Eagle Ranch Academy
Eagle Ranch Academy was founded in 2005 by two brothers, Paul and Dave Arslanian. They were formerly college and professional football coaches, which appears to be their only experience working with children. Eagle Ranch is a co-ed facility with a stated capacity of 52 students. It is located in St. George, Utah, on the former campus of Brightway Adolescent Hospital. The program accepts youth from 12-17. (sources: ww.wiki.fornits.com, www.programvisits.org, Eagle Ranch Official site -url withheld-) While the link to WWASP is subtle (mostly the fact that they operate on the former Brightway Hospital campus), and appearance would indicate that ERA is independently owned, the program model, jargon and methodology is very similar, if not identical in some ways to the WWASP Program model. Please see: What is a WWASP Program? and Red Flags
Staff
Paul Arslanian
Paul Arslanian is co-owner of Eagle Ranch Academy in St. George, Utah, which he founded with his brother Dave. Paul serves as Executive Director for Eagle Ranch Academy. Before founding Eagle Ranch in 2005, Paul, like his brother Dave, served as a college and professional football coach. (source: Eagle Ranch Official site -url withheld-)
Dave Arslanian
Dave Arslanian is co-owner and formerly served as Admissions Director of Eagle Ranch Academy in St. George, Utah. Before opening that program he served as a football coach for several college and professional teams, including Weber State and Utah State. (source: Eagle Ranch Official site -url withheld-)
Survivor Testimony
Request for Information: Reviews in Comment Section
Gallery
[nggallery id=14]
Eagle Ranch Academy is inhumane and abusive. I should know, I was there for 7 months. Dont sent your children there.
My daughter was there and it saved her life. She is now attending college and being successful with a bright future. Before ERA she was headed down the path of self-destruction. I was there and for you to say it was inhuman and abusive is just a flat out lie. This program saves lives.
And your and dumb bitch that obviously shouldn’t have been a parent.
I am a former student that attended the school for 18 months, and I would like to say that while there were more than a few incidents I could have done without, this place really did save my life. I was abusing hard drugs when I was 14 and I was going down a path I would never have come back from if I didn’t get taken there. I didn’t work my program for about a year, got in many fights, ran from there, had taken out my anger on all the staff. But after a certain point after all the denial and hating my parents for sending me there, i finally saw how much more I could be doing in my life. I actually was motivated to get my act right. There were incidents between staff and student that I would not like to talk about, but every one of those staff were fired. I had an incident with one of them, and I didn’t deserve what happened. A therapist there took me outside, listened to what I had to say, and that incident was reviewed on footage and the staff was removed from ERA. The program director KB would come in after hours and help out when the staff needed it if there were any incidents. For a week or so there was a lot of disrespect and acting out and KB was there for hours through the night. One day i learned that she doesn’t even get paid for the tens and tens of hours she comes in to help. After she gets off that’s it for the payroll. The staff if I’m being honest don’t get that much money. They come in and I know that 9/10 of those staff are there because they WANT to help. I’ve developed many great relationships with the staff there, even when I was cussing them out and punching walls and people. When the night was done that was in the past and I learned that they really do care, the program is a great one that I know is a lot better than many of the other ones that I know of. Not one treatment center can help everyone though, sometimes I’ve seen kids that needed more than they could provide. But I know that the program IS saving lives. Some people need to just get through it. I got through it, even though in the beginning I was throwing pity parties, and wanted to die. I made it out. They didn’t change who I was, but brought out the person I used to be when I was younger, a caring boy who wanted to help people. I was just blinded of all that once I went through the things I did before ERA. Long story short this place deserves more credit than they receive
This is the worst thing you could ever do to your child. My ex-husband sent my son there and I couldn’t do anything about it because I lived overseas and didn’t have the means to take him out of there. I was devastated.
I will never forgive him for what he has done to our son.
It’s an inhuman place, they lie to you, they censor letters, they deny phone calls or video sessions to your child, they abuse your child and they just try to convince you that he or she needs help so they can take your money. And it’s a lot of money too while the living conditions are hideous.
This place should close down, it’s criminal , this cycle of abuse has to end.
My mother regrets sending me there. I was groomed and sexually assaulted by the staff. I was very young and he was in his 30s. After I trusted the staff with what was done to me they told me to write the date and times it happened and then used that to delete to footage of it happening so we couldn’t have a legal case! They are horrible disgusting people who are okay with the kids there getting abused. They even let the abuser stay after they said they would keep him away from me.
Owner better watch his back, he’s going to get a brick to the back of his skull the sick fucking cunt.
Eagle Ranch Academy has high-tech cameras all over the campus therefore if there was abuse happening here, it would he documented and caught on camera. This place saved my life and has helped me realize alot. It is not gaurenteed that your child will be “fixed” but these people care alot about providing the best help possible. The Seminars are an experience you will find no where else and have not only given these kids opportunities to work through issues but their parents as well. I attended here for 18 months and thank God every day for this opportunity. If you have any further questions feel free to contact me at [REDACTED – are you kidding me? we aren’t going to let you use our site for advertising -Bill].
If you film your committing a crime, it isn’t as if you call the cops and send them the tapes. You’ll have to do better than that.
bro did you just edit a comment, completely invalidating every line of text in this forum?
No
We aren’t going to allow our website to be used for program marketing, get real. I could have just deleted it or refused to approve it, that’s the other option. Instead, I decided to allow it.
I was sexually assaulted by the staff while I was there. I was only 12-13 and he was in his 30s. Not to mention how often I was bullied by both students and staff. I was there because I was suicidal btw.
There are no cameras TRUST ME
LMAO Alyssa Johnston your probably Darel Or Catherine. All Eagle Ranch Academy has done for me is make me resent my mother its been 7 years and not a day goes by where i dont think about how 2 years of my young life was spent in an abusive treatment center and the person who did that to me was my mom the person who im suppose to trust most. i forgave her but i will never forget what she did to me it will haunt our relationship forever.
She’s real I went there with her. Just unfortunately another brainwashed individual
Don’t send your kids to any of these alternative programs. This will destroy them mentally and physically. If you really want to help them, don’t send them instead seek help else where with real license professionals. Your child will be physically and sexually abused. Not feed, mistreat and you will never be able to fix them after that. If you don’t believe me watch “the document” on Netflix. Trust your instincts. Don’t be fool all they want is your money.
I was there for 11 months and that place was awful. The way they treated the kids there was unacceptable when you had to pee you had to ask to cross in or out of the door and sometimes they qouldnt let me and made me piss myself infront of the whole pod. If just 1 staff dowsnt like you youll be there forever they can and did make lives a living hell and thought it was funny. Fuck that place sidnt help me AT ALL!!!
This broading school is all a cover up. They knew when and how to do things and abuse was everywhere maybe not like ivy ridge but enough.
After watching the horrifying documentary, what can people do to help shut these places down? I’m already firing emails about California contracting out to ERA. What else? This is sick, and unfortunately not even shocking.
Totally abusive facility. Our neighbor went there and has been traumatized.
