Safety, Structure & Support

Student Profile

Wediko Students

The Wediko School can serve up to 40 residential students and several day students who are struggling with serious mental health needs that get in the way of their success at home, school, and the community. Often, Wediko’s students do not fit neatly under the criteria of a specific diagnosis or they have been diagnosed with multiple disorders, including, but not limited to:

Resilience

Students at The Wediko School come from all over the country, referred by public schools, private educational consultants, public agencies, and word of mouth. While Wediko’s campus is rich with geographic, cultural, and socio-economic diversity, successful students share common elements of resilience.

Wediko students demonstrate a level of insight orientation.

Wediko students can identify elements of their lives and themselves that they would like to change. While our students don’t yet have the skills to make the needed changes, they are motivated and are willing to engage with us to work on their challenges.

Wediko students engage in language-based therapeutic interventions.

Verbal processing is used to develop insights, and to build and practice skills. Successful Wediko students have average or above Verbal Comprehension skills in order to benefit from this modality.

Wediko students are interested in relationships.

Wediko is a highly relational program and emphasizes group work. Students who do well with us are relationally motivated – though they may have social skill deficits, they have a strong desire for positive relationships with their peers and adults. Students recognize how their challenges get in the way of their relationships and are motivated to work on things that are hard for them in order to experience more successful relationships. Students who need a more structured behavioral approach (ABA, level system, token economy, or concrete rewards and consequences) may not be as successful here.

Families are active participants.

As the overarching goal is for a successful return home, students and families work together in family therapy to develop new patterns of interactions and practice transferring gains made and skills learned during regular visits.