Chat With Lon Woodbury
The Balanced Mind Foundation Live Event Transcript

Did you miss our chat with Lon Woodbury? Read the transcript of this exciting and informative chat. The Balanced Mind Foundation will be hosting several more expert chats this Winter. Watch your email for more details. 

                                Biography

Lon Woodbury

Lon Woodbury is an educational consultant who has worked with parent choice, private pay schools and programs for struggling teens since 1984. Prior to that, he taught in the public schools and was involved in public policy working for the U.S. Senate and for the Executive office of the President. He received his B.S. and M.A. degrees from the University of Idaho. He offers a nationwide referral service for parents of adolescents with behavioral and emotional problems; writes an education newsletter, Places For Struggling Teens Newsletter™; publishes the Parent Empowerment Handbook™: a Resource Guide for Parents of Struggling Teens, as part of the results of his research into which schools and programs of quality are available for the child who is making poor decisions; and publishes the website Places For Strugglingteens.com™, to provide parents and professionals with empowering information.                              

Nanci - The Balanced Mind Foundation
I'd like to thank everyone for joining us this evening/afternoon and I'd like to welcome Lon Woodbury to our monthly chat series. Lon, would you like to start out by telling us a little about Struggling Teens and the services that you provide to parents?

Lon Woodbury  
Hi everybody. I work as an Educational Consultant, with my main activity being publishing as much information as I can to help parents who are considering a placement decision. My main web site is http://www.strugglingteens.com/  and is meant to help parents.

An educational consultant is a kind of quarterback and our main help is to help parents think through if the decision for placement is appropriate and if so, to make recommendations as to which programs seem to best fit the needs of the student and their families.

Nanci - The Balanced Mind Foundation  
Can you talk a bit about the different types of placement options available?

Lon Woodbury  
I specialize in residential type programs, but there are a number of local resources we try to list in our online database that might be more appropriate. Residential can include anything from short term wilderness programs, long term programs largely based on wilderness, what is call therapeutic boarding schools, and for those with more clinical needs there are RTCs (residential treatment centers).

Chrisa_H  
How does the average family afford RTC? We've found a great program for our son, but our insurance won't cover it, the school district refuses to discuss it, and we've been unsuccessful at getting approved for a grant from our state.

Lon Woodbury  
The school district is required by federal law to pay all or a portion of the tuition, if you can prove that local and/or public resources cannot meet his or her needs. Sometimes program give a partial scholarship, and especially for wilderness programs and therapeutic boarding schools some (like me for my daughter) took out a second mortgage on our home. I've found that if a parent is cool and determined, generally they can find something that fits their needs, but it calls for a lot of elbow grease. For example, to get school district funding, you might have to become very well acquainted with an attorney.

Cristy  
How do you prove that local resources don’t meet the child’s needs? For example, we cannot get my daughter to school so she obviously cannot be educated.

Lon Woodbury  
Schools have precise procedures to determine that. You as a parent have considerable rights, but in many states, the school districts work very hard to avoid having to pay the tuition. For example, I understand in California, some time back, school administrators were sent to seminars to learn how to avoid paying that. Some parents have had to almost literally force the school district to respond in a positive manner. On my discussion board on my site I have a number of parents who share their experience doing exactly that and are glad to offer tips other parents might consider.

Nanci - The Balanced Mind Foundation  
School refusal is a fairly common challenge for our parents - do you have any suggestions for how to approach that problem, or what types of residential or therapeutic programs work best?

Lon Woodbury  
That question is a very common one, as well as the hardships of how costly the schools and programs are. Generally, the more impressive the credentials of the school or program and staff are the better chance of success. But the main question is how good a fit a specific place is for your child. It does no good to place him or her in a program that only vaguely can work with your child's specific needs. Determining a good fit is very important - first. Then work on finding funding for a program that fits that profile.

elkabong  
How do I know what to look for between a good program and a bad program? What should I be looking for?