Safe Teen Schools is looking for survivors of Eagle Ranch Academy to step forward and share their story! Were you abused? Neglected? Denied basic human rights such as food, water, bathroom, sleep, etc? Did you witness these things happening to others? share your story! you are not alone! Contact us at http://www.safeteenschools.org
Back In 2011 I Was Sent To Eagle Ranch To Simulate Jail
That Was The Point
This Program Is Too Mean And Was
It Made Me A Mean Person And Encouraged My Meanness
Because I Also Decided To Embrace Sobriety
And The Program
When I First Got There I Sat At A Table
where We Had What Was Called Last Ten
Where Their Is A Required !0 minutes Of Silence After A Meal
I Was With A Group At The Time Called Pod 3
Sitting At A Table
I Started Talking To A Girl
The Staff Members Name Was Allen
He Told Me To Be Queit I Said Fuck You
He Ran Up And Grabed the Back Of My Neck
Threaten To Make Me Eat Carpet
Called Me Names
While I was Walking Down The Hall
He Made Sound Effects For My Footsteps
Behind Me That Where To Make Me Literally
Sound Like A Stupid Cartoon Character
And Kept Calling Me Billy Badass
The System used Here in 2011 Was A Packet System
Each Packet Based On A Value
Discovery
Honesty
Acceptance
Forgiveness
Service
Trust
Respect
The Discovery Packet I Was Given To Be Completed
Had An Assignment Called An Amnesty
Wich Was A Letter I Had To Read To
My Parents On The phone
That Was A Recount Of
Not Only All The Drugs I Did
But Also All My Sexual Expericnces
Using The Words “ Intercourse, Or Heavy Petting “
And Wether I Gaved Or Recived It,
How Old I Was WHen It Happened
And Where I Was When It Happened
Only After I Completed That Assignment
And Got My Packet Signed By All Nine
Staff Members Could I Move On To The Next Packet
And Get Shoes That wernt “bob Barker”
Flip Flops And Socks
Some People Sat, It Was Called “Sitting”
On Their Discovery Packet Like
One Girl There Named Seneca
Who Was Mentally Ill
And May Actually Be Mentally Retarded
But Despite That
She Was There For More Than A Year
On The First Packet
The Staff Members Wouldn’t Sign Her Packet
For Here To Move On To The Next One
The Staff Was Abusive And Wong To Seneca
Senca Was A !4 Year Old Mentally Disabled Girl
And Ended Up On What Was Called Literally
“ Hobo Assignment “
She Was To Put All Her Belongings
In A Large Trash Bag And Take It With Her
Everywhere She Went
If She Did Not The Staff Would Take Her Bag
And Spill it On The Ground Or Poke Holes
In Her bag Along With The Students
And Myself One Time Too
Seneca Was Clearly Actually Mentally Disabled
Because She Stank Almost Always
She Had Problems Speaking
She Loved Micky Mouse
She Had A Mickey Mouse Doll She Loved So Much
One Of Her Punishments Was Having It Taken Away
And She Told Us Storys Of Having Fell Down Stairs
And We Heard Storys Of How Her Dad Would
Beat Her Phisically When She Was A Baby
Seneca Was Already Predisposed Enough To Homelessness
For Homeless, The Acceptance And Practice Of it
To Ever be An Acceptable Answer
Especially At A Place Selling A Program To Save Lives
I Don’t Understand How Not Even
The Staff members I Made Friends With Saw
And Understood How Wrong They Were To Her
Eagle Ranch Reinforced The Lesson
I Already Knew
That That All Incarceration Is Horrific
And Unnatural And Dirty
And Many Horrors And Wrongs
Exist Inside All Prisons And Our Society
It May Be Positive Because
It Reinforces Why I Don’t Want To
Spend Time In Jail But
The Only Thing That Really
Made Me Understand Why I Don’t
Want to Go To Jail Was Actually
Going To Jail Later
Not Going To Eagle Ranch
All Rehabs And My Own Family
Made Me Feel Like A Criminal
Sense I Was A Little Kid People
Have Been Telling Me I Was Bad
And “Catching Me “ Doing Things
Than Punishing Me
Now I Don’t Believe Anybody
About Anything And Feel
That Most People Are Wrong
And Society Is Wrong For Incarcerating People
Ever For Using Drugs
Its Hard To Imagine How To Teach
Both The Kids And The Parents
Because Their Parents Are Usually Both Wrong Too
I Wish My Dad Would Have Inspired Me
To Be More Interested In Activities
And Taught Me Why Being Good Was Important
But He Didn’t Really And Mom Sets Bad Examples
And Has set Bad Examples For Me My Whole Life
The Only Reason I Went To Eagle Ranch In The First Place
Was Because My Aunt Told Her To Put Me There
My Aunt Who To This Day Will Only Ask Me
Inappropriately At Family Parties If Im On Drugs
And Thats The Only Time We Speak And Thats Only
Things She Asks Then She Looks At Me Like
Im Lying .
I Feel Like Eagle Ranch And AA After It Stole My
Childhood In That It Encouraged Isolation From My Peers
I Never Had A Girlfriend In High school Or Went To Party’s
I Isolated To Stay Sober Because I Thought Smoking Weed Again
Would Make Me Do Heroin
Thats All Ive Got To Say Right Now
Also Wish No Bad On Anyone
Im Just Saying Its Was A Bad Thing
I Was Bad Too And So Was My Family
Their Was Alot Of People
Mostly All Of The People Working There
To Do Good
that Would And Never Did Allow us
To Be abused
I Feel Like This Website uses A Abuse
As A Vary Broad Term
And Makes Me Want To Think I Was Abused
But I Was Not Actually
I Feel Like I Was Mislead
I Don’t Think The Right Lessons
Where Tought To Me
Its A Vary Complicated Thing
I Cant Explain Simply
But I Feel Like The
Problem Lied More In My UpBringing,
My Home Life, And The Attitude
I Had That I Was Too Young
To Have Actually Been Responsible
For Myself
But Am Responsible For Now That I’m Older
I Was There For A Year No One There
Was Actually Criminally Abusive
NoBody Got Hit
They Strictly Restrained People
For Either Trying To Run Away
Or Blatant Disrespect And Usually
Refusal To Go With A Group If Somebody
Decided They Wanted To Stay In The Rec Room
And The Rest Of The Group Was Leaving
They Would Restrain That Person
But Never hit Them Or Do Anything
Worse Than Restraining us With Wrestling Moves
We Where Told That It Was One Of The Best Places
Compared To The Other Schools And It Was And Probably is
But The Only Way To Make Sure Your Child
Is Learning The Lesson You Want Them To Is
To Teach It Yourself Not Pay Someone Else To Do It For You
If They Haven’t Learned Yet Maybe Your
Teaching Them The Wrong Way
If They Still Don’t Understand
Its Probably More So Your Fault
They Have Problems
Than You Would Like To Accept
And Are Blaming Your Child
When Children Are Not To Be Blamed
For Anything
It Will Make Them
Bad If You Are Only instilling Most In Them
They Are Bad Or Wrong For Anything
Because They Are Not
They Are Mislead And Have Not
Been Shown The Way
Because They Lack Understanding
My 16 year old son HATES me, lies and refuses to quit smoking weed. Some of us problems may be my fault but I am trying everything to help him and he will not allow me. My husband and I can agree and we both feel hopeless. Eagle Ranch seems like a solution, I’ve read all of these threads and still can’t determine if it’s a good choice. Can you please tell me more and recommend whether or not this program can help our son
I recommend you research Wraparound services in your area. Wraparound has a lot of good research supporting its efficacy. Because it focuses on treating youth at home and in the community, it alleviates some of the risks for abuse posed by the residential model.
If anyone would like to talk about abuse and neglect and everything wrong about this program feel free to contact me I attended for almost 2 years against my will
IM BEING SENT THERE NEXT WEEK AND I NEED HELP
Hi, I went to ERA from April 2022 to November 2022. I have mixed feelings about this place. I was guilted if I had any negative feelings about ERA and was gaslit into thinking everything they did was ok. We had embarrassing “therapy assignments” (saying degrading things about myself after every verbal interaction), other kids also had very humiliating therapy assignments, such as being referred to as “King” and being asked to do anything and having a “scheduled temper tantrum”. I had 5 minutes a week to call my parents and unmonitored and 10 minutes monitored after I got onto the third packet. Some staff took me standing up for myself personally and made my life a living hell. Some staff would treat us horribly depending on our mood and continue to lecture us again and again for minuscule problems and things that small amounts of students did. People weren’t treated fairly. Some students were favored over others (severely) and the growth sheets were often done with personal bias. My therapist(Geniel) was very blunt, which was good at some times, but if I didn’t agree with her, it didn’t matter. It was her way or the highway. I was often afraid to voice my real feelings because I didn’t want the repercussions. I once didn’t have a clean change of underwear and they didn’t give me another pair of underwear because they did inventory and I didn’t put in a request. I was held to a higher standard than lots of other students due to my composure, but sometimes it was unattainable. Life in ERA wasn’t fair. And sometimes it was truly debilitating. My letters from my mom were censored with white out. That being said, I would not be who I am today without eagle ranch. I do believe that ERA truly traumatized me in many ways, but I also learned a lot. Although ERA had a positive result, it was not a positive experience. I was being manipulated and conditioned. I had bad experiences with staff Michael, Liné, Ginny, Ethan, and program director Eric. If you have any more questions or are also a past student who’d like to process, contact me at namjotara@gmail.com
Anyone who says Eagle Ranch Academy is a WWASP related program is absolutely wrong. Eagle Ranch Academy never has been, is not, and never will be related or affiliated with WWASP , or any WWASP related entity.
