What's New at KidsPeace

Schnecksville, PA – KidsPeace has earned The Joint Commission’s Gold Seal of Approval™ for accreditation by
demonstrating compliance with The Joint Commission’s national standards for health care quality and safety in
behavioral health care. The accreditation award, covering all KidsPeace’s Pennsylvania programs recognizes dedication to compliance with The Joint Commission’s state-of-the-art standards on a continuous basis.

KidsPeace underwent a rigorous on-site survey from August 15-17, 2011. A team of Joint Commission expert surveyors evaluated KidsPeace for compliance with standards of care specific to the needs of individuals served and families, including infection prevention and control, leadership and medication management. "In achieving Joint Commission accreditation, KidsPeace has demonstrated its commitment to the highest level of care for the people they serve," says Mary Cesare-Murphy, Ph.D., executive director, Behavioral Health Care Accreditation, The Joint Commission. “Behavioral Health accreditation is a voluntary process and I commend KidsPeace for successfully undertaking this challenge to elevate its standard of care and instill confidence in the community it serves.”

"With Joint Commission accreditation, we are making a significant investment in quality on a day-to-day basis from the top down. Joint Commission accreditation provides us a framework to take our organization to the next level and helps create a culture of excellence,” says William Isemann, President and CEO. “Achieving Joint Commission accreditation, for our organization, is a major step toward maintaining excellence and continually improving the care we provide.”

The Joint Commission’s behavioral health care standards address important functions relating to the care of individuals served and the management of behavioral health care organizations. The standards are developed in consultation with behavioral health care experts, providers, measurement experts, individuals served and their families.

Founded in 1951, The Joint Commission seeks to continuously improve health care for the public, in collaboration with
other stakeholders, by evaluating health care organizations and inspiring them to excel in providing safe and effective
care of the highest quality and value. The Joint Commission evaluates and accredits more than 18,000 health care
organizations and programs in the United States. The Joint Commission also provides certification of more than 1,700
disease-specific care programs, primary stroke centers, and health care staffing services. An independent, not-for-profit organization, The Joint Commission is the nation's oldest and largest standards-setting and accrediting body in health care. Learn more about The Joint Commission at www.jointcommission.org.

An Evening with Buck Showalter to Benefit KidsPeace Foster Care

Orefield, PA. December 7, 2011 – Two charitable organizations that dedicate their efforts to helping kids have formed a partnership that will enrich the lives of deserving children and teach them important life lessons. Community Bike Works and KidsPeace are launching the inaugural "Community Bike Works at KidsPeace Earn a Bike” program at the Orefield, PA, campus. Selected boys and girls in KidsPeace residential programs will attend the three month program that will teach bicycle repair and maintenance, safety and teamwork. Each child who successfully completes the course will be given the bike he or she has fixed up, along with a helmet and a certificate of course completion.

Rob Scott, who is the Facilities and Recreation Supervisor at KidsPeace, read about Community Bike Works (CBW) on the Internet (www.communitybikeworks.org) and contacted Executive Director and founder Stefan Goslawski to see if the two nonprofits could work together. The more he learned, the more Rob believed that the program would be a great benefit to KidsPeace kids. “Last spring I took a few kids to attend classes at CBW in Allentown,” Rob says. “They did really well and were thrilled to have earned their own bikes to take home with them when they left KidsPeace.” There is a vocational aspect to the program that particularly excited Rob because the education department was able to obtain Title 1 funding, as well as a grant from Just Born to purchase supplies to run the program at the KidsPeace facility.

After that, Rob actively recruited KidsPeace associates as volunteers to start up the program on the KidsPeace residential campus in Orefield. Rob and the volunteers attended 12 weeks of classes at Community Bike Works and learned how to take bikes apart, repair them and put them back together. They also learned about Stefan’s philosophy and the more subtle aspects of the program that help the kids learn life skills and develop strong work ethics.

According to Stefan, a retired teacher and bike shop owner, he founded Community Bike Works in 1994 after reading about a similar program that taught parents how to fix their kids’ bikes and after receiving a letter from an elderly lady who urged him to teach Allentown kids important skills. With the assistance of the Allentown Conference of Churches, which helped him gain nonprofit status, Stefan launched the program.

