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Improvement in the Troubled Teen Outpatient Services of Outreach Project

The New York State Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services has donated $116,000 to Outreach Project, the non-profit organization which helps those troubled teenagers and adults dealing with substance abuse in the areas of New York City and Long Island. This donation will be used for improving the teenage outpatient services at the Richmond Hill facility of Outreach Project.

A full-time family therapist will be hired, as well as a full-time case manager who will team up with the existing Substance Abuse Counselors and the Program Coordinator in order to better service the teens from 12-18 years old. The program based in Queens can presently serve 30 teenagers by exposing them to behavioral and motivational therapy which includes family involvement. This method was formed in a manner that would ideally lead to long-term success for the family unit.

Family Therapy for troubled teens

Crosswinds Youth Services Inc., a teen crisis center, has started a family based therapy program which aims to bring down the teen crime rate and lessen recidivism.
The University of Miami’s Center of Family Studies worked on the specialized therapy about two decades ago in order to help those troubled teens with drug issues. Because of Crosswinds, the university will be able to test its therapy in a real setting. Not only is this good for the university but ultimately it is good for Brevard County’s troubled teens.

The 13th annual birdhouse auction is a fundraiser for Project Return, a transitional home in Westport for troubled teenage girls since 1986.
“The Art of the Birdhouse” is set at 7-10pm on March 28 at the Inn at Longshore in Westport. The birdhouse auction just last year was able to raise $120,000 for the operating costs of Project Return. This year’s auction co-chairwoman, Susanne Hendrick, is aiming to exceed $140,000.
The actual deadline for the submission of the birdhouses was on February 5. John and Ginny Matchak’s business, the Woodworkers Club, was opened for the free use of those hobbyists participating in the Project Return auction.

New York Yankee Derek Jeter’s Turn 2 Foundation donated $500,000 to Phoenix House for an outpatient program for troubled teenagers with drug abuse issues.
Phoenix House has been helping both adults and teenagers since 1967 and it is the biggest non-profit substance abuse treatment and prevention facility in the U.S. Every day, in almost a hundred residential and outpatient programs in nine different states more than 5,000 people are treated.
The foundation will partner up with the Tampa Recreation Department in April along with the Yankees in order to put up clinics for the teens at Legends Field. This would be an expansion of a program which was done before in New York and Kalamazoo, Michigan.

It appears that doctors can predict psychosis with great accuracy in troubled teens before they may actually develop the full-blown disorders. This is based on a specific combination of risk factors. Once the criteria for risk was noticed, almost 80 percent of the patients were diagnosed with a psychotic disorder such as schizophrenia within just 2 and a half years.
Study researcher Tyrone D. Cannon, Ph.D., of the University of California, Los Angeles, said that those patients who showed early symptoms of psychosis along with a family history of psychotic disease, while exhibiting a decline in social function, were very likely to be diagnosed with the full-blown disorder within a couple years. Unusual thoughts or an unhealthy level of paranoia are examples of early symptoms which may show psychosis.

Teen Suicide Prevention in Nantucket

In the past eight months, 2 student suicides have occurred in Nantucket and the island’s mental health professionals are searching for ways in order to aid the island’s troubled teens who are experiencing emotional or social struggles.
Nantucket may be known for its paradise vacations but those who work with the island’s troubled teens know that confronting the teenagers’ issues must be dealt with in order to prevent any further suicides among their youth.
Peter Swenson, director of Family and Children's Services of Nantucket, said "We are hearing from a lot of kids that there is nowhere to go to deal with issues. A lot of kids are expressing that there is no safe place to go if they are concerned about a friend or fellow student."
A Student Assistance Program will be formed with the expertise of representatives from mental health organizations of the island. This program will have a coordinator who will particularly handle suicide prevention and offer support to those students from kindergarten to 12th grade.

Troubled teenagers should be wary that their actions and not just their grades in high school have repercussions on their vying for certain colleges.
Recently, those students with high academic averages but low grades in conduct may be rejected from the colleges they’ve applied for. This is because the common application which has been utilized by Stanford and hundreds of other universities has added a section which asks for information from school guidance counselors. The kind of information they want to know about their applicants can vary from getting caught smoking in the school bathroom or possessing a handgun.
These additional questions were formulated to aid these colleges in choosing students who were not just smart, but possessed the proper character as well.
Guidance counselors may be concerned that with these new questions, “typical” teenage slip-ups like sneaking a couple beers into a school dance can actually ruin a teen’s chances at future education.

