Former students at the $60,000-a-year Midwest Academy – a “therapeutic school” for “struggling teens” – claim they were placed in solitary confinement, forced to listen to round-the-clock pumped-in noise, and denied sufficient food as punishment.
The school, established in 2003, is located in Keokuk on the corner where Iowa, Missouri, and Illinois meet, and vows to provide “a safe, comfortable, structured and disciplined environment.” With monthly fees averaging between $3,000 and $5,000 Midwest offers a fast, if expensive, academic boot camp for teenagers, who have mostly been kicked out of other schools – with most pupils staying for less than 18 months. It hit the headlines last week after the FBI conducted a two-day raid on the institution resulting in an investigation being opened into sexual abuse, which was later expanded to cover other potential forms of maltreatment. Continue reading “Students say they were locked up, starved, at pricey boarding school under FBI investigation”