Today, the 12 week program teaches students from the Allentown and Bethlehem School Districts at certain middle schools and at the organization’s headquarters at 235 North Madison Street in Allentown’s 18102. “It is the most enjoyable job I have ever had,” Stefan says with a smile. The program currently works with around 250 kids a year, and Stefan expects that number to reach 350 in 2012. “We really need more volunteers in order to expand even more,” Stefan adds. “It is hard because we need a 12-week commitment from our volunteers to facilitate one of our classes.”

Additionally, Stefan has a group of enthusiastic volunteers from Cedar Crest and Muhlenberg Colleges who help the kids with their reading skills through one on one tutoring. “It is so exciting when the school districts tell us that kids we have taught and tutored have increased their reading levels by one to four grade levels and have improved their state test scores dramatically,” Stefan reports. “We also teach our kids that working hard for something will be rewarding,” Stefan points out. “They need to sign a contract, make and fulfill a commitment, help others in the class with their bikes, take pre and post-class tests, learn safety rules, write a thank you letter to the bike’s donor and keep a journal in order to earn their bikes.” According to Stefan, there is also a vocational skills development component to the program that teaches kids how to read manuals, use tools and do repair and maintenance work. These skills may help them secure a job when after they leave school.

Stefan Goslawski asks the community to donate bikes (20 inch BMX bikes are particularly needed) or funds, but his biggest need is for volunteers to work with the kids and help them learn skills and values that will last them a lifetime. Contact him at 610-434-1140 or stefan@communitybikeworks.org.

Rob Scott encourages donations of 24” to 26” mountain bikes to KidsPeace. Rob’s number is 610-799-7487, or email him at Robert.Scott@kidspeace.org.

Raheem Khawaja* was a troubled boy who came to KidsPeace in the fall of 2009. Raheem’s family had emigrated from Pakistan shortly after his birth; he had no conscious memories of living in Pakistan and was grounded in American culture… skateboarding, cartoons and McDonald’s. Raheem had done very well at his local elementary school, which was located within walking distance from his new home. His father walked him to school in the morning, and his mother was waiting at home for him when he returned afterwards. Raheem did well academically and had many friends. It seemed like middle school would be a smooth transition. However, problems started almost immediately in the fall of his sixth grade year. Raheem was suspended twice for fighting on the bus. His grades dropped, and he became moody and unhappy. His parents grew concerned. What was wrong with their son? When they asked him, he had no answers. His pediatrician assured them that the onset of puberty often produced such changes in behavior… this reassured them, for a time. Then, following another bus incident, Raheem was suspended for bringing a knife to school. The guidance counselor insisted that the parents take their son to the emergency room to obtain a psychiatric evaluation. It was then that Raheem was admitted to the KidsPeace Hospital for treatment.


Raheem was pleasant and cooperative during his stay. He followed the rules and did not exhibit any behavior problems. The Treatment Team had a difficult time understanding why this cheerful boy was having such a difficult time at school. The therapist gathered a comprehensive history of Raheem’s experiences, and everything she was told appeared to support the story of a developmentally normal, healthy boy. Then she asked Raheem’s parents about their own lives. Suddenly, the picture began to change. Mr. Khawaja’s face grew troubled; his wife looked down at her hands entwined in her lap. In halting English, Mr. Khawaja began to talk about living in Pakistan during war. “We lost our home,” he explained, “As many did. Raheem was born in the basement of a building that had been bombed. There was nowhere safe to go, and my wife couldn’t travel in her condition. The neighbors helped us.” The clinician asked gently, “Did you lose many people who you cared about?” Mrs. Khawaja began to cry. Her husband merely responded, “It was very bad. Ever since we were young. We came here and were very happy to be in the United States.”
As the days went on, the clinician worked closely with the Khawaja family, and significant issues emerged. Living in a war zone where they feared for their lives, and the lives of their loved ones, every day had emotionally traumatized Raheem’s parents. Their experiences of terror, loss and catastrophe had shaped the way they responded to the world. They thought that all of these problems would disappear when they came to America, and what they found was that the fear and panic that they’d learned to live with came to America with them. Raheem’s parents lived every day in fear and he, living with them, did as well.


The events that this family experienced create a tragically familiar story to many of the professionals who work in mental health treatment. A traumatic event is defined as a single experience, or an enduring series of events, that completely overwhelm the individual’s ability to cope¹. Traumatic events include some of the experiences that we least like to think about: Violent crime, natural disasters, accidents, wars, community violence, child physical and sexual abuse, bullying and domestic violence. While there are many different situations that can be considered traumatic, these events have one thing in common: They are events that cause overwhelming feelings of fear, helplessness and/or horror.² Think of the victims of concentration camps; the earthquake survivors in Japan; Viet Nam veterans.


