Working Ranches - A Positive Environment for Troubled Teens

Working Ranches: A Positive Environment for Troubled Teens

by Luke Hatch, CSW at Turn-About Ranch

Because there are so many different therapeutic programs available today, parents may find it hard to choose the best placement for their troubled teen. Some of the options are therapeutic boarding schools, residential treatment programs, wilderness programs, and working ranch programs. The purpose of this article is to explain the value of that last option. I will explain how the positive environment on a working ranch can be so effective in helping troubled teens turn their lives around.

When adolescents are failing in their home environment, it is sometimes essential for them to go to an isolated therapeutic environment to get their lives back together. One of the reasons an isolated working ranch environment is beneficial is because a ranch has no technology. While new technology comes out every day to make things easier for us, the flip side is that it also makes us lazier. Think of all the tasks we can do on the Internet without leaving our comfortable computer chair. We can shop, read, talk to others, play games, order food, pay our bills, get a loan, go on a date, watch a movie, get a college degree, make reservations, make travel plans, etc. We don't have to get dressed, move from our chair, leave the house, drive anywhere, or talk to anyone face to face. We hardly have to communicate or even think for ourselves. The computer, cell phone, TV, or video game make it easy for us to sit down, tune out and have very little interaction with anyone in our families.

In the working ranch environment, technology is very limited. This means teens have to be responsible and think for themselves. They have to deal with boredom and the lack of stimulation which technology provides every hour of every day. In one study performed in a psychiatric unit, Binnema (2004) found that boredom results from not finding meaning in our environment. To avoid boredom, we need to find meaning and think for ourselves.

A working ranch is a natural outdoor environment. A working ranch is rustic and reminiscent of the way our ancestors lived. Crops in the field, cattle and horses in the pasture - such a setting creates a quiet and serene environment. Over the last hundred years not much has changed about life on a working ranch. The work on a ranch is not just about having fun and building character; it is a necessary part of keeping the ranch running from day to day. You put up hay in the summer so that your animals can feed in the winter. You must care for your animals on a day-to-day basis. You need to build and repair your fences to keep your animals properly housed. You need to gather and chop wood for the winter. The list of essential work goes on and on.

A Maori Elder stated, "Those who build the house are built by it. Only when I participate in the fullness around me can I learn from the fullness around me." After clearing a field from new fresh bales of hay, an adolescent can't help but receive satisfaction from a job well done. Roger S. Ulrich, a research psychologist, studied how being in nature affects recovery. He found that when we are in nature, we recover sooner, take less pain medication, and have a better outlook on life (Jack, 2006). His research supports the fact that out in nature and out on the ranch, adolescents can be positively influenced by their surroundings.

Many adolescents refuse to go to treatment on their own, forcing their parents to find the program necessary to save their children's lives. The working ranch environment is particularly helpful for those that are resistant to treatment. Doing chores and work projects side by side with adult staff members is how these resistant teens gain so much therapeutic benefit. Relationships are formed in a natural way as staff members and teens work together. The staff can help the teens in a non-threatening way.

The working ranch program is an amazing tool for changing lives and helping families. We are so lucky to have these programs.

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