Self Respect through Self Discipline
Carroll Academy is an Adolescent Intensive Day Treatment Program operated by the Carroll County Juvenile Court and licensed by the State of Tennessee since 1994. We are funded by the Department of Children’s Services of the State of Tennessee as a custody prevention agency. We serve the Juvenile Courts of Carroll, Henry, Henderson, Weakley, and Benton counties, who order students to our program for six months or until they complete our behavioral plan. We transport each student to and from our program each day as ordered by that court for the purpose of behavior modification and intervention. Each student receives counseling, balanced meals, appropriate educational services, family intervention, and group life skills training while a part of our program.
On average, we serve ~200 students/year in our local community while holding parents accountable by an order from the local juvenile court. In Carroll County alone, we have been able to reduce the custody rate by keeping children at home and in our community where they must eventually function and live. This also enables us to provide services with agencies familiar with the students and families that produce them.
Our Purpose
Mission Statement
An integrated team of professionals providing compassionate, cost effective, competent care for at risk adolescents referred to them by five juvenile courts for the purpose of preventing more intensive court involvement and consciously teaching/modeling functional life and academic skills necessary to assume meaningful and productive citizenship in our society.
Our Philosophy
We believe that every child regardless of race, creed, or religion is a human being worthy of respect and shall be treated in that manner at all times.
The Carroll county Day Treatment Program is a comprehensive, community-based program for youth who are experiencing emotional and behavioral difficulties. The program is intensive. It is comprehensive in that it involves every aspect of a child’s life including their education, their family, and their peer influences. A continuum of special education and regular education services will be provided within the program and a transition period after graduation will be utilized to help integrate the student back into the regular educational community. Our approach is to assess each individual’s educational and treatment needs and then develop our program around the needs of the students well being served. Due to this type of philosophy our program activities will be flexible and will change according to the needs of our population. An eclectic treatment approach will be used in accordance with our basic philosophy.
Programs
Our program addresses these issues by limiting choices then building more socially/legally appropriate coping mechanisms by didactic instruction, experiential learning, immediate reward/consequence, and social skills development through role play, sports competition, and completion of our 5 level behavior system. Integral in this process is the parental accountability facilitated by our court order. Only the judicial system has this coercive element essential to working with our specific population.
We provide experiential learning with participation in Boy's and Girl's Basketball against public schools in regularly scheduled TSSAA games. We have had several All District Players, and two ladies attend college on athletic scholarships. We also provide exposure to the arts in dramatic, written, and expressive elements. We hold our students accountable to a rigid dress code, substance abuse screenings, and behavioral performance on a 5 level system with consequences for student and parent for non-compliance.
By keeping our students at home and with courts familiar with the student and their family we are able to avoid a duplication of services or delay of services with information gathering required when the treatment team is unfamiliar with the client. We also have ongoing relationships with referral sources that facilitate a smooth transition back to home school or work.
We benefit our students by providing a highly structured, respectful learning environment that holds them academically and behaviorally accountable. We also give them a workable plan to complete education and join workforce. We insist that our students regain control of their lives. We benefit our community by removing disruptive students from the learning environment, holding parents who are often disruptive in the community accountable, and providing jobs in an area where those jobs are limited. We benefit the state by providing a cost effective compassionate modality of treatment for a rural area while limiting the numbers of students committed to their custody requiring 24 hour care at considerable cost.
At the heart of Carroll Academy are our people. At risk students are not motivated by a rule in a book but by a limit or reward given by a trained empowered and compassionate person. Through the years our strength has begun on the bench with the judges and continued through the juvenile court staffs to our in-house treatment team. Students will rise to the level of our expectations when we are all on the same page. Lives have been changed and our society will be a richer place for the contributions of Carroll Academy.
Our Facilities
Carroll Academy is located in the north wing of the old Carroll County Hospital Building, constructed in 1965. Carroll Academy has nine classrooms: Seven High School classrooms for History, English, Math, Science, Personal Finance, Day Treatment Life Skills, Spanish, and Health and Wellness; and one Jr. High classroom for 6th, 7th, and 8th grades. Carroll Academy also has a Computer Lab, with computers donated by Connected Tennessee AT & T.
The Carroll Academy main classroom facility is 8000 square feet and is located adjacent to the Carroll County Library and Carroll County Office Complex.
Carroll Academy has administrative offices for the Director, Principal, Business Office, Senior Administrator & Athletic Director, Juvenile Court Probation Office, Cafeteria, and a Controlled Security Office with security cameras & monitors.
In 1994, Carroll Academy Juvenile Court Probation Kids and Carroll County Adult Inmates assisted in the $250,000 renovation and construction of the Carroll Academy classroom and gymnasium facilities. In 2002, Carroll Academy constructed a separate gymnasium adjacent to the Carroll Academy classroom facilities. The 7000 square-foot gym includes a regulation combination basketball & volleyball court, weight training room and locker room. Carroll Academy students are entirely responsible for the cleanliness of the Carroll Academy facilities and campus.
The Carroll Academy Gym houses the original Memphis Pyramid Basketball Floor. The Pyramid Floor was purchased by Carroll Academy Senior Administrator/Athletic Director Randy Hatch and then-Carroll Academy Boys & Girls Varsity Basketball Coach in 2002 for $14,000. The Pyramid Floor, originally installed in the Memphis Pyramid in 1991, was the home playing surface for the University of Memphis Tigers and the NBA's Memphis Grizzlies. Players such as Shaquille O'Neal, Penny Hardaway, Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, and many other men's & women's college and professional basketball stars played on the historic floor.