We are only beginning to understand the role that traumatic events play in the development of mental health problems, substance abuse and disruptive and dangerous behaviors. Severe and chronic trauma may lead to physical changes inside the brain and to the brain’s chemistry, which damage the person’s ability to adequately cope with stress. This is particularly problematic for children. Children who have witnessed or have been victims of interpersonal and community violence, have been neglected or have suffered terrible losses often present with a wide range of emotional and behavioral problems ³.


Children, like Raheem, can also suffer from secondary or “vicarious” trauma. This form of traumatization impacts people who are in a close relationship with traumatized individuals. Raheem’s parents’ experience of terror and loss had resulted in changes in their entire approach to life. Mrs. Khawaja in particular was afraid to leave the house. Moreover, she was terrified to let her child out of her sight and would panic when she put him on the bus in the morning. Mr. Khawaja was working two jobs and feared that he could at any time lose his jobs, and his family would again be homeless. Raheem told the clinician that he wished he didn’t have to go to school; he believed that he was safer at home, with his parents, and that they needed his help.


What is significant about Raheem’s situation is that the clinician asked this family about their history of trauma. In many cases, such information is overlooked as frustrated parents, overworked professionals and harried teachers focus on more immediate approaches to behavior. Often, the child is punished by suspensions or expulsions; various medications are tried without a thorough understanding of the problem; or the behavior is minimized or ignored until it becomes a significant threat to the safety of the community.


At KidsPeace, we recognize the role of trauma in the lives of the children and families who come to us for help, and we treat the entire family. The Sanctuary® Model, which is being implemented as the model of care at KidsPeace, provides the tools and the theory to help us to create a culture of safety, empowerment and positive change. This model teaches that, in order to recover from trauma, people need to live in a community of supportive people who are committed to their growth and healing. While KidsPeace strives to provide that for our children, we recognize that the best place for a troubled child to heal is in a safe, supportive family; and the best place for a troubled family to heal is within a safe, supportive community. KidsPeace is committed to using the Sanctuary Model, its theories and its tools to help our community become one where children and families, like the Khawajas, find peace.


For more information on the Sanctuary Model, visit the site http://www.sanctuaryweb.com or contact the author at 800-25PEACE.


¹Van Der Kolk, B.; McFarlane, A.; Weisaeth, L., Eds. (1996). Traumatic Stress: The Effects of Overwhelming Experience on Mind, Body, and Society. New York: Guilford Press.
²Bloom, S. L. (1997) Creating Sanctuary: Toward the Evolution of Sane Societies. (1997). New York: Routledge.
³Farragher, B. and Yanosy, S. (2005). Creating A Trauma-Sensitive Culture In Residential Treatment. Therapeutic Community: The International Journal for Therapeutic and Supportive Organizations 26(1): 97-113.

Leslie Tenbroeck, LCSW, Sanctuary® Coordinator and Clinical Instructor at KidsPeace, has over 20 years experience working in the mental health field with a broad range of direct-care experience with children and families. Ms. Tenbroeck has extensive experience in crisis management; she has taught courses in Handle with Care and Professional Crisis Management and is currently a certified instructor for Life Space Crisis Intervention. She has taught courses in conjunction with the American Health institute, the Penn State Cooperative Extension and Norwich University. She is affiliated with the Sanctuary Institute and is an advocate for trauma-informed care. For the past nine years, she has been teaching and assisting in developing curriculum for direct care staff in multiple areas of instruction related to children’s developmental and behavioral health, including the treatment of self-injurious behavior, therapeutic relationships, group therapy and trauma treatment. She is currently the designated coordinator for the implementation of the Sanctuary Model at KidsPeace. Ms. Tenbroeck lives in Allentown, PA, with her husband and two sons.

The effects of trauma in children may linger and manifest themselves physically and behaviorally. Will Isemann, President of CEO of KidsPeace, and the clinical experts at KidsPeace have compiled a list of tips to help parents talk to their children about what has happened to upset them and look out for future signs of distress:

1. Listen to children. Allow them to express their concerns and fears.

2. Regardless of age, the most important issue is to reassure children of safety and security. Tell children that you, their school, their friends and their communities are all focused on their safety and that those around them are working for their safety. Have discussions about those dedicated to protecting them like police, teachers and other school officials, neighbors, their government and all concerned adults throughout the community.

