Cottage Hill Academy is a staff secure residential program designed to serve adolescent girls ages ten through twenty. Cottage Hill Academy serves girls referred from the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families Department of Youth Services, Department of Education and Department of Mental Health. We generally serve girls in need of residential services from the New England region. Cottage Hill Academy partners with these agencies, institutions and regions with the aim of helping girls return to the community.
Partnership and collaboration are the basis of Cottage Hill Academy’s treatment philosophy. We are aware girls come to us already involved with numerous services and agencies and that many of them will require ongoing support from these agencies when they leave Cottage Hill Academy. We believe our collaboration with girls’ parents, adult siblings, extended families, foster families, lawyers, educational advocates, caseworkers, visiting resources and many others who have established positive relationships with them is key to each girl’s healing and growth. Our staff works hard to sustain, promote and learn from those who have worked and lived with these adolescents prior to their arrival at Cottage Hill Academy. At the heart of our team approach is an individualized treatment plan that is specifically tailored to each girl’s particular struggle. This plan is developed in collaboration with individuals and agencies involved with the client as well as her family.
Cottage Hill Academy is able to meet needs
of girls who present with a variety of symptoms related to trauma as
well as mental illness. We accept and develop treatment plans for girls
that have behavioral concerns such as running away, substance abuse and
aggression. We also work with girls who have mental health issues,
difficulties with social skills, affect regulation, self esteem and
relationships. Many of the girls who come to Cottage Hill Academy have
had problems succeeding in other placements but the team approach
combined with the structure we offer helps guide them to successful
community integration.
Cottage Hill Academy aims to provide state of the art treatment to girls’ with complicated histories of trauma, loss and relational disruptions. At Cottage Hill Academy each girl is assigned a team of individuals to work with including a Master’s level clinician, the unit director, a teacher and nurse or nurses assistant. These individuals help to create and monitor each girl’s individualized treatment plan on the milieu and in school. The treatment team ensures that there is ongoing assessment and monitoring of girl’s struggles and progress on a daily basis. The treatment plans are reviewed regularly and revised on the basis of data gathered in all contexts in collaboration with the girl herself.