The United Way of Dane County has begun to plan to help their troubled teenagers through projects which will ultimately aim to lower the rate of high school dropouts and control teen violence. The United Way’s objective is to “turn their lives around.”
In the 2005-2006 school year, 9 percent of students in Wisconsin schools became high school dropouts. An evident increase in violence among teenagers was also noted that year, making officials come to the conclusion that the issue needs to be given proper notice before it rises uncontrollably.
A United Way delegation for the improvement of the future Dane County youth was co-chaired by Corey Chambas. He agreed that action must be taken. "We want to help these kids. We see kids falling by the wayside, and there are ways to help," said Chambas.

City officials in Pico Rivera are asking the state for about $500,000 in order to help prevent gang violence.
There has already been improvement with an existing program which aids in keeping teenagers off the streets and moves have been made in order to combat graffiti in the city, yet City Manager Chuck Fuentes has assessed that this is not enough.
Regarding the funding that they are requesting, Fuentes commented “This would just enhance what’s already being done there.”
The money requested would be utilized by a project of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, the California Gang Reduction, Intervention and Prevention Program (CalGRIP), which has stricter probation terms regarding gang-related crimes and those repeat offenders. Through this project, funds will be set aside for programs against gang violence.

An outpatient substance abuse treatment center for troubled teenagers in Richmond Hill was given a $116,000 grant from the state in order to hire a case manager and a therapist.

Kathleen Riddle, the president of Outreach Project Ð, a treatment center at 117-11 Myrtle Ave. in Richmond Hill, said "This generous grant from (the state Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services) will help troubled teens get the support and treatment needed to grow into healthier adults."

The non-profit organization also heads the Outreach House, a residential substance abuse treatment center found in Ridgewood. It is also responsible for another outpatient center located in Greenpoint, Brooklyn.

Riddle also commented that being able to hire a full-time case manager and family therapist “will improve treatment outcomes for teens and their families.”

The generous grant will give the Outreach Project a chance to expand and help more teenagers.

A troubled teenager may go to his parents during tough times, or even talk to a guidance counselor, but with student support groups at high schools, teens can go to other teens as well. Sharing experiences and supporting one another can be highly effective in helping a teen get through rocky paths.

Anita Williams, a guidance counselor at Mesa’s Westwood High School, said “We keep the support group going, get discussion going. It’s not really a counseling group. It’s support — the kids supporting each other.”

Williams even added that the support groups aid teens with academics also.

“When their mind is gone worrying about other topics, they can’t concentrate in school,” she said.

The high schools within the Mesa Unified School District all have student support groups for a variety of different topics. These topics include: cultural awareness, stress management, senior transitions, and grief and loss.

Ever since the teen sister of pop star Britney Spears, Jamie Lynn Spears, came out with her news about being pregnant at 16, the paparazzi have gotten their fair share of photographs and headlines have been posted.

Now what is the effect of celebrity teen pregnancy on today’s teenagers? Jamie Spears is the star of Nickelodeon’s “Zoey 101,” a show made particularly for a teen audience. And with fans like this and young teen girls that adore her, it can come off as quite confusing to them when their idol becomes pregnant so early. This may make some teen girls think that getting pregnant at such a young age is not as bad is it seems. But this of course would be the wrong message.

Orrin “Checkmate” Hudson, once a state trooper and now a chess champion has been showing how chess can be used to inspire troubled teens. Hudson is the founder of the “Be Someone” crime prevention program. He utilizes the game of chess to enable teens to make the right choices and envision success.

You may be wondering how the game of chess could influence a teenager to steer clear of trouble, but it is more effective than it may seem.

Hudson said, "We discovered that if we teach young people to use their minds that they can be successful, but the key you have to learn to do is to stop and think. So our message is- you can be successful if you learn to stop and think. Think it out, don't shoot it out. Push pawns instead of drugs."

