Boot Camps in Tarpon Springs, Florida Can Help Troubled Teens, if They Are Like Gateway Boys Academy

Are you looking into boot camps in or around Tarpon Springs, Florida to try to help a out-of-control teen? Read on to see how boot camps can help troubled teens and look at how Gateway’s program may be even more beneficial for your teen.

If your teen shows deliberate disregard for authority, forever displays defiant behavior, gets into frequent and growing trouble with the law, and shows no cooperation in school, perhaps a boot camp will help bring him back to his senses. 

Boot Camps in Tarpon Springs, Florida Can Help Troubled Teens Learn to Respect Authority

Public impression gives military schools, especially boot camps, a reputation for making wayward teens put their lives in order. In truth, there are several positive ways in which boot camps can help troubled teens. Boot camps give a crash course in discipline, personal integrity and respect for authority. Programs like these can be a means of rescuing a teen who might otherwise ruin his life with crime. For the ones who respond well to it, boot camps can give them a new understanding of the consequences of their actions. For some teens, boot camps can initially help them move from unhealthy habits, to more manageable behavior. But those bad attitudes often return.

Boot Camps Can Help Troubled Teens Change their Behavior, But Many Teen Issues Go Beyond the Behavior

Although boot camps can help troubled teens in some cases, most teenage issues are more complicated than they seem on the surface and may only be symptoms of other problems. Boot camps focus entirely on forcing compliance; they do not offer the therapeutic support to help teens resolve the true root issues. For teens exhibiting anxiety, depression, drug use, low self-esteem, emotional disorders, and in fact most forms of rebellious behavior, the strict discipline of the boot camp environment may prove detrimental instead, if it isn’t set up in a way that the discipline is coupled with Christian love and support.

Most boot camps in Tarpon Springs, Florida fail to solve deeper issues but simply return a somewhat more respectful teen to the same home situation in which he was struggling. Boys who attend boot camps are more likely to return to old habits.  In fact, boot camps in Tarpon Springs, Florida are typically a short-term solution at best, and may be harmful to the teen at worst. Sadly, teens often revert to past behavior after returning home from short-term boot camps, because the length of the program doesn’t instill the attitude changes as a habit in their life.

Gateway’s Boot Camp-Like Program, Plus It’s Ongoing Behavioral Support are Designed to Turn Around Troubled Boys

If you find that a traditional short-term boot camp is not the best choice for your teen, but you still like the idea of what a boot camp teaches, Gateway an alternative that combines the benefits of the military style with the therapeutic component of a therapeutic boarding school. Gateway, located in the Panhandle of Florida, is a Christian program that has worked with – and brought hope to- struggling teenage boys and their families from places all across the country for more than 20 years. Struggling teenage boys from Tarpon Springs, Florida and other places benefit from an accredited education, counseling and instruction, an introduction to military drill and history, and the discipline for which boot camps are renowned. Gateway offers a  compassionate staff that cares deeply about each teen. Gateway is a military-style school that features a number of critical components that are typically missing from boot camps. Those include: 

• Caring staff and mentors who provide positive role models and concerned involvement, not simply breaking teens down.
• Biblical instruction and spiritual emphasis, to help teens discover the true source of lasting heart change.
• Counseling, to help teens address issues and replace self-destructive patterns with healthy new habits.
• Family restoration through Biblical instruction and seminars for parents and families.

Boot camps can help troubled teens if they are coupled with a longer term mentoring program like what Gateway offers. We invite you to look beyond Tarpon Springs, Florida, for what may be the best situation your boy…a program with a boot camp element, but also ongoing instruction and mentoring for a longer period of  time.

Gateway is Located in the Panhandle of Florida. Boys Come to Gateway from Around the Country. Call Us!