Elan School
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Elan School is a private, residential behavior modification program and therapeutic boarding school (beginning with 9th grade and extending beyond high school completion) in Poland, Androscoggin County, Maine.
Elan School was founded in 1970 by psychiatrist Gerald Davidson and Joseph Ricci. It specializes in helping teenagers with behavioral problems. Students attend year-round.[1] As of 2007, there were about 95 students enrolled. [2] The school is located on a 33-acre (13 ha) campus.[2]
The school's treatment methods are based on the "TC" or therapeutic community modality popularized in the 1950s at facilities such as Synanon, and later at Daytop Village.
The school achieved some notoriety during the 1990s when former classmates of Michael Skakel, who had attended Elan in the 1970s, testified against him in his trial for an unsolved murder that had occurred about two years before he enrolled at Elan. [3]
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[edit] Controversy
Throughout its history the school has been faced with numerous allegations of student mistreatment.
In 1975, Illinois state officials pulled 11 children out of the Elan program, charging that they had been mistreated. [4]
In 2002 during the trial of Michael Skakel witnesses testified that they were subject to beatings and public humiliation were parts of life at Elan during those years.[4]
In 2007 New York education officials raised questions about the mistreatment, alleging in a letter to the school and Maine education officials that Elan students are physically restraining their peers and being deprived of sleep. The allegations prompted the state of New York to threaten to withdraw tuition money for taxpayer-funded students. The school's lawyer said that virtually all of the New York allegations are false.[4]
[edit] Notable alumni
[edit] References
- ^ Basic School Approval Report Pertaining to the Elan School, Maine Department of Education, September 3, 2002
- ^ a b Kevin Wack, New York seeks change at Elan School, Maine Sunday Telegram, March 25, 2007
- ^ a b A Miscarriage of Justice: Reform-School Witnesses, The Atlantic, January/February 2003
- ^ a b c New York seeks change at Elan School, By Kevin Wack, Portland Press Herald and Maine Sunday Telegram, March 25, 2007
[edit] External links
- Elan School
- Elan School Alumni
- Elan School Visit Report, by Tom Croke, Struggling Teens, June 1992
