Top Flight Academy Boarding School for Troubled Teens

OVERVIEW

STUDENT PROFILE

POSITIVE PEER CULTURE

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Positive Peer Culture vs. Behavior Modification

Positive Peer Culture helps students develop internal self-control as well as sensitivity to others around them. Students will leave Top Flight Academy as stronger individuals, not because they were forced or punished to comply, but because they will have the skills necessary to solve their own problems.

There are a number of reasons why Top Flight Academy uses Positive Peer Culture rather than behavior modification:

Positive Peer Culture	Behavior Modification
Focus is on internal change that will last long after leaving Top Flight Academy	Focus is on external compliance and adherence to rules while at the program
Based on a belief that the individual can learn how to manage his/her own behaviors no matter what the situation	Based on the belief that the individual must be forced to comply to rules by fear of punishment
Actively teaches the individual how to recognize, resolve, and prevent problems on his/her own	Conditions individuals to avoid punishment
Help individuals develop long-term thinking	Encourages short-term thinking
Helps individuals identify their own values, beliefs and goals	Teaches the individual to simply comply with rules
Helps the individual discover what behaviors are consistent with his/her own values, beliefs, and goals	Forces the individual to use behaviors that will allow him/her to avoid punishment What if there is no authority available to provide punishment?
Teaches the individual how to help himself/herself through helping others	Does not provide any instruction on how to help others
Teaches the individual how to create more healthy and effective social and family relationships	Does not provide any instruction on how to create better relationships
Teaches the individual the value of contributing something positive to his/her community	Does not provide any instruction on how to positively contribute to society

Positive Peer Culture is clearly more effective, so why are other programs still using Behavior Modification? The differences are clear; Behavior Modification is a much easier way to "control" student behavior... temporarily. PPC teaches students to control themselves long after they leave Top Flight Academy.

Positive Peer Culture	Behavior Modification
An innovative treatment that is used by relatively few programs	Method employed by the vast majority of treatment programs
Requires a significant financial investment to implement and maintain	Less expensive and relatively simple to implement and maintain
Requires a substantial amount of initial and ongoing staff training	Staff requires very little training
Places most of the responsibility for progress on the student. Staff is trained not to punish students; instead they are trained to process with the students	Staff takes responsibility for student's progress. Punishing the student is the focus of the program
Based upon the belief that, given the right situation, individuals help themselves	Based upon the belief that the program must force the individual to change

Top Flight Academy has chosen to use Positive Peer Culture even though it is expensive, time consuming and difficult to implement. Positive Peer Culture is the most effective tool available to help troubled teens. Our goal at Top Flight Academy is to provide students with the tools they need to be successful. More importantly, Top Flight's mission is to provide each student with the best possible opportunity to succeed when they leave the Academy and return home.

During my past thirty years of professional experience I have worked with many programs that deal with troubled youth. My experience with Top Flight Academy has been the most rewarding and challenging I have encountered. Almost all of the other programs I have experienced have been based on behavior modification principles that require the use of external control, force, and an artificial point system. Top Flight Academy is unique to my experience in that it utilizes PPC (Positive Peer Culture). The most important implication is that PPC teaches internal self-control. This facilitates the establishment and growth of a personal moral system for each youth. Behavior modification teaches youth to react to external power and control. PPC teaches youth to regulate by accessing their personal internal moral code of conduct. In real life PPC is the only one of these models that can consistently help to create responsible and effective adults.

John Bagley, L.C.S.W.
Clinical Social Worker