. Sure I did some great things while I was there. I had some good experiences, learned a lot and made some good friends. I was 18 when I left, and, yes, I was a lot more mature, then, than when I arrived.
RMA,CEDU, et al were the product of a self-indulgent furniture salesman’s idea that what’s right for a drug addict strung out in the gutter is right for a teen who’s having trouble coping with school or growing up. The program was run by a bunch of abusive, self indulgent, narcissists/sadists who loved staying on top of us students as close to 24/7 as they could–prying into every aspect of our personal lives, subjecting us to theirs, and expecting us to smoosh with them, WHAT THE HELL? I liked smooshing with girls, but I can’t say I ever did it with a guy unless someone, often a staff member, wanted me to. Well, there was always something you were expected you to be doing. Don’t get me wrong. I think being close to your friends is wonderful, but that just never seemed natural to me. If it did to you, great!
In raps, the staff expected that we all had all these things that we felt bad about. I copped to a few things I actually felt bad about and, apparently, they just weren’t extreme enough for the drug addict, ex-con, ex-gang member, etc. staff. The stuff they expected, most of which, I hadn’t done, and the few things I had, I didn’t feel bad about, but that would be actual honesty. They wanted their usual, sick, over the top stuff. I’d never lit anyone on fire, prostituted myself, or had sex with animals, for instance. (I still haven’t, incidentally.) People who do interrogations seem to say if you push someone hard enough, they will give you information (of some sort or other).
I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve told this story since I left: This man came to visit the campus as people did sometimes. We were usually told, “This is John visiting from Burbank.” and not much more. I don’t recall his name, but he was introduced by one of the staff members as his friend, so-and-so. I spoke to him, briefly. He asked me a few questions about the school. I don’t recall much of the conversation.
The next day I was indicted in a rap by one of the staff. Why do you think? Had I said something I shouldn’t?
Here’s how the indictment went:
That guy who was here, yesterday…He had something to say about you…
You can imagine what this was like. I had just met this guy and had no idea what this was about. But obviously, I was going to have, possibly, a whole room full of people screaming at me about it—and that was eminent.
Of all the students here he could have picked out, he said you were one kid we should keep an eye on. He said, “If anyone here is going to commit suicide it’s him.” And he’s someone who knows these kinds of things.
Well I remember being shocked at how totally off base that accusation was. Unfortunately, my “Who is this guy? He doesn’t know me from Adam.” argument didn’t seem to hold any weight. In fact, I think I said exactly that!
The thing was, in raps, if someone pointed the finger at you, you were the victim. You were either the victim of whatever they came up with and you needed to run your feelings about it—or you were their victim until things turned away from you. You could argue in your defense, but if you did, it was just for your own sake. It just didn’t seem to matter. Generally, it made things worse for you. There were times, like this one that I thought I totally debunked the claim against me, and it just never made any difference. It was the helplessness that, even now after 25 years, writing this, thinking about that situation, I just found myself fantasizing about beating up the rap coordinator and ending everything, and then having everyone go home.
Some students just cried. I just don’t seem to cry easily. Sometimes when the heat was on for a really long time, I would try to, hoping I could get them to move on to someone else. A couple of times I actually did it, at least a little. It did seem to focus things elsewhere.
Usually, the focus would turn to someone else, and sometimes what happened to them would be a lot worse than what they had just been getting at you for, but you would be glad the heat was off of you. We all got it. I felt bad when it was someone else’s turn, but that was the way it was. It was nice when it was over, and, especially, when a rap was finally over, and you could go outside and have a few minutes to yourself, calm down, and relax for a while.
So what do you tell a 17 year old kid who is, supposedly, troubled and having a hard time—especially because of the school he is in—that things will be fine; he should just work hard and enjoy his life, take up a new hobby. How about, “You’re going to commit suicide some day?” and then have a whole lot of people yell at him right after you say it for twenty minutes or so?
I remember being told by a staff member in one of the workshops, the story of a former Cedu student who was doing a lot of drugs, was so totally out of his mind on drugs that he put a single bullet in the cylinder of his revolver. And then he spun the cylinder, put the gun to his head and … well, apparently, he went to Cedu afterwards to tell the story.