Any website or person who says otherwise is intentionally lying or is grossly negligent in making false statements. Either way, such conduct should call into question that person or that website’s credibility.
Advocate for Truth (Our name is withheld, fearing reprisals and harassment)
Maybe next time you should actually read that on which you are commenting:
also, you gave your name as “Advocate for Truth (Our name is withheld, fearing reprisals and harassment)”. that seems a bit dramatic, no? i have your email, and IP, ewe could easily find out who and where you are, but we don’t really need to do so. You are undoubtedly either a program shill or an employee or owner, and frankly not worth our time. Even if you were, we neither harass nor react against anyone for speaking their mind, unless you count also speaking OUR OWN minds, which of course all you yahoos with persecution complexes try and use as an excuse for a wide array of ridiculous and pitiful behavior. Remember, Mr. Jared of Salt Lake City, Utah…free speech works both ways. Now go shill elsewhere, and remember to wear your tinfoil hat.
How dare you minimize students awful experiences.
Whoever you are proves that you didn’t fully achieve the 8 core values.
My daughter has had an awful experience, so have we as parents.
Not allowing our daughter to send us post cards that we were told is allowed immediately.
Annie played dumb with me this morning
“Oh you should’ve received two post cards”
All along they were withholding them from being mailed.
The therapist lie and tell you what you want to hear! Not the truth at all.
No one responds to your emails for 5/6 days and it’s irrelevant to my question or concerns,
Being put on strict when you first arrive and having a difficult time being 25 hours away from home and there is no communication allowed with your child is abusive!!
Not letting her parents know she was in a physical altercation on her first day there and some loser bitch swings at our daughter.,
Lies, lies, lies.
Our daughter is coming home tomorrow !!
Glad you had a life changing experience you must’ve been a bully.
To the former student that says this is an abusive program, I must call BS. I was there and I can tell you that this place is not abusive. Of course I didn’t want to be there, no teenager would, but it in part help save my life. After being there a few months I got word that a group of my friends were drinking and smoking weed, skipped school, and rolled the vehicle they were in. 2 of my friends were killed. I know I would have been in that vehicle if I had been home. That was my second wake up call… the first being sent to treatment. I am now enrolled in college and engaged to be married. The tools I learned there will be with me for life. The staff pushed and pushed but always in a respectful way. At times I hated all of them, but now as I look back I know they loved and cared about me. If anyone would like to talk to me about ERA I would be happy to.
Maybe i know you haha
e are considering ERA for our 15 year old son, but I am concerned about making sure the therapy is appropriate and not abusive. Would you be willing to talk to me?
9252021915
Please call me at this number. I really need your help
I stayed at this place for over a year… Never, i repeat NEVER has this place been abusive! In fact this place had some of the best people Iv been ever around. By the time I was ready to leave I had amazing strong bonds with not only the other students, but the staff as well. No place is perfect, and we were all stupid troubled teenagers at the time. So when the staff needed to do what had to be done, they did. Anyone who says otherwise brought it on themselves. I plan on visiting ERA soon to tell my story and to express the opportunity they have before them.
Solders of Hope!!!!
Tanner
I have a daughter at Eagle Ranch right now. Would you be willing to talk to me?
My email is amandaghudson@yahoo.com
tanner we both went to era at the same time. if you r who i think u are how can you say this. i saw staff abuse you as well as other kids. ???????
I was there at the same time as y’all too and they were NOT abusive. Restraints only happened when someone would try to run away or get violent, at that point there’s no other option. There were some staff that were too strict/tactless but it never crossed the line into abuse. It was a good, safe place for many kids who would otherwise be homeless or incarcerated. Without ERA a lot of us would be dead, and a lot of our former drug friends are dead. Which side would you rather be on?
What a charming excusal/apologia of abuse. Love the false dichotomy, too. Nice touch. This is perfectly executed program jargon. No matter what the program is, the first thing they teach you to spout off is “I would be DEAD without XYZ-whatever-the-fuck-program-name!!!”
This is because the valuable commodity that programs are designed to produce is not “fixed” children, but positive testimony from students and parents. Without it, they literally cannot continue to operate as a business; everything they do is specifically designed to make it.
We’re considering sending our defiant drug using 16-year-old son to get clean and straight at Eagle Ranch. We’ve tried everything he refuses to cooperate with us so yes we are afraid he would end up dead. Can you recommend this program?
So your saying that you know when they make you carry all of your things in a sheet and tell the other kids to mess with you and then all your stuff is nasty and has been on the ground outside that isn’t abusive. Wearing sandals all the time eating one bowl of oatmeal and 4 cheese sandwiches a day cause you lost privileges that’s not abuse?
You must have been around some fucked up people your whole life then cuz that place fucking sucked and so did the staff
I’m a former student here and I would definitely say not to send your child here there are better ways of handling the problems that you are facing trust me. Many but not all the things said about this place are true. The accusations of verbal abuse drugging children and social isolation are very real. Not all the people here are bad or out to hurt people, I think they sincerely believe in what they are doing. But all to often do frustrations,bias, and judgement cloud the decisions these staff make. These people would literally tell me they had me all figured out and told me they new things about me better than I did myself. I would be denied the right to talk to my parents in the beginning AND EVEN WEAR SHOES! as you can imagine this is not easy for one to handle.especially because we were given prison sandals, and forced to do calisthenics in the cold and wet grass in the early morning. While mind you wearing nothing but these sandals and a pear of socks, which get wet and cold in no time, as well as just a t shirt and thin basketball shorts.(we were also given one change of clothes for the cold.) They shave your head if you’re a boy and give you no clothes except for the same grey or red shirts day in and day out.(just one green orange or purple shirt for a certain day of the week.) They take away your individuality and make you part of a “family”. (They actually call them pods for some reason) the staff (and even kids) would be verbally abusive to me and pretty much every one at some point in their stay. Some more than others, depending if you were willing to fall in line. I remember at one point in my stay I was made to stand up in front of a room full of people and be verbally dismantled, being told I don’t love my family and I was selfish and a brat for my choices I had made in the past. (I’m not saying I’ve never done any thing wrong we’ve all made our mistakes before.) The sad thing is I was so mentally broken down at the time I literally believed it all. I was made to believe that I was all my mistakes that I had made. I stood in front of about 20 people and cried for hours. (This was part of one of their seminars), I also couldn’t respond or defend myself against this justified form of name calling and slander. (Which happened to people almost daily in our twice a day sessions of “group therapy”)while I was there I was put on various medications including anti phsycotics and anti depressants. Medications I had no choice in taking,I quickly became a very different person turning to things I had never done before like self harm and needing to lie constantly about my true feelings. I hated it. I hated my life. I couldn’t stand it.I fantasized constantly about running away or getting “pulled” (being allowed to leave) with my peers. I noticed that the girls especially were what I would think of as brain washed. We were forced to talk about things that happened to us in our lives even if we weren’t comfortable with it, mind you they expected us to do so in front of two dozen or so people. Please think twice about this place and DON’T BELIEVE THE WEB SITE!!!! They lie about almost everything. I don’t believe they even have an updated list of the staff. The site is almost a complete lie its almost funny how stupidly absurd the lies are. I could go on about the things that happened there.and can only imagine what’s going on now. I feel for those kids I really do, the living conditions in our “cottages” were disgusting if we complained they got mad at us. You can’t really clean up after the 13 other people that live there but they would say it was up to us to keep it clean. And believe it or not some kids were used to it and just made it worse when you did clean. So doing so was pointless. But they always made sure of having every thing in order when parents were visiting. But I’m just going to stop here, I’ve spent the last 45 mins on my phone typing this up and I could still go on. If you have any questions please email me,I probably will not get on this site again. To any defenders of this place please don’t contact me in search of an argument. They go no where ive done it hundreds of times before while there and I don’t care to any more.you can think or say what you want If it worked for you that’s great. I’m just saying what I saw and what happend to me.