Lon Woodbury  
Credentials can be of some help, but that is not infallible. Using a professional educational consultant can steer you away from a bad program. Also, I do an annual survey among the best educational consultants in the country, and those schools and programs that there is a general positive consensus are the only ones allowed in. Also of a little bit of help is if a specific program is a member of a professional organization like NATSAP (National Association of Therapeutic Schools and Programs http://www.natsap.org/), and of course state licensure.

Nanci - The Balanced Mind Foundation  
Are the survey results available on your website?

Lon Woodbury  
Not really, the survey results are available to any consultant who participates, and of course if a parent calls me I will give them the results of any specific program they ask about.

Nanci - The Balanced Mind Foundation  
We have several questions about wilderness programs, so let's focus on that area for a few minutes.

Chrisa_H  
Are wilderness programs appropriate for kids with mental illness, or are those just for "stubborn" kids?

Lon Woodbury  
That depends on several factors. Most of the good ones have Masters level therapists in the field, and have credentials in treating various types of mental illness. One of the first questions would be if something like bipolar is under control by medication. If rather under control, then they can work with the child.

One of the best uses of a short term wilderness program is an assessment based on staff working with the children 24/7. I use them if a diagnosis is in doubt. If a serious diagnosis is firmly established and not really controlled, then wilderness might not be helpful. But, from parents that call me, it seems like almost 90% of them don't have firm diagnoses but recommendations are all over the board, and really nobody knows if a specific illness is a firm diagnoses. For example, I remember several parents being told by one psychiatrist that their child was definitely bipolar, while the next psychiatrist said definitely not bipolar but depression or even a bad case of ADD. So, parents are understandably confused.

Nanci - The Balanced Mind Foundation  
Am I correct in understanding that in the case of a child without a firm diagnosis, an RTC or other residential type program can hold the key to a diagnosis?

Lon Woodbury  
Perhaps, if they mix common sense in with their determination. :)

Chrissy
What happens at a wilderness program when a bipolar child needs more clinical support?

Lon Woodbury  
If it is beyond the capability of the program, the responsible ones will bring them out and help the parents find a more appropriate program, or work with the parent's educational consultant to determine the need.

Cristy  
How do you decide whether RTC, Wilderness, boot camp, etc. is the right placement for your child?

Lon Woodbury  
Largely that depends on how confident you are of the diagnosis, which is where everything should start. Without a good diagnosis or one that makes sense, then find some way of getting an assessment you can feel comfortable with. Boot camp in my opinion does not work. It is based on punishment and the last things kids need, especially those with some mental illness, is to be punished.

SunWillShine  
Parents are in a really difficult position when it comes to RTCs, where it’s difficult to get the laws that are designed to help us to actually WORK for us. Is there anything we can do about that besides fight it out one on one with schools? If you keep up with legislation, is there anything pending that might help?????

Lon Woodbury  
The schools and programs I work with are exclusively private, which have more latitude (and often more sensitivity) than the public funded ones. For example, boot camps were found to be ineffective and sometimes dangerous, and would have probably died out except for federal legislation promoting them. 

wendy  
Are there specific RTCs people should avoid?

Lon Woodbury  
None specifically I can think of. I just keep running into RTCs all the time that don't have good results but have gotten some favor from various institutions. One thing I think that is important about the schools and programs I work with are they are parent choice based, that is parents have the right to be directly involved in the placement decision. In many cases some professional or public agency makes the decision and the parent participation is optional.

Nanci - The Balanced Mind Foundation  
Can you expand on that a bit? It seems ironic that so often parents are battling to get their child placed, yet from what you've said, it sounds like the opposite if true as well.

Lon Woodbury  
There are some programs that will take anybody, and often don't screen to their strengths very well. Then there are a lot of public programs that depend on their survival by taking students that fit some jurisdictional criteria.
I guess your question depends on what kind of battle. The most often ones I hear about are those trying to get some public funded program to take their child. In a private parent-choice program, it doesn't make sense to force them to take your child if they feel they are not a good fit.

Moms
What constitutes a good fit for my child?