I kept up with Bailey for about six months to a year after I graduated. I don’t know whether he filled the cylinder or not, but I miss him.
CEDU closed in 2005 to avoid lawsuits
Sources:
- The original testimony (Surviving CEDU blog)
- The CEDU history and organization (Fornits Wiki)
Sunday, September 29, 2013
greenpea at CEDU High School (From:HEAL-online)
This testimony was made on the survivor message board belonging to the human rights organization HEAL-online. All rights belongs to the original author.
I went to Cedu High School which is owned by the Brown schools.
Most of it is a blur, but I do remember that I experienced a lot of terror. Since my experience there I have nightmares every night involving the school in some way, and wake up with anxiety accompanied by sweats and a fast heart rate.
I recall that while I was at the school I was on a heavy sedative called Remeron for depression, anxiety, and a sleep disorder. It was prescribed to me by a psychiatrist before I went to Cedu, and it made it almost impossible for me to get out of bed in the morning. Our dorms had no air conditioning, even though all of our parents were paying $10,000 a month for us to be there.
The only way they dealt with us was through discipline and scare tactics. I had fallen asleep without a shirt on one night because it was so hot in our dorms. Before the alarms went off to wake us up, one of the upper class students came into my room and pulled the covers off me. She yelled at me "get the f*ck out of bed!" She pulled me out of my bed and threw me in the bathroom and told me to do my morning chores. I did so, in a half asleep state because of my medication, without a shirt on until the girl gave me permission to get dressed. She had been given free reign to do this to me by a counselor, and she did without supervision. This type of humiliation was normal, and went unnoticed.
The fact that I was on a sedating drug wasn't taken into account. The brilliance of their methods was that they turned the other students against you, and promoted their (other students') mean spiritedness to get across the school's message.
When I was caught for kissing a boy later, I was told that I was a "sexual predator" and put on a restriction where there was no singing, smiling, laughing, touching, or talking. It was called a "full time". They pulled me out of my schooling and put me on a "stump". This meant that I was left in the middle of nowhere with a shovel and a small saw to dig a tree stump out of the ground.
There was no staff around to make sure I was alright, and I was forbidden to talk to anyone. Like I said before, no singing, smiling, laughing, touching or talking. The phrase was spoken to me so many times I still have it memorized, 6 years later. This was in the 100 degree weather. I had to wear steal toed work boots, jeans, and a collared shirt. At night time I ate alone and had to write in a restriction booklet.
They would give me assignments and pushed "issues". If your mother was dead, they'd make you write about that. If you had a mental illness they'd make you write about that. For me, considering that I was a christian, they made me write about "how I hide behind God". You couldn't say "I don't hide behind God" or anything like that. You had to submit to the idea given, or you would never get off your full time.
They challenged me on everything. After dinner I was assigned "pots and Pans", which meant I had to scrub the pots and pans that the cooks used to make the entire school's meals, breakfast, lunch, and dinner. By myself I did this, for about a month.
Eventually I was pulled out of the program early by my parents, but the most sickening part about it is that they don't want to talk about it. It took me until this year (6 years) to get them to listen to what they had put me through. Leaving Cedu was terrible. I feel like I left a piece of myself there.
Their policy was to break down the student and then build them back with discipline. But my experience was cut short, and I only progressed through the breaking down process. I left Cedu feeling like I was a nothing. I was unable to make friends and relate to the people at my school.
My parents put me back into public schooling the next day. I remain bitter about the whole thing. The moral of the story is to not send your kids to these places.
Sources:
I went to Cedu High School which is owned by the Brown schools.
Most of it is a blur, but I do remember that I experienced a lot of terror. Since my experience there I have nightmares every night involving the school in some way, and wake up with anxiety accompanied by sweats and a fast heart rate.
I recall that while I was at the school I was on a heavy sedative called Remeron for depression, anxiety, and a sleep disorder. It was prescribed to me by a psychiatrist before I went to Cedu, and it made it almost impossible for me to get out of bed in the morning. Our dorms had no air conditioning, even though all of our parents were paying $10,000 a month for us to be there.
