PROGRAM COMPONENTS & STAFFING

The Court Ordered Sexually Aggressive Youth Treatment Program provides individual, group, family and milieu treatment. Efforts to treat "throughout the program" involve the work of youth care staff and teachers focusing on offender specific issues in settings that approximate those youth will return to after discharge from the RTC. Therapy and "community" groups are viewed as essential to the youths' treatment and these are co-led by professional level male and female therapists with substantial experience and specialty training.

 TREATMENT COMPONENTS

• Specialized Dormitory – COSAYTP youth are served in their own dorm and only educated ithin our Secondary School.
• Behavior Therapy – To reduce "grooming" patterns and reinforce positive social skills.
• Cognitive Restructuring – Developing the internal motivation and capacity of the youth to use coping skills.
• Social Skills – Taught to improve respectful, mutualistic interaction and to increase the assertiveness and confidence the youth need to meet their needs appropriately.
• Cycle Analysis – The youth learn their offending patterns.
• Covert Sensitization and Arousal Management – Specific techniques for the youth to use to "shut off" aggressive or deviant sexual behavior.
• Sex Education – These youth need remedial attention to normal sexual development, behavior, and values.
• Sexual Victimization Treatment – Offending often develops partly as "identification with the aggressor" and this needs to be explored.
• Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Treatment – Most COSAYTP youth have sexual victimization or exposure to violence in their history and many suffer PTSD symptoms, which can be part of the offender cycle.
• Family Therapy – Continued family contact is, in many cases, a right for the youth and his parents and other family members. For this to be productive, clinicians supervise visitation, coordinate treatment of the offender and victims, help parents understand their role and make necessary changes, and supervise the youth and family in developing both transition and relapse prevention plans.
• Community Step-Down – Offender treatment is a lifelong commitment by these boys and their families. Living arrangements and services after discharge from the RTC require professional involvement.

 REFERRAL CRITERIA FOR COURT ORDERED SEXUALLY AGGRESSIVE YOUTH TREATMENT PROGRAM

1. Age 13–16 at admission.
2. Not denying the offenses and related responsibility.
3. Youth who have displayed entrenched deviant arousal patterns and/or who have repeatedly used sexual acts for their own purposes; however, because of Harmony Hill School's non-offending population, referrals of youth with apparent pedophile fixation on younger boys cannot be accepted.
4. Not severely violent in committing their offenses (e.g., those using a weapon or kidnapping to rape are unacceptable referrals).
5. Meet all other Harmony Hill School general admission requirements.
6. Agree to comply with the Court Ordered Sexually Aggressive Youth Treatment Program requirements; family and attorney also agree.
7. Must be adjudicated for a sexual delinquency offense and have at least 12 months probation or parole from date of admission; at the Agency's discretion, youth and families committed to cooperating with treatment through other mechanisms, can be considered.
8. Youth parents and referral source accept Harmony Hill School's experience regarding the likely need for 2-3 years placement to reduce the offender's risk sufficiently for transfer to a less restrictive placement.
9. Youth requiring a "full course" of residential treatment are preferred, i.e. this program is not an "assessment" nor is it a "step-down" service.

The referred offender and his parent(s)/guardian will be counseled as to program waiting list. If they so choose, they will go through the regular pre-admission screening. If allowed, an interview is next. Additionally, an offender specific assessment will be done unless this is available with the referral. If the full on-site process is required, two pre-placement visits need to occur within a two-week timeframe. Decision for acceptance will be made within 10 days of last interview. A date for admission within 90 days will be given, space permitting.