My email is ggghg6223@gmail.com
Thank you for your time.
not important my friend just got sent here and i was wondering if he will be alright i heard things about this placed and im in shock. what kind of low life parent would send your family here instead of dealing with the problems yourself and manning up and being the better person. PARENTS DONT EXPECT TO EVER TALK TO YOUR KID AGAIN YOUR HALF THE PROBLEM IF YOUR GOING TO SEND YOUR KID HERE YOU GO YOURSELF TOO.
joshyboy don’t believe everything you read on the internet. I was there at the same time as this girl and a lot of what she’s saying isn’t true. There was no drugging of children, there weren’t even consequences if you refused to take your meds. There was no verbal abuse on the part of the staff, & while l can’t quite say the same about the students, they’re there for a reason. They were probably abusing their families and peers on the outside, so naturally they do so in treatment too, but that’s WHY THEY’RE THERE! To work on those abusive behaviors. Social Isolation was only used for limited amounts of time in extreme cases of attention seeking / obstinate defiant behavior, and even then they’d usually be allowed to vent to staff when they really needed it.
“Eagle Ranch only abused kids when they really really deserved it.”
If you’re really complaining about having to exercise outside for 30 minutes a day, then I don’t think you should wonder why you were sent to treatment. There is a reason they strip you of your material poccessions and cut you off from the outside world- so you can focus solely on healing and fixing yourself. This is intervention and it’s for those who can’t/won’t help themselves get out of destructive behaviors. So basically, the only people that left ERA without accomplishment and a sense of satisfaction and thankfulness are those who were never willing to help themselves once they entered the program. I’m thankful everyday for the day I walked through those doors and met the most amazing people in my life, my guardian angels I call them. Im thankful everyday for the values they taught me (integrity, trust, respect, honesty, etc) because I see people living without these values struggling everyday and hurting others and themselves as a result. There will never come a day that I am not grateful for my time there and the people I met, and what I learned. And there will never be a day I don’t miss it. Eagle Ranch Academy was the only place I ever felt at home. You sound incredibly ungrateful by stating that being “forced” to exercise for 30 minutes a day outside was one of your top complaints. And by the way, if you were respectful and sincere in your program the most you went without shoes was one month. The people and the program at Eagle Ranch Academy saved my life and many of the relationships in my life because I was willing to work for it.
Sincerely, A former Eagle Ranch Academy graduate who was a high school drop out living in a truck stop motel before ERA, abusive, destructive, depressed and wanting to die by the age of thirty. Now, about to graduate college, working two jobs, and wanting to grow old and happy experiencing all of life through a sober lense.
Our experiences are based on our attitudes. You can say you didn’t enjoy ERA. But don’t you dare ever say the staff and the program was abusive and cruel.
Some of the comments saying this place is a good place…. Don’t make me laugh…I HAD a friend that was sent here…. HAD being the main word, she killed herself not long after getting away from there, she told us about how they were forced to take medication, made to tell her parents falsehoods, was physically abused as well as emotionally, made to feel alone and isolated, called names and told that it was her own fault she was there and that she was not wanted by her family.
This place is a lie. Any parent that sent their child the was lied to. living there for over 1 years i saw many kids picked on and abused by staff.
You are absolutely correct., Parents are lied to which makes them hypocrites.
They expect kids to learn them meanwhile they lie to parents to make it sound like the perfect place until you get there and drop your child off and 10,000.00
And, then all the communication stops!
SCAM
I was at ERA for over a year and I read all the stuff “former” students post on sites like these. In fact, I don’t even know if former students, especially those that hide behind fake names, are really former students because they talk about a different ERA that I know. I must have walked around for over a year with my eyes and ears closed because I never saw any abuse. I saw staff that cared about students that would push us to reach our potential. They didn’t allow us to get away with much crap and if you call that abuse you’re in for a long hard life. For those “former” students making all these accusations that abuse was occurring on a regular basis you should contact ERA and tell them times, places, and staff names. I know they will be concerned enough to investigate. You can call ERA a lot of things, but the owner is honest and you can trust him to do the right thing. Well said Rachel. You sound like an awesome person who’s going to be successful throughout your life. Keep it up.
Jared I lived at ERA for 1 years in 2006. If you think taking away shoes and socks making kids walk on hot pavement to eat every meal to where me and others had blister on our feet is right. Or letting kids sleep in a bed with no sheets and no pillows for months is helping kids learn the ways of life? I hope you never have children. I was Forcefully taken in the middle of the night handcuffed and put on a plain and mind you i had never even gone to jail or had problems with law. After i was abused and dumb at ERA for the first 3 months i had no contact with anyone in my family parents or friends. Why do they do things like that its a tact so you cant explain what really happens on a daily at era. After three months of being brainwashed and they are sure you wont bad mouth the program then you get a supervised 10 min call. Not even in jail do they not allow you a phone call for this amount of time. AS for the owners of this place that you trusted so much i maybe talked to them 2 or three times the entire time i live there saw a therapist 4 or 5. For every 1 kid this place thinks it helps there are 10 more out there it has made life pretty difficult for. People that say abuse does not go on here anger me. If you think its right to isolate kids in room alone for days or “ghost” kids for months with no contact to anyone but staff. Or that its right to restrain kid to the ground till their rest and arms bleed, tackle and presure point 12 to 17 year old children till they eat what you want them to eat or walk where you want them too. This place and any place like it are wrong in so many ways. I could write a book with all the abuse, taunting, and brainwashing i saw at era. Get real!!!! Me and 90% of the kids sent to ERA dont need treatment they need LOVE to be showed they are cared about not shipped of to people who’s true intention is to make a buck.
I appreciate your post. Whether or not you want to call it “abusive”, taking away basic human rights, such as clothing/footwear, is completely unethical. These are rights that prisoners receive. What’s scary is that all letters are read by staff before they’re sent and phone calls are monitored. So if something bad has actually happened, the student wouldn’t be able to communicate that to anyone outside of ERA. Also, why are the progress reports completed by staff handwritten but the ones completed by students are typed? How do we know the students are actually the ones typing?
Are letters home read by staff? Why would I send my son there if he is forced to walk barefoot outside and cut his hair short or have limited time with me. It certainly doesn’t sounfd like a form of confidence building. I was about to send him but it sounds like a terrible place to send a broken person.
I am heart -broken to hear the kids awful experiences.
Today marks our daughters second week there.
Let me begin with the planning & preparation process with ERA it is very long.
I was constantly being called, text and emails- excessively..however I answered every call, email & text.. endlessly.
Fast forward we finally get to ERA and they gave us 5 minutes to say our “goodbyes” our daughter was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. They still came in and took her away from us. We live 25 hours away from that place. Meanwhile I’m still an emotional wreck, shaking and crying. Kris Willard was consoling me with lies that she said would be taken care of. Cora the nurse was uninterested being in the room period,
Tracey the therapist made it seem like she will be working with our daughter multiple times per week. Not true! She has sat with our daughter 2 times in 2 weeks. After the session were over I would get an email that our daughter is doing great! She is happy and has made friends!