The only way they dealt with us was through discipline and scare tactics. I had fallen asleep without a shirt on one night because it was so hot in our dorms. Before the alarms went off to wake us up, one of the upper class students came into my room and pulled the covers off me. She yelled at me "get the f*ck out of bed!" She pulled me out of my bed and threw me in the bathroom and told me to do my morning chores. I did so, in a half asleep state because of my medication, without a shirt on until the girl gave me permission to get dressed. She had been given free reign to do this to me by a counselor, and she did without supervision. This type of humiliation was normal, and went unnoticed.
The fact that I was on a sedating drug wasn't taken into account. The brilliance of their methods was that they turned the other students against you, and promoted their (other students') mean spiritedness to get across the school's message.
When I was caught for kissing a boy later, I was told that I was a "sexual predator" and put on a restriction where there was no singing, smiling, laughing, touching, or talking. It was called a "full time". They pulled me out of my schooling and put me on a "stump". This meant that I was left in the middle of nowhere with a shovel and a small saw to dig a tree stump out of the ground.
There was no staff around to make sure I was alright, and I was forbidden to talk to anyone. Like I said before, no singing, smiling, laughing, touching or talking. The phrase was spoken to me so many times I still have it memorized, 6 years later. This was in the 100 degree weather. I had to wear steal toed work boots, jeans, and a collared shirt. At night time I ate alone and had to write in a restriction booklet.
They would give me assignments and pushed "issues". If your mother was dead, they'd make you write about that. If you had a mental illness they'd make you write about that. For me, considering that I was a christian, they made me write about "how I hide behind God". You couldn't say "I don't hide behind God" or anything like that. You had to submit to the idea given, or you would never get off your full time.
They challenged me on everything. After dinner I was assigned "pots and Pans", which meant I had to scrub the pots and pans that the cooks used to make the entire school's meals, breakfast, lunch, and dinner. By myself I did this, for about a month.
Eventually I was pulled out of the program early by my parents, but the most sickening part about it is that they don't want to talk about it. It took me until this year (6 years) to get them to listen to what they had put me through. Leaving Cedu was terrible. I feel like I left a piece of myself there.
Their policy was to break down the student and then build them back with discipline. But my experience was cut short, and I only progressed through the breaking down process. I left Cedu feeling like I was a nothing. I was unable to make friends and relate to the people at my school.
My parents put me back into public schooling the next day. I remain bitter about the whole thing. The moral of the story is to not send your kids to these places.
Sources:
Sunday, March 3, 2013
Heather Harding at CEDU (From: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
Monday, August 1, 2011
Laura DuPuy Weeks at CEDU (From:youthrights.org)
CEDU Survivor. October 1989-May 1992
Hi My name is Laura DuPuy Weeks. I give full permission for my statement to be used. Let me start by thanking the people who are doing this. I have thought of this often. My friends and I have just recently made a documentary on CEDU with everyone telling there stories. Our hope is to raise awareness about therapeutic treatment facilities and to maybe, just maybe give some rights to adolescences and offer some protection, to break this horrible trend.
I was sent to CEDU October 4th 1989. I can remember it like it was yesterday. I was 14 years old and I was tricked into going there by an educational consultant and my parents. I had behavioral problems growing up, a lot dealing with adoption. I also had a history of alcohol and drug abuse. But it was the "oppositional defiance disorder" that sent me there. Basically a label thrown on me however I do not remember seeing a doctor to receive this label. I was experimenting with alcohol and weed. I snuck out of the house, fought with my parents and was an average student at school. I hung around with the troublemakers, all though it seemed that it was I that was the trouble maker, mostly do to the fact that I was always grounded and never allowed to do anything. So that is the behavior that landed me that label. Let me also include that I am from North Carolina. I was sent to the top of a mountain in California.
The program at CEDU was 2 1/2 years. I never got to say goodbye to anyone. I didn't come home for a visit till almost 2 years later. I was not allowed to speak with or correspond with siblings or grandparents for the first 9 months. I spoke on a monitored phone call to my parents every 2 weeks. My mail was read before it was sent and before I received it.
