Springboard Home for Girls is a grace-based 3-6 month program for girls ages 12-17. Our students come from all over the country and from different walks of life. We are a smaller facility, which makes it easier for discipleship and for working with the families and students. Springboard’s grace-based program and approach addresses the heart issues behind the behavior.
Our Program
Head describes what the students learn in the classroom. The students do recovery-based learning that helps to shift their mindsets and teach them truths about God, themselves, and others.
Heart describes what the students experience in counseling. The students participate in individual, group, and family counseling where the root issues are identified, addressed, and healed from a Biblical perspective.
Hands describes the real-life application where the students apply what they are learning in the classroom and in counseling in their relationships with staff and peers. Through fully engaging in the program they experience lasting transformation of their heart, attitude, thoughts, habits, and character.
Putting these three aspects together creates the space for God to do what only He can do in their lives and creates a foundation for holistic healing for their
future.
Our Program
We combined the Fruit to Root model from Gospel Fluency by Jeff Vanderstelt, The Teen Challenge Self-Evaluation process, and the concepts of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to create our version of Fruit to Root. We use this model and the process of asking open-ended questions to help our staff and students address the motives, thoughts, and beliefs that drive their behaviors. This process helps lead towards repentance and growth.
“One thing I would like to take from Springboard is the discipline. I lived a pretty rough life and grew up really fast. I mean who hasn’t! It felt like juvenile detention and treatment centers were always in the picture in my life, but none of those places had the right discipline.
I was so used to getting yelled at and expecting a consequence that it meant nothing to me when I did get in trouble. The consequences were repetitive, the verbal abuse, the lectures, and even the restraints. The authorities that were placed over me would try to taunt and scare me saying, ‘You are eligible for (Juvenile prison, higher than juvenile detention).’
When I say taunt, I’m talking about the fact that their meaning behind what they were saying was “get ready, be prepared, it’s a lot worse so many things could happen.” The discipline these other places had were just scare tactics which did not work on me. My response to that discipline was fighting back, yelling, or arguing, just to prove the point that I was not scared of them. This kind of discipline never helped me to grow, if anything it set me back.
I was used to adults just yelling at me and I wanted that. I wanted to fight. I used to manipulate adults into fighting. But that didn’t work with you guys. You didn’t yell, you would just say, “Oh, that’s a bummer that that happened, what are we going to do about that” and calmly address the issue without yelling or arguing or overreacting.
That confused me because I had never had that kind of discipline before. It taught me that there are other ways to handle situations other than yelling and arguing, which was the only way that adults in my life had ever modeled how to handle conflict or how to discipline.
It also taught me that Jesus is a graceful and loving God and showed me how He deals with me too.
Springboard provided a structured grace-based discipline that encouraged me to evaluate myself and move forward. Most of the times I made mistakes I would beat myself up and put myself down. But with moving forward, Springboard taught me that there needs to be forgiveness both ways, to myself and to others.
Another form of discipline Springboard uses is “stripping away distractions” such as social media, secular music and worldly events. The goal with stripping away these distractions is to help us become content with where we are at so we don’t seek out things that could end up leading us astray.”
Our goal at Springboard is to love our students through what they’re going through in a safe and caring environment.
John 5:6: When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be healed?”
Every couple of months, we host a Parent Workshop that is open to our community and all students and families enrolled in Springboard are required to attend before they can graduate the program. We talk about trauma informed parenting, active listening, creating a grace-based environment at home, communication, and more.
We encourage Springboard families and students to stay in touch with us after graduation so we can provide any necessary support. All families fill out an agreement before their students return home so that all parties know the expectations of returning home. Our counselors and staff will follow up with anyone as needed.
For Parents/Guardians:
Keep Your Love On by Danny Silk
Loving Our Kids on Purpose by Danny Silk
Overcoming Emotions That Destroy by Chip Ingram
Parenting Teens with Love and Logic by Cline and Fay
Tailor Made by Alex Seeley
The 15 Fundamental Laws of De-Escalation by Brendan King
For Families:
Gospel Fluency by Jeff Vanderstelt
Boundaries by Cloud and Townsend
Bait of Satan by John Bevere
Tired of Trying to Measure Up by Jeff VanVonderan
For Springboard Students:
True Faced by Bill Thrall, Bruce McNicol, John Lynch
Safe People by Cloud and Townsend
Unashamed by Christine Cane
The Heart of Addiction by Mark Shaw
When Life Hurts by Jimmy Evans
Gospel Fluency by Jeff Vanderstelt
The Bait of Satan by John Bevere
Gay Girl Good God by Jackie Hill Perry
The Last Arrow by Erwin McManus
Unexpected by Christine Cane
Present over Perfect by Shauna Niequist
Dating Declassified by Jeanne Mayo
Managing Emotions by Joyce Meyers