Same Bullshit on the second email.
I knew all along our daughter isn’t doing well.
Oh!! Before I forget this we were told that could start writing to our daughter on post cards, immediately?!?! WTF! Kris and Paul said that our daughter is allowed to write and send postcards to us which NEVER EVER HAPPENED!
I was emailed a list of approved items that she could have 85% personal hygiene. I ordered her $200.00 worth the personal hygiene products and they were NEVER given to her they were being stored away until she earns them!!!?? What adolescent male or female would be motivated to get their personal hygiene products that is necessary to have?!?!
That makes absolutely NO SENSE AT ALL.
My husband I found out three days later that the first day there our daughter was in a physical altercation and the girl swung at our daughter. It was minimized as No big deal our daughter is unphased. Bullshit!
The lack of communication with the staff is bullshit.
They conviently do not respond to parents questions and concerns.
6-7 days later you might get one very vague email that has nothing to do with any of our questions.
The entire staff are hypocrites not modeling any of the 8 core values they expect our kids to learn. One of them is TRUST. Paul said trust the program he left out a very important detail don’t trust the the staff.
I am beyond happy to say my husband is flying to Utah tomorrow morning to get our daughter out of that BULLSHIT!!
At ERA I was told to believe and trust in my peers. I would like to point out that 90% of those peers that I was told to trust in and use the advice they gave me have relapsed and are just better at covering their mischief up. I was verbally abused on the daily by my peers, in fact I still have nightmares and anxiety attacks over the tramma I experienced their. They would play favorites with kids with well to do parents. Who they knew could afford to pay or kids who would non stop talk about their feelings. I on the other hand was left with the short end of the stick, being an introvert by nature and coming from a middle class family. I ha a very difficult time expressing my feelings, from watching a girl be cut down and told she was an idiot for feeling the way she did. I was terrified. I was then put on a project where I had to express every period of the day. After every expression I was called a liar and unbelievable because it was difficult for me talk to these people. I was brought to tears everyday. I began to believe even more that I was my “illness”. The whole reason I was sent there was for the lack of trust I had with my parents. And the suicidal outcomes that came from locking up my feelings. I wanted so badly to talk to a professional, and even sent letters home asking for the ability to talk with my counsilor on site. In the six months I was there I had three one on one meetings with my counsilor. And each one ended with her saying something along the lines of me needing to admit to all the drugs I did. This was confusing to me. I wasn’t there for drugs, in fact I had never smoked or drank at all in high school, my parents knew that too, being from Utah and LDS. It wasn’t something I desired to ever do. So that ruled out ever telling her what was going on in my heart. She denied me any interaction with my parents although I earned phone calls home. The three times I got to talk to my parents during my stay were with my amnesty reading, one therapy call and a visit that was unexpected by everybody. The unexpected visit was when I was finally able to talk to my parent one on one with out Shannon breathing down my neck. Telling me what I should and shouldn’t say. And boy when I was finally able to tell my parents about the two abusive relationships and 3 separate rape incidents without being interrupted, my parents were furious. Not with me but the program, for my therapist was telling them complete lies of what I was telling peers and what I was doing. If it wasn’t for the fact that it was so close to the end of the school year, and I being a senior who still needed to graduate. I would have been pulled that day. I left about three weeks later. ERA badgered my parents on the daily to pay them money for things that I never got, (I.e 17 therapy sessions, immunizations, and medications and also off campus trips.) ERA is a waste of money, they administration are liars and will try to scam you out of money. The abuse is real. It may not be all physical but it is mental and emotional. If you want your child to get help I would send them to a prison before I would send them here. They get the same level of treatment and it would probably cost you less.
Thank you for sharing this…Bless your heart honey.
Everything you said I believe!
Our daughter is 2 weeks in and we have so many complaints about that place.
Happy to say my husband is flying there tomorrow morning to pick our daughter up and get her out of there.
So happy you are no longer there.
The way abusive organizations work (called “High-Demand Groups”), is that they get certain people to buy into the program. Those people become supporters or even abusers. Everyone else who does not conform gets abuse. Those who conform never see the abuse, or if they do they see it as “discipline” not abuse. So to different people the exact same group can look completely different. There are countless books on these topics, written by both quacks and solid professors of psychology and sociology. (Consider skimming book “The Lucifer Effect” or reading a little on group psychology, the Phillip Zimbardo Standford Prison study or Stanley Milgrim authority experiments. And be sure you understand the Stockholm Syndrome and the extreme loyalty that high-demand groups create in people.)
My point is that ERA could be extremely abusive without many of the members seeing it. It could be good for some and highly destructive for others.
The key indicator of a High-Demand Group is not that they have obvious negative effects for all or even most of the people who go there, but that the negative effects are extremely negative and the positive effects also create other mental health issues for those who’ve come through it, that are often hard to define.
Often people who’ve been through a high-demand group won’t even realize the extent that they were abused until years later. Often they won’t realize they were seriously harmed until they are married or have children and their spouse, children, friends or the authorities tell them that their behavior toward their spouse or kids abusive and must stop. Then they realize that what they were taught at the high-demand group was used to control them and did get them in-line but that those techniques are not generally healthy or even generally destructive.
Keep an open mind. ERA may be good and it may be very bad and the only way to know is to do your research, talk to people. Parents must demand the ability to drop in any time unannounced and see their child and tour the facilities. If they don’t find anything and the kids don’t report anything then that’s good.
It’s tough because kids that go to places like this go because people already think of them as deceptive and manipulative, so when such a kid says, “Mom, Dad, this place is horrible! Please, I’ve got to get out!” they may not even believe them, causing further destruction of trust and health of the child.
Think carefully folks! I know I will be.
Excellent comment.
We’ve learned a hard lesson with ERA that place is more destructive and abusive, not to mention liars.
We’ve had absolutely no contact with our daughter.
She was allowed immediately to write us on post cards, we began immediately writing to her.
I asked why our daughter has sent us anything ?
Annie played dumb with me saying she wrote two cards hmmm I’ll have to look into it.
It’s been lie after lie after lie.
Withholding our child’s personal hygiene products until they earn it?!?!
What kids are motivated by deodorant and shampoo!! Give me break!
Most ridiculous bullshit I’ve ever heard.
Our daughter will be coming home tomorrow!!
I am a former student from ERA. I was picked up in the middle of the night by 2 strangers and flown across the country without any explanation. I was a decent kid, i had a solid friend group, good grades in school, a job, and played on the soccer team. My parents were going through a divorce and as a last ditch effort to save their marriage they decided to put the blame for their marital issues on me. So i got sent away.
I was forced to wear prison sandals. They only gave you 5 pars of underwear and you were only allowed to do laundry once a week. You do the math. The interventions were nuts. Kids would have to carry around backpacks full of rocks or sand, they practiced isolation and seclusion, and upon intake they make you do a cavity check.. I was denied the use of the bathroom one day and ended up peeing my pants after being denied for 4 hours. I wasn’t allowed communication with my parents and when I finally was allowed to talk to them (6 weeks after arriving) i was monitored so closely i couldn’t say anything. These are just some of the things that went on while i was there.
Today I have my masters degree and just got licensed (LCSW)! I work very closely with government funded residential programs. I know what is legal and what is not. ERA is very much abusive. Parents: PLEASE do research before sending your child to a residential treatment center. When i was finally able to tell my parents what was happening I was pulled immediately. It was a mistake that I have gotten over and accepted as a speed bump in my life. I have built upon my horrible experience and made a career out of making sure that what happened to me does not happen again.
To the people that think ERA was a good experience: maybe it was for you, and I’m not trying to discredit your opinion or your experience but I promise you this, there are better options. Some kids do need a wake up call and the “tough love” approach, but it shouldn’t come with the price that it does. No child should be denied shoes, or the bathroom, or communication with their parents. There are better options, PLEASE consider them before sending you kid to ERA.