Lon Woodbury  
The strengths of the school match the needs of your child. That is partly "art" and it helps to have somebody with years of experience finding schools that fit. A lot of my recommendations are based on the description of the child's behavior and the tests that have been conducted - and that picture looks a lot like the students I might have met when I toured a school. So, it’s not a firm cut and dried process, but one based on experience of touring schools and talking about them with other professionals.

chrissie  
What types of programs have you seen work for semi-stable bipolar children with school phobias?

Lon Woodbury  
If a parent made that kind of description, I would have some general ideas of where to start looking. I would review the results of my survey to see what other consultants have said; call some of them to get a feel about their clinical support and ability to work with school phobias. A lot of this would depend on the fuller details of the child. If a parent tries to bypass using a consultant, then they would have to do the research themselves and try to get up to speed. A good way to check that would be to network with other parents, and especially other parents who have had children in the school or program you are considering.

Chrisa H.
Do educational consultants get compensation from placing children in these facilities from the facilities themselves?

Lon Woodbury  
Not the ethical ones! Both the Independent Educational Consultants Association (IECA) and the Certified Educational Planners (CEP) have strict prohibitions against a consultant receiving compensation from a school or program for the placement of a child. Unfortunately, there are a number of referral agencies (often with no credentials) who make their money from payment from the schools or programs. The result is that those people are working for the schools rather than for the parents or child.

Wendy  
How does an IEP work at a residential program?

Lon Woodbury  
That's getting beyond my experience. Most of you probably know more about the details than I do. I don't get into that kind of detail once a child is placed. I know many schools do routinely work with IEPs and/or develop their own.

SunWillShine  
Can you walk us through the process of being admitted to an RTC?

Lon Woodbury  
In the private parent-choice schools and programs, the parent makes the application. Any consultant will perhaps be providing advice, but most will not forward the application to the school or program. The school will screen the student as to whether it seems (in their view) to be a good fit and come to a determination.

If both sides seem agreeable, then a frequent next step (if time allows) would be for the parent to visit the place to see if it looks and feels like they thought or if it looks like a good place for their child. If all is positive, it is the parent's responsibility to get the child there for the enrollment appointment.

If things are so far out of control that the parent is unable to do that (there are a lot of legitimate reasons for a parent to not try but it is best if the parent gets the child there) then they can hire a transport agency to deliver the child to the school or program. The good transport agencies usually never lay a finger on the child. They are able to bond with the child quickly and effectively so that the child trusts them and goes more or less willingly. However, they are trained to handle anything that might come up.

Lon Woodbury  
Does that cover the steps enough to answer your question? 

Nanci - The Balanced Mind Foundation  
I think you did a good job of describing the process, SunWillShine, please let us know if you have follow up questions.

We have time for one or two more questions, this hour went very quickly!

chrissie  
What do you think about the quality of child psychiatrists who work with or at an RTC. There is a huge shortage of child psychiatrists. Is it reasonable to assume that most child psychiatrists who are good would make it in private practice?

Lon Woodbury  
I think that would be a good assumption. In the good quality programs, like the ones in my directory (Parent Empowerment Handbook) the psychiatrists are generally pretty good. That comes from the necessity for the program to keep the parents satisfied, and they need to look for psychiatrists who can deliver quality service to both the students and keep the parents happy.

I wouldn't say that about child psychiatrists in general. There are many good ones I've run across working elsewhere than in the places I work with, but I've also ran into ones who I would want to let within a hundred feet of one of my clients.

And yes, often psychiatrists working with therapeutic boarding schools especially have their own practice and see the children regularly but don't work full time at the school or program unless they are an owner and/or have some administrative duties.

Nanci - The Balanced Mind Foundation  
Lon, thank you so much for sharing your time and expertise with us. This is a topic we've long wanted to address and it is very helpful to have someone who understands the details of residential programming to answer our questions. We very much appreciate your willingness to share your knowledge.

Lon Woodbury  
It’s been my pleasure and the invitation is open if any want to call me and ask some more specific questions relating to their own situation.

Nanci - The Balanced Mind Foundation  
What is the best way to contact you?

Lon Woodbury  
Check my web site at http://www.strugglingteens.com/. Or you can call me at 208-267-5550 (Pacific Coast time).