I felt completely abandoned...again. The program was based on one mans idea turned philosophy, to be implicated not by a highly trained therapist or doctor, but by other recovering addicts and criminals most of whom had no education in working with children. These so called faculty verbal, emotionally and mentally abused us repeatedly. They climbed inside our heads, used our horrible thoughts and issues against us in front of our peers. Convinced us all that obviously we were not wanted by our families and that this was the last stop. I remember specifically being told many times that we had no rights and that our parents signed them over to the school.
Three days a week were divided into groups and sent to sit in a circle and have these "raps" Basically being screamed at by the faculty and then your peers at how much your a loser, slut, whore, mistake and so on. Until you broke down and cried. I was 14.. I had not lost my virginity yet. They also had emotional growth experiences where we had 7 different ones that lasted 24 hours. They kept us up all night screaming and yelling at us telling us awful things until we all finally broke. They made us do bizarre things and humiliated us in front of our peers.
I ran away 7 times. Again I am from North Carolina. I didn't know where I was going and I did not care as long as I wasn't there anymore. I hitched hiked with strangers, wandered the woods and hung in the shadows. I always got picked up by the cops. Once I refused to go back there and told them to send me to Juvenal Hall. I sat there for three days. Once brought back I was not a loud to speak unless spoken to. I=No laughing, no smiling, no singing, and I could not be touched or touch. Only a few people were a loud to speak to me. I did work and dish detail, as well as sit at a table in the dinning room, for all to see, but they had to pretend like I didn't exist. The longest I sat at one was for 28 days.
There is so much more to say that it could be put in a book. There was no doctor or nurse during the time I was there. No licensed therapist. There were children there that needed far greater attention and could have benefited from some medication, that was not allowed. We had no contact with the outside world. Education there was a joke. I left there at 17. My education was the same as when I went in. At a 9th grade level. Somehow the school got strange things approved for education. For example, chopping and crosscutting wood was science. Tending a farm was for something else. We only had one real teacher there and she was part time. We did a lot of craft stuff as classes too. So when I started college. It took me over 2 years to catch up to a freshman level at college.
The lack of education is not what scarred me, it was the rest of the awful experience that did. I have struggled for the past 17 years with that school. I have been diagnosed with PTSD form the school. I have had night terrors ever since I left. Mostly about being sent back. Waking up in utter terror sweats and so on. I have literally run away from the emotional scarring by moving all the time, problems with drugs, anger,pain and confusion. It was not until last year that I was able to get some help and deal with the things that happened to me there at that school.
Again I give my permission for you to use my statement. If there is any further information I can give ( because I have tons of it)please don't hesitate to contact me. thank you for your time,
Laura ldupuy1
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
Friday, May 20, 2011
Alia Michelle Weiner at CEDU school (From: Youthrights.org)
I was sent to CEDU school when I was 14 years old. The trauma that I experienced there sent me into a state of complete isolation from which I have only just begun to emerge from recently, being jarred out of my denial when my Dad was diagnosed with a brain tumor February of 2007.
I have spent the past 15 years believing that I was defective, that I was a sexual pervert, that my parents thought this and were too afraid of being judged to address it openly, and that no matter what I did I was never going to be able to have a healthy sexual relationship. I was celibate for 6 years and cloistered myself in the Christian church for 10 years to try to prove to my parents that I was not this horrific thing that they thought I was, but could not speak to me about.
Then, last year, when I was under so much stress that I allowed myself to speak with my parents about these thoughts, they were shocked. It turned out they had no idea about the 5 hour long screaming sessions we were put through at CEDU, or the all night 'propheets' we were subjected to. They had no idea that they were teaching me that self hatred, humiliation and shame were the way to 'salvation' and they never would have allowed me to be there if they had.
As soon as we got there, though, our communication with our parents, family and friends was completely shut off. They monitored our phone calls and read our outgoing mail, and because they benefited the community financially, all police and local business turned their heads and closed their ears to any stories they may have heard from the teens who were sent there, dismissed by the community as drug addicts and losers.
