The following Summit Blog Post is the lightly edited transcripts of the Autism and Neurodiversity Podcast hosted by Jason and Debbie Grygla. This episode is with Nichol Ernst, our executive director, in which he talks about how Summit Achievement works with young people with Autism Spectrum Disorders and Non-Verbal Learning Disorders. To listen to this episode titled click “Safe […]
by Will White, DA, LCSW, MLADC CSW, MLADC Over 25 years ago, I was part of the team that started Summit Achievement, the country’s first hybrid model wilderness therapy program. Before joining Summit, I practiced as a licensed mental health professional in various organizations, including an outpatient mental health clinic, boarding school, hospital, public […]
In this video Nichol Ernst, LCSW, Executive Director, Co-Owner of Summit Achievement reviews the value of our model. Watch the video or scroll below for a summary. We are an owner-operated residential treatment program with a wilderness component that has been continuously operating since 1996. Here is a link for more about our history. Our community of […]
By Mike DeLuca, LCSW Since the days of vision quests in the wild by First Nation youth, or much later in the 1960s when the Colorado Outward Bound School first started using wilderness to foster resiliency, character, and compassion in American youth, humans have sought out wild places for catalysts for change and transformation. Why does […]
By Mike DelucaLCSW, Therapist – Summit Achievement Ever since I entered the “helping profession” I have heard the mantra “You can’t adequately care for others if you haven’t cared for yourself.” I remember learning this mantra when I was 15 years old while training for my first job as a lifeguard. It made sense to me […]
Anxiety is challenging for young people and their families and Summit Achievement is here to help. We know that many productive, engaged, and happy children can become withdrawn and sullen to the point of not being able to leave their house or their rooms by the time they reach their teens due to anxiety and […]
Here is a resource outlining how we are handling program operations during the COVID-19 pandemic and the ever-evolving situation here at Summit Achievement. While our campus is quite isolated up here in Maine, we are very aware of the risk of COVID-19 finding its way onto our campus. While we cannot eliminate all risks of […]
Summit Achievement finds the Stages of Change Model as a beneficial way to look at the change process for troubled teens and young adults. The Stages of Change Model, technically referred to as the Transtheoretical Model of Change, was first developed in 1977 by Dr. James Prochoska at the University of Rhode Island. The premise is […]
Summit Achievement has had an academic component since it started operations in 1996. The impetus, at that time, was that one of the co-founders was working as a psychotherapist at a Northeast Boarding School and counseled many students who had gone to wilderness programs before enrolling at the school. He observed that many of those […]
Summit Achievement has achieved being one of the nation’s oldest and most prestigious accredited programs for struggling teens by providing our students and their families with high-quality treatment, challenging academics, and outdoor experiences. At times we are asked if we “scare straight troubled teens.” We use the term “struggling teens“ versus “troubled teens” as we […]