3. When discussing the events with younger children, the amount of information shared should be limited to some basic facts. Use words meaningful to them (not words like massive devastation or sniper, etc.). Share with them that weather or geological shifting has caused a specific disastrous event in a certain part of the world or some bad people have used violence to hurt innocent people in the area. Discuss that we don’t know exactly why this has happened, but a natural disaster or violence has occurred. Do not go into specific details.

4. School-aged children will ask, “Can this happen here, or to me?” Do not lie to children. Share that it is unlikely that anything like this will happen to them or in their community. Then reiterate how the community is focused on working to keep everyone safe in the community.

5. Parents, caregivers and teachers should be cautious of permitting young children to watch news or listen to radio that is discussing or showing mass death or carnage. It is too difficult for most of them to process. Personal discussions are the best way to share information with this group. Also, plan to discuss this many times over the coming weeks.

6. When discussing the events with preteens and teens, more detail is appropriate, and many will already have seen news broadcasts. Do not let them focus too much on graphic details. Rather, elicit their feelings and concerns and focus your discussions on what they share with you. Be careful of how much media they are exposed to. Talk directly with them about the tragedy and answer their questions truthfully.

7. Although this group is more mature, do not forget to reassure them of their safety and your efforts to protect them. Regardless of age, kids must hear this message.

8. Be on the lookout for physical symptoms of anxiety that children may demonstrate. They may be a sign that a child, although not directly discussing the tragedy, is very troubled by the recent events. Talk more directly to children who exhibit these signs:
• Headaches
• Excessive worry
• Stomach aches
• Increased arguing
• Back aches
• Irritability
• Trouble sleeping or eating
• Loss of concentration
• Nightmares
• Withdrawal
• Refusal to go to school
• Clinging behavior.

9. Parents and caregivers should often reassure children that they will be protected and kept safe. During tragedies like these, words expressing safety and reassurance with concrete plans should be discussed and agreed upon within the family and can provide the most comfort to children and teens.

10. If you are concerned about your children and their reaction to this or any tragedy, talk directly with their school counselor, family doctor, local mental health professional or have your older children visit KidsPeace’s teen help website, www.TeenCentral.Net, which provides anonymous and clinically screened help and resources for teen problems before they become overwhelming.|

In the last fifteen years, a number of large-scale attacks at schools have made the issue of school violence a prominent concern across the United States. Despite the massive attention focused on this issue, there are widespread misconceptions about school violence.

Frequency of Homicides at School
Perhaps the biggest misconception is that school shootings and other types of school-related homicides are common events and/or increasing in frequency. The reality is much different. According to Dr. Dewey Cornell, in his book School Violence: Fears Versus Facts, “the average school can expect a student-perpetrated homicide about once every 13,870 years.” In other words, most schools will not have a homicide within our lifetimes, or for many lifetimes to come.

The peak academic year for school homicides was 1992-1993. Since then, the rate has decreased significantly. The Youth Violence Project at the University of Virginia recorded 42 homicides on school grounds in 1992-1993. In the ten years from 2000 through 2009, the average was 6.3 deaths — a dramatic reduction. And, in both 2008 and 2009, there was only one homicide on school grounds each year.

What accounts for this decline? It is impossible to say for sure, but it is noteworthy that the turning point in the homicide rate occurred between the years 1999 and 2000. From 1992 to 1999, the school homicide rate averaged 30 deaths per year. From 2000 to 2009, it averaged 6 deaths per year. Perhaps this reflects the impact of the attack at Columbine High School that occurred on April 20, 1999. Although there had been large-scale rampage attacks at schools prior to Columbine, it was this attack that really made school safety a prominent national concern.

If this hypothesis is correct, it suggests that schools’ efforts to increase safety made a difference. Or perhaps students became more sensitive to warning signs of violence and started reporting their concerns to parents, teachers, counselors or administrators. Whatever the reason, the data clearly indicate that school-related homicides have become very rare events. On average, school is the safest place children can be.

It is hoped that the current economic climate does not result in reduced funding for schools. Budget cuts could potentially result in an increased risk of violence. Cuts to faculty, counselors, security officers and others might adversely affect the ability of schools to maintain the level of safety that has been established.

Who Commits School Shootings and Why?
Certainly, school homicides can take many forms including beatings, stabbings and shootings, but it is rampage school shootings that have received an overwhelming amount of attention. These attacks involve a student going to his own school and opening fire — generally at random people. Who commits such an act? Initially, researchers focused on identifying a profile of rampage school shooters. This effort, however, missed the fact that school shooters are not a homogeneous group.

