High-Support College Preparatory School

Clinically Informed Academics®

Why Choose Academics West?

Selecting a specialized school can be a challenging and oftentimes emotional situation for families. Simply, it can be confusing to figure out what level of care each school is able to provide. Academics West is accredited both academically and therapeutically, which reflects the high standards of care we are dedicated to. Each student’s schedule includes a minimum of five therapeutic services each week and family support are an integral component of our model. Our therapist to student ratio is on average 1:5 (16 clinicians on site for a maximum of 75 students) ensuring all students benefit from direct and consistent care.

What Makes Our School an Accredited Therapeutic School?

Many programs define themselves as therapeutic; counseling may be provided however it is not always integral to each student’s individual program. At Academics West it is. All students engage in a variety of therapeutic modalities which are integrated into their schedules. We are also structured as a “therapeutic milieu.” Meaning, the way we structure the environment and train all our staff is intended to support prosocial behavior among our students. It is our goal to help students rehearse critical therapeutic skills throughout the school day to optimize their progress.

Therapy is a requirement for all students and is conducted solely by licensed mental health professionals with a minimum of two years of experience. This level of certification also indicates that family therapy is an integral part of the program. Academics West, therefore, provides traditional academic support and remediation while also offering a wide array of clinical interventions. Students benefit from individual and group therapy, family therapy, art therapy, occupational therapy, and speech therapy in an integrated collaborative care model.

Clinically Informed Academics®

All students with emotional struggles experience a degree of executive dysfunction. Without adequate executive functioning students struggle with learning and make less substantial academic and therapeutic progress. Our proprietary CIA® (Clinically Informed Academics®) approach combines evidence-based clinical practice with research-based educational interventions to help students become strategic learners. To achieve this, we develop a carefully constructed learning plan (“The CIA® Profile”) for each student that uses assessment data to develop customized interventions to best support the student’s learning and emotional needs.