And so society had branded us, and so we branded ourselves, and punished ourselves for the crimes we had committed, in my case, being interested in sex at 14, in others' cases, having eating disorders, not playing along with our families usually dysfunctional habits. My father was a good man, but he had no talent for intimacy and not much more for understanding others, but he loved me. They preyed on him because he did not know himself well enough to see through their distorted and exaggerated ideas, and it cost me my entire life with my father.
My parents sent me there because they feared for my safety, and they told my parents that they were creating a stress free environment for us, pampering us, nurturing us in ways that they, with their stress filled city lives, could never provide. They told my parents that they had failed me, that they were bad parents, and that I needed real help now to repair the damage they had done.
My parents were not perfect, but they loved me, and they are to this day some of the best people I know. And so I learned the lessons CEDU taught me, learned that no one cared about me, learned that hatred of myself was the only way I would ever avoid being destructive, isolated myself and kept myself from people while inside trying to find a way to prove my worth. I got a BA in Business from Pepperdine, but still could not see myself as accomplished. Spent 6 years celibate and 4 years married but still could not see myself as virtuous. Worked as hard as I could to solve every one around me's problems, but still could not see myself as having worth, let alone consider that my own problems might need solving.
I see a therapist twice a week now to try and undue some of the damage they did to me. She makes me feel good because she reacts with shock and care when I tell her the things that happened to me there, like being read my own epitaph or labeling myself slut in front of all my peers, or pounding pillows that I was instructed to picture my parents' faces on, and my own. She doesn't react the way I react internally to my own memories, the way I react is how they trained me to react, pitiless, merciless, and ever placing blame on myself.
I don't know how to give adequate testimony in text form as to the kinds of destruction they enacted upon my young and vulnerable mind. I am a smart person, gifted, high IQ, and so I was smart enough to shut out as much of what they did to me as I was able to, but being smart doesn't protect you from this kind of brainwashing because they play on your emotions and they destroy your sense of self. No thought, no idea, no impulse was acceptable in this environment without somehow referencing the cultish, empty philosophies they pretended to espouse there. We were told to be honest while they lied to our parents. We were told to have integrity while they called us losers and junkies who would never succeed. We were told to have compassion while they provoked us into sobbing, hysterical messes 3 times a week. We were told to persevere while they drained our parents' bank accounts.
They said they were making us strong when really they were making us crazy, and no one has been held accountable, no one has even taken a counting of the damage that has been done. They told us all this was our parents' fault, they even scoffed at our parents at how flippantly they gave up their children, saying things like, 'If they really loved you, they never would have sent you to a place like this, would they?'
As far as real physical evidence of their abuse, I ran away once while I was there and was raped. My rape was neither addressed nor viewed as any different than any other sexual deviance that I had enacted. It went right up there on the list of evidence that I was a 'slut'. I pretty much just kept my head down in that place, as best as I could, but no matter how hard I tried, they still got in my head and convinced me of my worthlessness. This is why I feel more raped by this school than I do by the man who actually raped me when I ran away from there and hitchhiked all they way from San Bernadino to the Hollywood Hills at 15 just to avoid going into the next propheet, or being on my 'full-time' punishment where I was not allowed to sing, smile, laugh or be touched by another person. They revoked the 'priviledge' of touch. This alone causes psychological illness, and to do this to teens is truly cruel and unusual punishment.
As for being defined as a school? I fell behind in all my studies being there. There was no adequate education: staff member's spouses and whoever they could get to stick around in their crazy program was all we got to teach us, largely because they made the staff go through raps and propheets just like the teens, so we all got put through the self hatred machine and went along with the program or we got the boot (fired if you were staff, full time if you were a student)
And the deepest tragedy is that this self hatred kept me in fear of speaking my true mind to anyone, especially not my parents, and so I have gone all this time with little real guidance or sense of my own life. I feel robbed and raped by these people, and although they owe me the very life of my father, who died too soon for me to explain in full to him why I had been so distant for so long, all I want is that nothing like this ever be allowed to be done to any other family.
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
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