Academics and Recovery

by Corrine Barner

Corrine Barner

As we open our second Addiction Studies “ICDS” classroom in Newport Beach, CA I began to think about the intersection of Academics and recovery. There seems to be a controversy within the field of addiction treatment about the role and benefit of Academics for young adults in early recovery, while in treatment. As the Academic Director of Sober College, a treatment center for young adults, I can tell you that based on my experiences I firmly believe in the benefit of an Academic program for our students.

Here’s why. What we offer is not the one-size-fits-all type of education that many of us are familiar with. The education that truly effects change in my students is experiential, individually tailored and fully integrated into treatment. With this style of education the age-old question “when am I ever going to use this again” becomes obsolete because the tools they are gaining are clearly beneficial to the student as a whole. Through a program with those components they are building self-esteem, independence and accountability. These skills benefit them in every area of their lives.

Performance in academics is not only a vehicle for students to gain understanding about themselves. It also serves to benefit the clinical and counseling staff by offering unique insight into students’ behavior when they interact with the “real world” outside of treatment. The behaviors that many of our students exhibit in their courses are similar to those they engage in when they leave our care.

At Sober College we are fortunate to be in a partnership with Woodbury University, a private liberal arts college in Burbank, CA. Through them we offer five college courses, that provide a Certificate of Completion in General Studies. The on-site Instructors are in constant communication with counselors and therapists in order to understand learning disabilities, mental health challenges and other relevant information.

Young adults who are abusing substances during the formative years of their adult lives typically end up leaving a path of destruction from their previous school and work experiences. This often results is a negative attitude towards school or work, accompanied by a lack of insight into their previous failures. They have developed a habitual response to school...avoidance. Our job, as treatment providers, becomes helping them to gain the insight they need to become productive members of society. This is where Academics in treatment are crucial in helping them to experience the very success that they do not believe they can achieve. It provides an experimental setting for them to try school out with a solid safety net.

This setting provides a no-pressure place for them to gain self-esteem through facing challenges and receiving positive reinforcements. The goal for my students is to help them re-learn their study skills and work habits, while building life skills, gaining time in sobriety, maintaining, physical health and engaging in therapy to support the whole picture. The end result is someone who has an improved sense of accomplishment, self-esteem and some college credits or work experience to back it up.

Recently a student came to Sober College the semester prior to graduating high school. He was only three courses short of graduation and was ready to throw in the towel. He felt completely overwhelmed and was unable to tolerate the slightest frustrations. His low frustration tolerance made it difficult for him to remain consistent throughout his work. This was also represented throughout many other situations in his life. Throughout the time that he was with us, a total of six months, our teachers continued to hold him accountable and provide specific resources for his educational needs. Much of this was making sure that he was taking care of his other core competencies, such as therapy and physical fitness to lower his anxiety level.

At the end of the six months he had completed a full semester of college courses, using three of those courses to graduate from high school and was accepted to a small private college in the Pacific Northwest. He is a perfect example of why Academics belongs in treatment, for without it this student would never have been able use the momentum of coming into our facility to help him reach his tangible goal of attending college so soon. He would have to face the challenges of a school environment without the resources offered to him in treatment, the very resources that provided him the skills to work through his challenges. Or he would have had to undergo treatment and then look for assistance in academic completion.

Let’s talk further about the full integration aspect of Academics I mentioned earlier. On its own an Academic program is not enough for a young adult substance abuser to have a corrective experience, the real change comes from the counseling and therapy that is done parallel to their schoolwork. The expectations of student allows us direct access to their weaknesses in areas such as time management, organization, frustration tolerance, etc which influence all areas of a young adults life as they begin to actively interact with the adult world around them. They start to see successes in other areas of their lives as they become more responsible and aware of their strengths

What about traditional college campuses instead?

While this option may seem to provide the same parallel treatment benefits while the student is transitioning to a school environment, it still does not tailor the education to the student in recovery’s unique needs. This is a vital part of the process in order to help them understand their strengths and weaknesses. At Sober College Academic Coaches work with students daily, helping them to create systems to manage their deadlines, master the writing process and their stress level. Rachel Sanders, the Assistant Academic Director at Sober College stated that Academics “Gives them a future goal to look forward to and it gives people the sense of accomplishment.”

Another example of the benefits of Academics in treatment is one of our alumni, Mark. Upon admission to Sober College he stated that he did not want to go to college, he wanted to work on his recovery and then become a mechanic when he completed his time here. We did not push him to do otherwise; we supported this decision and started researching the career path for a mechanic. After a couple weeks, he started helping other students with their essays and was a big support for them; he also started to enjoy completing the assignments. He approached his academic coach, asked to join classes and enrolled in one course. He admitted later that he didn’t ever believe that he was capable of meeting the demands of school and was really surprised at his ability to do well and receive good grades. He ended up completing three courses while with us and transferred to a community college. His goal is now to go onto a four- year college and get his degree.

This transformation would not have been able to take place if Mark had not experienced an educational environment that was different from his prior experiences in school. It allowed him to correct his view of what an academic setting was and motivated him to take an academic course.

Not all of our students go on to attend four-year colleges; many of them seek careers in creative fields such as music or substance abuse treatment, as drug and alcohol counselors. Everything that the students learn as they faced their fears will benefit them as they move forward in their lives.

Please visit our website, www. addiction-studies.com for more information about the chemical dependency counselor certification course, as well as our exciting new classroom location.