Would you consider submitting this to our testimony section?
Thanks for your post. My sister and brother in law both retired from social work, and your comments caught my attention due to your licensure in social work. I am incredibly amazed that you were able to somehow recover given the type of trauma involved in being whisked away under cover of darkness, something we hear about in dictatorships in poor countries. Those that defend this institution sort of reminds one of beaten wife who claims she fell after being knocked unconscious by her abuser. Those that claim they were helped fine; on the other hand, just one abuse to the extent described in situations above justifies criminal investigation, requiring sentencing and jail. To those posting that these children deserved what they got, that tells me what sort of parent you may become, note I said, “may” because there is zero justification for that sort of behavior on defenseless people, young, old, mature. I hear that argument all that time, it is just one step away from the psychopath.
My son is a good boy academically and athletically. However his behavior was outrageous and unpredictable. He has anger issue. What other options do we have? Please guide us. We love our son but unable to accept his behavior.
That is awful!!
Unfortunately it is TRUE!!
Our daughter has been there two weeks.
Red flags were everywhere the moment we left to drop her off.
The staff are hypocrite liars!!!
Wearing prison sandals is abusive!
Having the kids earn their personal hygiene products that parents buy.
Is the most RIDICULOUS shit I have ever heard.
It speaks volumes of how they operate.
Why teen is motivated by deodorant and shampoo??
Insane! Our daughter was assaulted within a few hours of being there and no one told us about it for 3 days, The therapist lies to tell you what you want to hear Instead of the truth.
Oh she’s doing great. Really…?!?! No she isn’t!
And the no contact with their parents is a form of trauma/ abuse.
Our daughter is out of there in 11 hours hours from now.
We are bringing her home!
Everything you said I believe.
Unfortunately it is TRUE!!
Our daughter has been there two weeks.
Red flags were everywhere the moment we left to drop her off.
The staff are hypocrite liars!!!
Wearing prison sandals is abusive!
Having the kids earn their personal hygiene products that parents buy.
Is the most RIDICULOUS shit I have ever heard.
It speaks volumes of how they operate.
Why teen is motivated by deodorant and shampoo??
Insane! Our daughter was assaulted within a few hours of being there and no one told us about it for 3 days, The therapist lies to tell you what you want to hear Instead of the truth.
Oh she’s doing great. Really…?!?! No she isn’t!
And the no contact with their parents is a form of trauma/ abuse.
Our daughter is out of there in 11 hours hours from now.
We are bringing her home!
I had a relative, a close relative sent here. She was taken in the middle of the night from her bed, handcuffed,put in a car and driven to another state by 2 strangers (traumatic for a 14 year old). She was not allowed shoes, in the winter, she had to earn them. She was duct taped to another student for a day. She was also “ghosted” for a month (ghosting is when nobody talks to you, you are completely ignored by everyone). She was finally released because the insurance company realizded she had no business being there. She now has sleep issue’s and needs medication and trust’s absolutely no one. Tell me this is not abusive. BTW, ERA IS NOT A LICENSED FACILITY. The only license they hold is a daycare facility. The 2 owner’s are former football coaches that were fired. Anybody who say’s this is a great place is either brainwashed, related to staff or just plain stupid. These schools should be banned and it makes me wonder why Utah is the only state allowed to do this.
Oh my god! ????
Please tell me this was reported to the police!!!
Oh my God if I hear anything at all has happened to my daughter more than we already know.
ERA will be dealing with the law!!
Picking up our daughter at noon today – getting her out of that place.
Pray your relative got therapy from that traumatic experience.
You asked why Utah is one of the few states that are allowed to do this and it has to do with politics. Many of these programs back politicians like Mitt Romney and many others. These are how these programs are able to stay open for extended periods of time. If you are looking for a program please exhaust all other means first. I am a WWASP Survivor, my family moved to a 3rd world country when I was 15, I was a minority to say the least and was uprooted from everything I had know, I got into minor trouble ditched school here and there, had never done drugs nor had any interest in them I loved baseball and skate boarding. I made some close friends who helped me cope with the change then there grandfather they were living with died and they left and it sent me into a spiral I became severely depressed (not Suicidal) to me it was a prison sentence. My parents didnt listen to me, as far as they were concerned I was being over dramatic, I startedto get into fights at school mostly cause I was an easy target, ended up smoking weed a couple times and drinking a couple times trying to make some friends that would have my back which led to more problems at home to where eventually at 17 was kicked out of the house in a foreign country. I ended up in Paradise Cove (WWASP) affiliated. The Abuse, Neglect, forced confessions that were endured have scarred me for life. I have a functional relationship with my parents at best, I’m almost 39 years old, certain songs play on the radio and I have flash backs, I still have nightmaresof being back in the program. If you saw me in the street you would never know, I have a family with 4 children, one recently married, another going to college, and other 2 are in high school and will be graduating in the next couple of years. I will not list my occupation but will tell you its one of the toughest to have, and have been to some horrible places but these seem tame to me compared to what I endured while at the Cove. Some came home with physical scars everyone came home with emotional scars. So I plead with you if you are going to send your child to be fixed by some one else listen to the horror stories of those that have been there, I’m not going to say all of them are true but some where in there is the truth. Troubled teen industry is a multi-billion dollar business in the U.S. and Utah has been cashing in for decades. A program in Utah would be the last place I would look for anything to help with a troubled teen but given Utahs history with Troubled teens I wouldnt look here and especially not St. George. FYI Look into Crosk Creek Manor I believe in Laverkine Utah the wife of the Sheriff/deputy back then was a Councilor there charged with sexual assault of a minor, there was a class action law suit that shut the program down finally. That was a WWASP program not Saying ERA is WWASP affiliated but the seminars strike and similar cord that gives me chills. I wouldnt send my kid here but thats just me and what I learned from my experiences I have dealt with in life.
Eagle Ranch Academy not only has MULTIPLE police reports, but is known for brain washing and sexual abuse. DO NOT send your children here!
This false. I enrolled my daughter into Eagle Ranch Academy and before I did I contacted the St. George Police Department, the State of Utah, the Washington County Sheriff’s Dept, Child Protective Services, and Eagle Ranch has never had a complaint filed against them. So anyone that says it is abusive (sexual or physical) is lying. They are accredited through the state of Utah and CARF, which is a nationally recognized accreditation commission.
Just because a complaint hasn’t been filed doesn’t mean they haven’t abused anyone. To claim otherwise is utterly nonsensical and disingenuous at best.
But as a parent who put their child through this, I can certainly understand your strong instinct or imperative towards total denial. I would feel pretty guilty, too. I know my parents have expressed to me that they feel guilty
Look at the State of Utah please! Many wonderful people, but that does not mean all facts are on the table. Bill Boyles is correct. Where have you been all these years, denial of the truth is a big part of our history. We are never taught the truth, we are given sanitized history of our country, federal agencies cover their misdeeds, information withheld from ‘we the people.’ If it were just one story of abuse posted here, then you have a case. There are too many of them posted; imagine those not posted! What then? Farming out children to an institution is a serious choice, even a dog knows this instinctively; this being true, think of how a (your child) would feel? Jubilant? I do not think so
Perfect scandalist system filled with hate and traumatized and having constant nightmares parents should be ashamed the therapists should be publicly ashamed every single staff from shit stain director to sexually perverted staff lives in a bubble fuck you you made your money death to you all
Fuck this place I was raped by bill
I have a daughter presently at daughter at Eagle Ranch Academy.
As her Mother and all of Katy, Texas community, we all are very disturbed by no communication or contact with her.
I have only spoken to here for 5 minutes on skype for 5 minutes in 5 months. She became hysterical and hateful had to be returned to her pod “family “. She just wrote me a beautiful Mother’s day card.
This came out of nowhere.
