NFA was a last resort for us after a mental health crisis and subsequent autism diagnosis for my 15-year-old. Adam was an excellent therapist, and I recommend NFA as a stabilization step for neurodiverse kids. The schedule is very regimented, and there is a points system that reinforces appropriate behavior. It was tough at first, and then my child flourished. The stay lasted about a year and a half, which turned out to be a good fit. It's worth noting that once stabilized, my child began to feel the weight of the regimented system and was ready for next steps. At times, my child could become fixated on fairness in how the level system was applied and how privileges were granted or withheld. That said, in our experience throughout this mental health journey, this sort of system is NOT unique to NFA, and flexibility can be difficult for neurodiverse kids. To the team's credit, this expectation was also set early. After an initial observation period, Dr. Park projected a stay of about 15 to 18 months, which held true. I do feel that Dr. Park and Adam are experts in understanding what makes neurodiverse kids tick. A few other things worth noting: evening staff can be a little mixed, with uneven enforcement of the rules at times. There was definitely some staff turnover, and academics are not the top priority here. I also recognize that Heber is not a big city, and the pool of qualified mental health experts and certified special education teachers is not a deep one. All that said, every credit carried over to our school system back east. My child left with a deeper understanding of their emotional challenges and renewed resilience, and is now back home and doing great in private school. We are grateful. If you are considering NFA, keep in mind that reviews on public sites or Reddit rarely show the success stories for mental health facilities. Former students, some of whom may not have been a good fit for a place like NFA, often use reviews to vent when things don't work out. I would ask NFA to connect you with parents who have agreed to serve as references, like us. Lastly, if you are considering making a case to your school district for tuition coverage under existing laws, I HIGHLY suggest engaging legal representation EARLY in the process, before enrollment. read more

I went to NFA i think from June 2017 to August 2017 and I can wholeheartedly tell you that the bad reviews are untrue, every staff there is there to help, I was only there for three months because I acted out sexually and had to leave afterwards which wasn't anyone else's fault but mine, Dr. Park if you are reading this, I am doing much better now than I was when I left NFA, I wish I could tell you what I've been up to and tell you that you helped me, I'm Cian btw if you don't remember me read more

New Focus Academy was hands-down a phenomenal experience for our son - and for us as parents. The admissions process was smooth and easy and they made him (and us) feel comfortable and welcome from the moment he arrived. They embraced him, and spent a great deal of time evaluating him, listening to him, listening to us, and eventually crafted an improvement program tailored to his needs. Dr Park and his staff are clearly experts equipped with in-depth experience and capabilities designed to help neurodiverse kids identify the areas where they have issues and then help them down a tailored pathway that enables them to manage anxiety, emotional dysregulation, school acceptance, and other issues that in the past had been debilitating. Ultimately they gave our son the tools and confidence and desire to look at everything differently and build (and rebuild) healthy relationships with peers, educators, other adults and especially family members. He told us that staff were caring and listened to his needs. When redirection or consequences was needed, it was reasonable and we felt like he made progress each time something happened. There were definitely bumps in the road, but the staff actually looked forward to those events seeing them as opportunities to help him develop new coping skills and achieve lasting improvements. The teachers inspired him. For the first time, he began getting straight As, and he told us he actually liked going to school! Our son has celiac disease, and they did a great job of accommodating him with excellent gluten-free choices. His individual therapist, Adam, was a rock star. He developed a close and trusting relationship with our son, and wasn't afraid to redirect him and impose reasonable consequences when needed. Adam was encouraging and helped him progress on a path that eventually awarded him with a semi-autonomous living situation where he could develop and practice executive functioning skills that have prepared him for eventual independent living. Our weekly parent meeting sessions with Adam gave us skills and ideas for how we could build a much stronger relationship with our son, and be able to handle the inevitable behavioral challenges. We are huge fans of NFA, and will be forever grateful for the help they gave our son - and us! read more