A Safe Place for troubled teenagers

Students at Mill Woods elementary school will no longer have to fear mental-health problems. There are some troubled teenagers who can open up to their teachers about mental-health issues that they may be having. But there are also teens who keep these issues all bottled up, even when teachers can see the signs. Teachers can observe depressed teens at their desks, those that prefer isolation rather than hanging out with other classmates, and also those teens whose interest in school takes a nosedive. Some troubled teens may even just stop coming to school altogether.

There could be a number of reasons behind these signs of mental-health problems—issues at home, problematic parents, alcoholism, or violence. Recently, Mill Woods students dealing with mental-health problems can find a haven in A Safe Place at Dan Knott junior high.

Oregon Youth Academy for Teenagers

A film producer and Southern Oregon educator are in the process of setting up a residential high school which aims to aid the homeless as well as the troubled teenagers of Oregon through educating them in film-making.

Sam Baldoni, the owner of Inspired Films Inc., and Steve Pine, the regional coordinator for career and technical education at Southern Oregon Education Service District, aim to launch the Oregon Youth Academy for teenagers from 9th to 12th grade fall of 2009.

“Monitoring the Future,” a recent study of the University of Michigan funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse has shown that less teenagers in the 8th, 10th, and 12th grades have been reported using illicit drugs, yet those who do have been abusing prescription drugs. The study surveyed 48,025 students from 403 schools.

In all three grades, the use of OxyContin, has risen. Researchers observed that 1 out of 20 12th graders have had experience with the narcotic within the past year.

The division director, Wilson Compton, of the National Institute on Drug Abuse felt particularly problematic about the results of the study.

"Prescription drugs remain at high and very concerning levels. We need to do a better job of communicating the risks of these prescription drugs and protecting youth from what can be dangerous in the long run," says Compton.

A call for sex education in Indiana

A mother at the age of only 17 is now 20 years old and has been charged with the murder of her 3-year-old daughter, TaJanay Bailey. Teen pregnancy is definitely an issue which has all the more been highlighted because of this tragic incident. Thankfully, the majority of teenage pregnancy cases do not end up this way but still the statistics do tell us that most of these children born from teen moms may end up becoming teen moms themselves or live in poverty.

The president of Planned Parenthood of Indiana, Betty Cockrum, chose to speak out because of these sad realities. She, too, has been aware of the news regarding TaJanay, the Phoenix Apartments, and the Northeastside complex where single teen moms live. This complex is also where TaJanay suffered her fate.

Cockrum recommends that the state should progress further with its child welfare system.

"But let's finally start at the beginning. We need comprehensive sex education in Indiana. Ideally that happens with parents. But we can't assume that is happening," she said.

Internet tips for your teens

As much as you want to be extra careful and provide the right supervision for your teenager, as technology improves it can get harder to monitor exactly what your teens are checking out on the internet. A present study has actually shown that 93 percent of teens from the ages of 12 to 17 are regular internet users. It can be hard for parents to do any proper monitoring if socializing occurs more online than outside. Keep on reading for tips on how to ensure the safety of your adolescents.

Make sure that you are fully aware of the latest updates in technology. A lot of the times, in households the teens knows more about what’s going on in technological advancements. You should check out what exactly can be used to surf the net in your home.

Troubled Teen Hotline

The Be Right! Project opened a hotline for troubled teenagers. The teens can call the hotline at any time and it can provide support for the teenagers’ families as well. Ever since it’s opening, the project director has witnessed its growing popularity with those teens who need help.

Darion Hutcherson, the one in charge of the hotline and head of the Be Right! Project, commented "The response has been very high. It's older people calling, young people calling, and parents are calling wanting help for their teenagers."

Football Fridays with teens in trouble

In Birkenhead, Colin Hunt administrates a boxing and gym club for troubled teenagers. The teenagers who join in come from referrals by agencies or want to be included themselves in the club because of what they know about Colin. These teenagers may either have substance abuse issues or academic problems. Colin himself calls them “challenging” teens.

He says, "They are at a crossroads in their life and I am helping them choose the right path."

Colin is able to keep up with managing the club through the help of a government-funded initiative which aids teens in underprivileged areas -- Positive Futures. With their help he is able to give free gym membership to these troubled teens and even offer boxing and circuit sessions for free.

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