I am very frightened for her and her wellbeing.
I gave custody to her father 7 months ago thinking she would have a 2 parent family, her 6 year old brother from the new marriage with sit down dinners nightly and an environment that provides her stability.
I have made a horrible mistake….
Could someone please email or call me and let know how I get her out of this facility????
Claudia Hoffman
Cell 2817015656
Email: hoffman30@gmail.com
My son is a good boy academically and athletically. However his behavior was outrageous and unpredictable. He has anger issue. What other options do we have? Please guide us. We love our son but unable to accept his behavior.
Perfect scandalist system filled with hate and traumatized and having constant nightmares parents should be ashamed the therapists should be publicly ashamed every single staff from shit stain director to sexually perverted staff lives in a bubble fuck you you made your money my lowest wishes for everyone here
Was at ERA for 7 months and witnessed many children be restrained by several adults at once. Ive seen children be degraded and treated as subhuman or “non-working”. Ive seen children be forced into isolation for months at a time where they couldn’t even talk to friends or staff. I could go on and on all day about this places inhumane practices. If your child is an addict in any way this place will not help. Ive never seen a single student leave and get better what so ever. If your child has behavioral issues the same is true they will always get worse. For depression and suicide this is the WORST possible decision you could make for your child.
I was at ERA for 17 months and was the longest on campus for a while. I saw the campus change for the better and the worse. After a month of being there, i fell into a deep hole of depression and self- destruction because of the environment, self-harmed once, and went into a spiral because of all the medications they had put me on as a result. I would get in trouble and punished (privs taken away) for not doing school even though my eyes were vibrating from the medications to the point where i couldn’t read anything. I was disruptive so they sent me to another facility for 10 days, where i was almost stabbed and witnesses a brutal beating- WITHOUT MY PARENT’S CONSENT -and then ERA made them pay for it. When they found out that i had been sent, my parents asked for me to be taken back to ERA, and their request was denied. But at least I was given candy on the way up, right? I never needed medication before ERA and i am THRIVING without any now. I have seen kids forced to take medications that make them fall asleep in groups only to be reprimanded and punished for it. Kids only allowed to eat cheese sandwiches as a punishment and forced to consume plain, cold oatmeal for days on end- for not finishing their regular food or for being rude to the cook. Kids who didn’t have chair or even talking privileges, getting in trouble for speaking even if they are suicidal (happened to me, i was told to “shut up”) and being forced to sit on the ground like a dog and lean uncomfortably on the ground during long school blocks. I wasn’t allowed to wear shoes for about a week, because i had been making an “annoying noise” with them and got them taken away, and was forced to walk around in my socks inside and outside during rainy season. Kids who weren’t allowed to have pillows or even blankets when they slept, secluded from the group by being denied sugar priveledges- even as simple as syrup for their pancakes- for being SUICIDAL- everyone being forced to work out in heavy Wrangler jeans and collared shirts in the 110 degree Utah summer heat (called Strict). I have witnessed someone’s eyebrow being split open by a staff who didn’t know how to restrain properly, someone’s face being pushed into the carpet so hard and excessively they got deep carpet burn all on their chin, forehead, nose, and cheeks, and many other incidences. I was at ERA when PCS was still around, and witnessed 3 people’s wrists being broken by staff using excessive force, and one they didn’t take to the hospital for a full day because they didn’t believe he was actually injured. I was goosed multiple times and after a pop, the staff weren’t able to restrain on a specific wrist because they pushed it so hard i was literally immune to it- and can still am extremely flexible without pain in that wrist to this day. Past staff brought drugs into the boy’s living quarters to give to struggling addicts, he was fired, another staff tried to sexually assault another student, he’s in jail, another student on suicide watch wasn’t being actually watched how they should’ve been according to ERA’s Suicide watch regulations or whatever and ended up stopping his own heart before being resuscitated on site and sent to another facility. ERA stole my personal items from my inventory- probably just threw them away, and i didn’t get back half of what i came in with, and lost cherished stuffed animals, expensive jewelry, and pictures even after asking for them to be sent back to me multiple times when i got out. I journaled almost every single day i was there about my experiences and all of my journals were disposed of by the establishment. For females, the tampons on hand were a horrible brand that caused burns if you were on your period more than a few days and the pads were like diapers. When requesting feminine products sent from home, i was denied multiple times, even though according to their rules i should’ve been allowed to receive home sent products. One female needed to change her feminine product and was denied multiple times which could’ve caused medical issues. I had to pee once and was denied for several hours. i ended up trying to make a run for the bathroom in an attempt to not pee my pants in front of everyone and was restrained. The food was soaked in butter and all frozen or processed. The vegetarian diet was often only noodles or bread for lunch and dinner which is not sustaining at all. Staff can be manipulative, rude, and unfair, and often played favorites with certain students. I have seen staff both bully students, and witness bullying and do nothing about it. ERA is grossly unprepared to handle kids with Autism and the hostility from other students towards them. I know for a fact that my therapist lied to both me and my and parents to get the outcome that she wanted in certain situations. I have witnessed and experienced firsthand the unfair punishments put on all children because of 1 student’s actions. I have witnessed a student being forcibly dragged out of bed for not getting up in time, my postcards sent from home were all read and i was only given the ones that mentioned me working on my program, they threw away the others. We were not allowed to tell our parents or guardians what was actually going on, and if we attempted to we got in trouble and were seen as “manipulating to get pulled”. Whatever pictures are on the website, your child probably won’t experience that. I went on 2 outings in my 17 months there, left on the packet of Acceptance. Very few kids got to go on excursions and you had to manipulate the program hardcore to get to that point. Kids on higher packets would come back to the rooms talking about how they can’t wait to get out so they can use again, how they were fooling everyone so they could get out and go back to their way of life. I think i know of 1 sober person out of all the kids who were there with me, who i still keep in touch with. The doctor who occasionally came in didn’t administer pain medications when doing procedures on things like ingrown nails. The showers and bathrooms gave people foot fungus, we were forced to work out every single morning (minus a few holidays) even to the point of collapse and puking. My Pod at one point was told that if we didn’t work to graduate we would go home and die. The campus went through lots of ups and downs depending on how the majority of each group behaved but overall, in my experience, ERA was a traumatic place that metaphorically and mentally beat you into submission, depriving you of human decency, and forcing you out of your ego and image so they could build you back up and force you to become what a perfect child is in their eyes. My hope and wish is for ERA to one day be fully shut down for good or for their methods to change dramatically, and for no other child to experience the horrors that me and the kids i was there with had to endure. because of that trauma we are all friends for life. it makes me sick to even think about what each Pod is doing right now and what the kids that are still there are going through at this very moment.
https://www.stgeorgeutah.com/news/archive/2021/11/15/cgb-man-arrested-for-alleged-sexual-abuse-of-teen-while-working-at-st-george-facility-for-at-risk-youth/
No cameras in the laundry room — makes sense.
Shameful.
– former ERA student
I think I know you
Eagle Ranch is abusive! I’m 22 years old now and I’ve blocked out two years of my life from my mind. I was sent to ERA when I was 14-15 and I don’t ever recall anything from that time until recently. Staff, especially their beloved “academic coordinator” (Meghan P), were degrading and dehumanizing. Also Katherine B. was a tyrant. In no setting is it ethical or right for CHILDREN to earn basic human rights and label it as PRIVILEGES. This place strips you of your identity. Let’s not even get into the “seminars” we were forced to participate in. This place is not therapeutic despite the sub-par “therapists” they provide. Most of the children there were on medication, and I was one of the few that were not on any. I have severe trauma, trust issues and memory loss from ERA. Do not send your children here. Anyone who says this place ‘saved’ them is a prime example of the program doing exactly what they intended.