This place is horrible. Even though all the kids are different and didn't get along, it constantly felt like it was a war between staff and students. How well you do is almost entirely based on how much the staff like you. I am a tall guy, and I wasn't getting enough food. Thankfully, the therapist I was assigned to was great, accommodating my food situation, but then he got fired after I graduated. Why? Because of something this place does that is clever, sure, but is just a way to squeeze every last second they can spend with you so your parents can send more money into the owner's bank accounts. The method in question is to filter out good staff and keep staff that is just good enough to make NFA look like a legitimate business. That way, the kids will get angry. Then, they can tell the parents how their kid just had a crash out, and being a "treatment" center, the parents' only choice is to keep them there. One example of this was the principal. She was amazing. There wasn't a single kid that didn't like her. That sounds pretty okay already, but if you went to NFA, you would know that every student collectively agreeing on something is more revolutionary than the moon landing. And she got fired. The exact reason is debated by a lot of people, but one thing is still clear. She shouldn't have gotten fired. After she left, most of the other teachers abandoned ship, making school a lot worse. In fact, one time I was in class with another student after the new batch of teachers rolled in, and him and I didn't really get along, but this was insane. He had Tourette's that was amplified by another kid and him living in the same house together. It was the same one I lived in and they both had Tourette's, which made tics a lot more common. Anyway, we were sitting in class together and I watched this kid get in trouble for saying swears because of his tics. I'm not kidding. The teacher got mad at him because he had Tourette's. At one point I got an infection. It eventually got so bad that I had to go to the hospital just to make sure that I was okay. The doctor prescribed that I rub an ointment on and take a medication or something to make it go away. But here's the key part: I asked how I hold back the pain and he said I should take 600mg of ibuprofen and I think 400mg of Tylenol alternating every 4 hours. The staff member who was with me even took notes so there was no confusion. This was on the weekend, so when Monday came, it was time for me to take my ibuprofen. I went with a staff member to go take it, but the normal amount was only 400mg instead of 600. In order to find out, she called the head nurse and we asked her about it, and she said I could only take 200mg. Not even the 400 that was normal. This might sound a bit petty, but you gotta understand the amount of pain that I was feeling because of that infection. I would wake up in the middle of the night because the pain would flare up. There was another staff that was awful. They worked at my house in the morning most commonly, and the first time they did this was on me. It was a great morning, there was only one significant thing that happened. Everything else went flawlessly. A kid was doing the dishes for their chore, and she got annoyed at another kid for something I'm not going to go in depth into, but all you have to know is that one of my friends tried to stick up for the other kid, and she did swear, so I'm not saying she shouldn't have gotten in trouble, but the way it went down was completely unfair. We just had a normal day at school. Everything was fine, and we were going to go clean the vans for our outing that night which was great! We love that outing because afterwards we get ice cream! Until my one of my other friends and I got in the van. One of the staff members told us that we were on participation, which was the lowest level, so we couldn't go on outings. Confused, we went inside and with our other friend, the one that got mad that morning, we went through the entire morning to figure out why we got dropped to participation. And there was one answer we could come up with. No reason. The staff member who had seen my friend get mad dropped her to participation and blamed my other friend and me, who were downstairs at that moment, for ganging up at the kid she got mad at. The thing is, this wasn't even close to the last time this happened. It was the only time it happened to me, however. Please don't send your kid here. There are stories that I can't even type here because of the character limit. Even worse, these stories are just things that I have witnessed. (Besides the thing about my therapist getting fired) There are so many other things that I've heard about, but I want to keep this review completely accurate, so even though I believe all of the stories told to me, unless you want your kid to have an absolutely terrible experience at best and traumatized at worst, find another option. read more

Best child abuse I ever received. A great place to send your child if you want them to suffer the most dehumanizing experience of their life. Costs $600 a day too, worst money my parents ever spent. (Still no refund.) I was here almost a year when I was 16, celebrated my 9000th birthday here due to how torturous it was. If you are considering sending your child here, they will have a better experience being sacrificed to Satan and undergoing eternal torture in Hell. read more

I spent two years at NFA. I can't say bad things didn't happen, but I can still call those two years the best in my life. I promise you will have a good experience if you cooperate. The staff are really great, and so are the kids. Its really really hard but even more worth it. read more

Our son spent a year and a half in NFS's LIFT program for young adults (18 years+) and had a very positive experience. Prior to NFS, he was in a 6-month program solely addressing health considerations such as autism thinking, OCD, Pika, and depression. NFS' therapists continued to help our son with his health issues and to develop his skills for building longer-term friendships and independence. They also supported his switch back to high school academics, and vocational training. The therapists, teachers and administrators were amazing and their love for our son was obvious - the experience was consistent/positive from the admissions process to the day-to-day stuff and to eventual graduation. The owners' knowledge and involvement in training the staff and kids and building the culture was a real difference-maker. We had weekly zoom calls with our son and his therapist, who not only guided our son but shared his thoughts and recommendations with my wife and me - this help was key to making our communication with our son more consistent/productive. This, along with the owner and therapist-led off-sites in which topical books were delivered to the parents in advance and then taught at the offsite, helped us to better understand our son's condition, his way of thinking, and ideal communication patterns. Ultimately, our son became more positive-minded, had a successful academic experience, and gained the confidence he needed to focus more attention on developing his vocational skills and living more independently. Special shout out to Winslow, Janelle, Alta and all the teachers and staff who went above and beyond in helping our son, caring for him, and keeping us in the loop - they helped make the distance between New Jersey and Utah...not so distant. My wife and I recommend NFS without reservation. read more