Nonetheless, there are common misconceptions about school shooters. People often think school shooters are loners, victims of terrible mistreatment and detached from their schools and communities. It is also commonly thought that school shootings are acts of retaliation against specific people who tormented the shooters. In most cases, however, school shooters do not fit this description.

In almost every case, school shooters have friends. In most cases, they are not victims of bullying. They are often involved in activities at school and in the community. And they rarely target anyone who picked on them. So who are school shooters?

As explained in my book, Why Kids Kill: Inside the Minds of School Shooters, the perpetrators of rampage school attacks fall into three categories:

• Psychopathic shooters. These are youths who are narcissistic and sadistic. They have deficits in the ability to experience empathy, guilt and remorse. They reject traditional values and morality and meet their own needs at the expense of others.

• Psychotic school shooters. These youths experience hallucinations and delusions. The most common type of delusion can be described as paranoid, although some of them also have delusions of grandeur. In addition to hallucinations and delusions, these youths have significant social and emotional deficits.

• Traumatized shooters. Whereas the psychopathic and psychotic shooters come from intact families with well-functioning parents, the traumatized shooters come from broken homes and dysfunctional families. They have parents with criminal histories. They have parents who abuse drugs and alcohol. These youths are victims of emotional abuse, physical abuse and sometimes sexual abuse. They bounce around from one relative’s home to another, sometimes ending up in multiple foster homes. Their lives are unstable and unsafe year after year, and eventually they reach the breaking point.

The fact that someone is psychopathic, psychotic or traumatized, however, does not mean he is destined to be a killer. In fact, most people in these three categories are not violent. The categories help us to understand the types of youth who commit school shootings, but the categories are not complete explanations. There are always other factors involved that shape the behavior of the perpetrators.

But if the attacks are not retaliation against bullies, what is the motivation? Motivations vary across shooters and, even within one shooter, there can be multiple factors driving him to murder. Sometimes shooters are seeking fame and to establish powerful identities for themselves. They may be lashing out at the world, unleashing pent-up rage and frustration. They may attack the students they envy — those kids who seem to have everything going for them. The shooters may be paranoid and believe their lives are in danger; thus, they lash out at others in an act that they conceive of as self-defense. They may hear voices telling them to kill people. Occasionally, there is a specific target, but this is not necessarily a bully. It is perhaps more likely to be a girl who rejected the shooter or a principal who symbolically represents the school.

What works in prevention?
When people think about preventing school shootings, they often think in terms of physical security measures: ID badges, video cameras, metal detectors and so on. Though these measures serve a variety of purposes, they do not stop school shootings. Rampage attacks have occurred at schools with metal detectors and even armed security guards. By the time a student enters a building, armed and willing to die, physical security measures will not stop the attack. Similarly, lockdown drills may help to minimize casualties during an attack, but they do not prevent an attack.
What can be done then to prevent school shootings or other school-related homicides? The best approach is to focus on educating students on the warning signs of violence. It is, of course, important to educate faculty and staff as well, but students are really the eyes and ears of a school. If someone is planning a violent attack, other students are most likely the ones who will know about it. If they are trained in what to look for and how to report their concerns, school shootings can be stopped entirely. In fact, the majority of foiled attacks have been stopped because students came forward with what they knew.|



Dr. Langman has worked with children and adolescents for over twenty years. He spent 12 years at KidsPeace and now consults to the organization. Dr. Langman’s book, Why Kids Kill: Inside the Minds of School Shooters, was named an Outstanding Academic Title of 2009 by the American Library Association. It has been translated into German and Finnish and is forthcoming in Dutch. He has been interviewed over one hundred times by media outlets in the United States, Canada, Europe, Australia and the Middle East. He has appeared on CBS-TV, CNN, Fox and the BBC. His research on school shooters has been featured in articles carried by The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, Forbes, USA Today, Education Week, Junior Scholastic, MSNBC, Yahoo News, and thousands of other news outlets. Dr. Langman writes a blog for Psychology Today. His research on school shooters has been cited in congressional testimony on Capitol Hill. His website is www.schoolshooters.info. Dr. Langman received his B.A. in psychology from Clark University, his M.A. in counseling psychology from Lesley College, and his Ph.D. in counseling psychology from Lehigh University. In addition to being a psychologist, Dr. Langman is a poet and playwright.