Therapeutic Integration

Helping families chart the course

Student-led Process

Therapists and guides work together with students to determine the treatment plan and individual goals. This allows students to take ownership of their forward progress, acknowledging the patterns that have been keeping them stuck and learning new skills to help them improve their lives.

Team Collaboration

Therapists work closely with each student to identify personal goals and objectives for addressing student’s self-directed areas of concern. As students practice their emotional goal work in the group setting, therapists work closely with guides to implement individualized treatment plans that address initial areas of concern and a student’s presentation within their group.

Under the direction of the therapist, guides also help students as they respond to feedback while helping them to capitalize on the practical and metaphoric lessons from interactions with peer and adult mentors.  Weekly clinical trainings also enhance the relationship between guides and therapists and provide the guides with invaluable resources as they provide individualized in-the-moment interventions with students.

Guides facilitate multiple daily gatherings with the group which allow the students to share goals, ask for support, and discuss the topics that come up for them throughout their weekly activities.

Student Curriculum

In addition to their individual therapeutic goals, all students complete a written curriculum, which invites them to understand and connect with their environment and achieve specific outdoor skill-based milestones. Students progress through four non-punitive phases and build on their own success as they learn various wilderness survival skills. Therapists and guides work with students to draw on the use of metaphor and apply the lessons learned to their lives outside of True North.

The therapeutic process is highly integrated, and each aspect of the program is deliberately focused on the overall progress of the students. In addition to the therapy, curriculum, and team collaboration, these additional program features contribute to student success:

Skip to content