My son attended NFA for almost a year. He had great therapists and was making progress. I also felt that he was a receiving a solid academic education. Usually the home staff were great. I think the challenge there was turnover. He made friends and enjoyed the outings. The chores he did were reasonable and he was taking more responsibility for himself. A friend's child graduated from the program and was very successful at home afterward. Because of this, we were not in any way expecting what happened. Around 6 months into his time there, we (parents and psychiatrist in discussion with the therapists) adjusted his meds because he was very sleepy and was losing points for falling asleep during the day. The adjustment did not go well and he started having huge outbursts. The school was not prepared to handle the results of improper meds. If they had simply said that the program wasn't a fit at that point, we would have been upset, but also understanding that he needed something else. That makes sense. But instead, they decided to file charges with the police for property damage at an amount that would result in a felony. I know of other schools that send kids to the ER when they get this dysregulated. I have never heard of a school charging autistic kids with crimes when no one was hurt. It was a very difficult time for our family to go through the process of dealing with the legal system. We were doing everything we could to help our child NOT end up in the justice system (which has no track record of helping kids with autism). We trusted NFA with our child because they are experts in neurodiverse education, but they were not closely enough monitoring the meds changes or being honest about how bad it was and having us take him out before things continued to escalate. They told us he could stay and then charge him with a crime the next time there was an incident. They even said that it was a therapeutic decision to charge him and they thought he needed to go in front of a judge. But there is no research that supports that as a therapeutic method. I realize that Brandon might reply to this review. I hope he will not deny or discount this experience. I definitely wanted to be fair in telling about our experience because, until the end, it was largely a good one. It was a mistake how it was handled. I hope they are committed to not doing this to another child/family and that they have much more caution with handling meds changes. On the bright side, our son then went to Spark Balance in Provo to get his meds straightened out and do assessments and I can recommend that (or Huntsman, I hear) as a first step if your child needs a placement before a residential therapeutic school. read more

I believe the stress from being in this place is slowly killing me. I have been stuck for two years. In these two years, I have been bullied, manipulate, sexually harassed, and disrespected. I have moved between their various houses nine times. They have put me with seventeen roommates. I have had four therapists. When I graduated high school, their academic director withheld my diploma. They don't take care of us when we are sick. There was a time I had pneumonia. I was coughing so hard I was vomiting on the desks and they still made me go to class. I have the sickness to my friend and she was hospitalized. Another friend of mine was put in chokeholds on multiple occasions. There is no consistency to the point where we think the people in charge are just jerking us around. They "give us the right" to refuse our medications, but severely punish us if we choose to, even if the meds make us sick. The staff they hire are the same ages as the students. I believe that I will have long term trauma from being here. PLEASE DO NOT SEND YOUR CHILD HERE. read more

Absolutely terrible. I left recently, and please do not send your child to this place. The place is shown to be "fun", containing a lot of fun outdoor activities, but it's quite the opposite. A lot of the outdoor activities are forced upon you, if you don't want to do something tiring or genuinely disinteresting and unfun, you're punished and don't earn participation points because you didn't want to participate in a fun activity that doesn't benefit you in any way? They also make you do labor!! They'll make you do chores that are not related to you in any way, such as cleaning the downstairs bathroom when you use the upstairs, or cleaning up a van when your group didn't make it a mess. Not to mention one of their activities is gardening, which, by the way, they do not let you plant or relocate anything!! The only gardening you do is weeding! Super fun for your sad, autistic 12 year old, no? (It's not fun.) Not to mention they also accepted FORGED documents with signatures that were not valid, as well as restricting me from calling my legal guardian! They will not allow your child to contact you if anything bad happens to them, you will simply have to go off of the word of men who only care about making a dollar off of keeping your child in that treatment center for as long as possible. They will use your child as their cash cow and manipulate you into thinking something is wrong with your child, when they probably just suffer from completely normal teenage angst. The staff also directly say to your face that they do not care about your problems! They will tell you to not dismiss what they say, get mad at you when you do so, and then dismiss what YOU say. If you tell a staff you're uncomfortable with something they said to you, they will straight up say "I'm sorry you feel that way." And the context in which this happened to me was on the grounds of my deceased father. read more

This place is full of con artists. They make you sign a contract saying all the things you'll have to pay for if any damage is done to staff or the building by your child and then they make the kids lash out by provoking situations and then try to charge your for it. They restrain kids physically and talk horrible and condescending as well. In the before process it's impossible to see through them. This place is full of actors. They seem like the nicest people on earth until they are stabbing you in the back and traumatizing your child. DO NOT send your kids here. The Theripists they have are not attentive and they often promise things and never follow through. They will take belongings away from children that they have a right to have such as coping items. Their "house chores" are more like slave labor read more

New Focus Academy is a great place. My wife and I took a tour there and we thought that it would be a great fit. Looking forward to seeing how they can help our family and child out. read more