Yo I still remember getting enough credits to graduate there and Meghan telling me that nope I had to take one more class. I never did cause I knew I already finished the day I left she was passing me in the hall and literally threw my diploma at my head. Good stuff also got put on nothing for not studying my ACT book still got a 29 best score in the group I was in lol lady can eat shit was so rude to me constantly. Also this place stopped all progress I was personally making towards my transition from male to female and it would be another 7 years before I felt ready to start the HRT process. I was there in 2014-2015
Lol anyways so I got sent to this hell hole and it was awful and they make such small things such a big deal.a guy kissed me and they flipped their shit. I have been here for over a year and I’m still not out they punish us for every little thing and don’t send us home when we are ready
okay i have a lot to say about this place. i was there from November 1st 2021- May 18 2023. My experience there was absolutely horrible and i came out with much more trauma than i went in with. i experienced several male staff flirting with me or making inappropriate comments for me being a minor. a lot of the staff are extremely degrading and will genuinely bully you if you’re struggling. when i first got there i wasn’t close with the staff because i just met them, so when i was upset i had no one to talk to. when i first got there we weren’t aloud any type of therapy on the first level. a lot of kids stayed on the first level for months. i was on it for 6 months. how are you going to call yourselves a “therapeutic boarding school” but not offer therapy to the kids who first get there and probably need it the most?? the cook was above all abusive. if a student had low appetite and couldn’t finish their meal, she would put them on something called “portions” and limit them to extremely small amounts of food. when i would be in the kitchen with her, there was always mold and she would proceed to serve the kids with the moldy food. there was one time a student that was hindu was served beef without knowing it and she was fully aware of his religion and how he could not eat beef. she even told the other students in the kitchen “he won’t know”. there was another student that would get sick a lot and had really bad stomach issues. when she was sick, she was forced to walk around all day holding a back with her puke in it and was not aloud to lay down at all. if she did, she was punished. there was a staff member there named Lacey who found enjoyment in tormenting the kids and degrading them for their addiction issues. the expectations set out were almost impossible. she would hold kids back from going home and moving on. the place was disgusting, dirty, and trashed. the staff always had drama and would take their personal lives out on the students. overall, this place has left me with trauma i will always have. the thought of ever going somewhere like that brings me to genuine tears. i still get nightmares of the facility. and i’ve been out for 6 months. i would do anything for this place to get investigated shut down. the way we were treated in there was so inhumane it disgusts me. there needs to be an end to this facility so the kids that are currently in there need to be sent somewhere with staff and adults that actually care and where they aren’t treated like animals.
I attended this program in 2011-2012, total of 9 months. I was sent there following being sexually assaulted, which I had refused to report. This was due to years and years of sexual abuse from my father, which I couldn’t even speak about until I was 20. Many others had also experienced devastating traumas influencing their maladaptive behaviors (symptoms of the root issue!). When I was first sent to ERA, still recovering from the assault, I was treated as if I were the perpetrator. Psychological torment is the bread and butter of this place. I was sat in the middle of a circle while letters, that my dysfunctional family wrote describing the “horrible child” I was, were read by members of my group. After all the letters were read, each and every person in the room, staff included, gave “feedback.” The feedback was verbal abuse. I was told that I was completely worthless, would never amount to anything, was a waste of space and resources, and deserved everything I got because of my extreme behavior. Despite the many lies that were in the letters, especially my father’s, I was not allowed to clarify or respond to anything. I had to sit there silently as these people I’d never met decided that I was a despicable and vile human being. This type of verbal abuse, as well as other “interventions” were used until I was completely broken. The other interventions included being put on isolation for extended periods of time, not even staff could speak to me unless it was an emergency. I would be forced to carry heavy boxes everywhere I went to show me the “weight” of my issues. I once had to pick an emotion out of a box and act it out for an entire hour all day every day until I convinced them that I could show emotion and then get punished if the emotion I showed was anything but remorse for my actions or gratitude for the program. The worst was when I was sat in front of a wall, wearing a maid’s uniform, for hours. The wall had horrific, slanderous words on it (B*tch, Slut, Wh*re, Addict, Worthless, Stupid, Unloveable, etc.). While I was made to stare at this wall for hours, staff would repeatedly dump tiny shreds of paper on my head and make me pick it up by hand. When I finally snapped and had enough, they told me that I “passed.” I was also forced into admitting I was a sex addict even though the only consensual sex I had ever had was with my long-term boyfriend at the time. I was also told that my boyfriend was abusive to me and that I was abusive to him, effectively tearing out the only person in my life I had ever felt safe with just because we had a trauma bond (admittedly not the healthiest, but it was all we had aside from our abusive families).
If one of us got into trouble, we were all in trouble. Anything from getting our chair privileges revoked, to being made to sit in a silent circle for days or weeks on end until we confessed to our transgressions. This helped them succeed in their goal to make us revile one another. If you began to form any close relationships with other residents, you would be put on separation and not allowed to even look in eachother’s direction.
This doesn’t even begin to describe the use of psychological torture used against children. And I can’t even bring myself to write about the physical incidents and sexual incidents that occurred between staff and the children they were hired to “help.” Note: There are NO cameras in the bedrooms or bathrooms (for obvious reasons). This is where the abuse occurs in facilities such as ERA.
It was brainwashing, it was abusive, it was detrimental to the many children there struggling with real issues that needed real support.
I’ve read many of the comments of self-proclaimed “students” of ERA that assert that the program was never abusive. To you, I hope you find healing. The brainwashing didn’t end the moment you left the facility, it continued in the aftercare, and it lived within the manipulation that your parents were victim of by this corrupt institution. Yes, we needed help. Yes, many of us were engaging in dangerous and potentially fatal behaviors. There is a way to help youth who are experiencing such challenges, and it certainly isn’t through cruel and inhumane treatment of the still-developing brain. You deserved better. And so did I.
When I finally got to go home, I was forced to live with my father. The after-care director would have weekly calls with us to ensure that I was adhering to the contract they set forth, which was completely unobtainable. I had graduated highschool while at ERA, just 2 weeks after turning 17 (I learned nothing, the academics were abysmal). My home contract stipulated that I must go to community college, have a job, and go to 3 meetings a week, all while still being home by 8pm. I was set up to fail, there was no feasible way for me to work, go to school, hit the meetings, all while taking public transportation, and still make it back by curfew. In each of the weekly meetings, I was told that I wasn’t committed enough to my success and that I was actively sabotaging my sobriety. The threat of return loomed over my head until the day I turned 18.
My life had been a series of abuses, and after all the work ERA did to break me into an obedient and docile shell of a human being, they sent me right back to the hands of my primary abuser. I ended up becoming homeless and getting into harder drugs in attempt to escape my trauma. Now, 12 years later, I have a beautiful life. I still struggle daily with CPTSD but have found new life through trauma-informed care. ERA did nothing but deepen my wounds and make them harder to clean out.
We need to make these programs illegal and put our efforts toward evidenced-based, effective treatments of youth with mental health and behavioral challenges.
**Darryll and Annie, if you read this: My father’s name is Damian. Remember me and remember how you failed me. Do better.
Was here in 06-07. Place was absolutely abusive spent about 8 months here. If you want to screw your loved ones up then go ahead and send them there.
I went to eagle ranch academy for 1 year, though there were some nice staff that cared a lot of the staff didn’t, I seen a 13 year old boy named trace rape a little 10 year old kid in his room and when we tried to report it Katherine benson didn’t do anything about it. a staff named will put his foot and knee on my neck during multiple restraints which resulted in me passing out. The staff there were mostly thriving off power and they liked restraints. The staff would damn near break our wrists. They would take out sugar away and we could only plain nasty oatmeal. I couldn’t talk to my parents for the first 2 months. Kids were stomping shit down the drains, kids were cutting themselves, throwing shit and piss on each other, Ethan Huffman or the poop bandit, out shit in all the soap dispensers. It was inhumane and disgusting. This place needs to be shut down. Staff were having sexual relationships with students.
U should watch Netflix the program cons,cults, kidnapping