Northeast
Survivors of boarding school for troubled teens expose shocking abuse in new docuseries
A new docuseries chronicling abuse of troubled teens at the hands of New York’s Academy at Ivy Ridge has prompted a wave of new police reports from former students and a police investigation into the now-shuttered boarding school.
Netflix’s “The Program: Cons, Cults and Kidnapping” follows director Katherine Kubler and her former classmates as they visit the site of the school that closed in 2009. Student files, including Kubler’s, were all still at the abandoned site, giving the students more insight to process what happened to them.
They said they spent years isolated from their families and were “treated like prisoners, undergoing mental, physical and sexual abuse,” according to the series.
The former students claim they underwent abuse ranging from abduction from their homes, strip searches, starvation, sleep deprivation, corporal punishment and solitary confinement. Meanwhile, they said, they received no formal education.
Kubler, pictured at 14 years old with her father, Ken, said that she was abducted by two men, placed in handcuffs and taken to the program for troubled teens after she was expelled from boarding school for having alcohol. (Netflix)
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Teens in the program were reportedly not allowed to smile, speak or have any communication with the outside world. Phone calls and letters to parents were closely monitored, and any attempts to tell their loved ones about the abuse they endured would be intercepted and punished.
Victims said they were “brainwashed” by a program that painted them as drug-addicted, manipulative and hopeless — and that still-existing programs for troubled teens throughout the country use the same damaging methods.
Katherine Kubler and a group of her former classmates visit the abandoned school where they said they were physically and psychologically tortured. Along with chilling graffiti, student records — including their own — were left behind at the quickly-shuttered school. (Netflix)
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Several former students reported sexual abuse at the institution, which filmmakers called an “open secret at Ivy Ridge.”
“They dehumanize the kids, that these kids are liars, manipulators, and they use that to create compliance,” one interview subject said.
Kubler and her classmates described mandatory endurance exercises called “seminars” — in one, they would spend about an hour screaming and slamming towels wrapped in duct tape on the ground. If they stopped the exercise, they said, they were sent to a new seminar meant to break them.
St. Lawrence County, New York, District Attorney Gary Pasqua said new reports have been pouring in since the documentary aired on March 5. (Netflix)
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Two former students who attended the program for 22 months when they were 15 years old said that they had to sit on a chair and repeat the words “palms up, palms down, palms together, palms apart” while acting out the instructions with their hands for eight uninterrupted hours.
In high school, Kubler said, she found herself “drinking, smoking, sneaking out at night… typical teenager stuff.”
She was expelled from her boarding school during her sophomore year in 2004 for having alcohol and assumed her father would pick her up. Instead, her parents had arranged for two men to abduct her and take her to Ivy Ridge.
Kubler said the trauma she endured there followed her for the rest of her life, with one college roommate telling her that she “[didn’t] need to explain the program to everyone [she] met.”
Filmmaker Katherine Kubler said she was forever changed by her 15 months at the school. (Netflix)
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“They really drill into you this complete sense of shame, and that you’re this horrible person for being there, so I felt like I had this disclaimer I needed to say to people,” she said.
The St. Lawrence County District Attorney’s office and state police said at a Monday press conference that complaints of abuse at the school near Ogdensburg have been pouring in every day since the series first aired on March 5.
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District Attorney Gary Pasqua urged the public not to call the DA’s office to harass staff or inquire about the investigation. He also asked that the public not trespass on the abandoned Ivy Ridge property.
“I understand the reaction that is going to come from watching some of the things that were on those videos. But it is not a reason, it does not give you a free pass to go and harass anyone, whether it be a person or a business,” Pasqua said. “Please. Let us do our job.”
Former staffers of the school have also been harassed and even threatened with violence, Pasqua said.
The documentary claims that staff members at the school were untrained and had no credentials — neither did those who created the program itself, according to the three-part docuseries.
In the last episode of the series, titled “Follow the Money,” filmmakers explored where the profits from these programs went. Robert “Bob” Lichfield founded the Worldwide Association of Speciality Programs and Schools, and the Academy at Ivy Ridge was one of more than 25 boarding schools or youth programs affiliated with the Utah-based group worldwide.
The organization made millions each year until it dissolved amid legal battles over abuse allegations, according to the docuseries.
“There are glimmers of hope, but these places are like Whac-a-Mole,” Kubler said. “You get one shut down, and it’ll open again under a new name… sometimes in the same building with the same staff.”
The Netflix film advocates for the Stop Institutional Child Abuse Act, which calls for more thorough accountability for these programs. The proposed legislation would formally ban the use of restraints and seclusion, designate a group to make recommendations on the length of students’ stays and collect outcome-oriented data on students at least six months after they are sent back home.
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A married high school physical education teacher has been indicted on two counts of third-degree sexual assault after being accused of having an inappropriate relationship with a male student.
Alisha Crins is accused of exchanging sexually suggestive messages and engaging in sexual contact with the student while he was enrolled at Ponaganset High School in Rhode Island as a 17-year-old, according to an affidavit cited by WPRI.
The investigation began after the former student filed a formal complaint with Rhode Island State Police in October, the documents obtained by WPRI show.
According to the affidavit, the student told investigators Crins began texting him while he was a sophomore after allegedly finding his cellphone number online.
A sign marks the main entrance to Ponaganset High School in Rhode Island. (Google Maps)
He said she initially asked him to do work for her while she was on vacation, but the two continued communicating through text messages and social media after that plan fell through.
The student alleged the relationship escalated during his junior year. He told investigators Crins frequently complimented his appearance and once asked to wear his jersey during a school pep rally.
He further alleged Crins invited him to meet near her Cranston home, where they kissed inside his vehicle. During a later encounter, she allegedly climbed into the back seat and engaged in sexual contact, according to the affidavit. The student denied having sexual intercourse with her.
The alleged assaults took place between April 1, 2024, and June 30, 2024, according to WJAR.
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A Rhode Island State Police cruiser parked near a waterfront with boats visible in the background. (Rhode Island State Police Facebook)
When questioned by investigators, Crins denied “getting physical” beyond a single kiss but admitted to flirting and exchanging text messages that contained “sexual innuendos,” the affidavit states.
She also acknowledged sending photos and videos and told investigators the two discussed plans to have sex once he turned 18, though she said they never acted on those plans.
The Foster-Glocester Regional School District said Crins resigned from her role at the school Oct. 1, 2025, according to WJAR.
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File image of a woman texting. According to an affidavit, the student told investigators Crins began texting him while he was a sophomore after allegedly finding his cellphone number online. (iStock)
In a statement obtained by the outlet, the district said it is cooperating with authorities and referred further inquiries to state police.
Fox News Digital has reached out to state police for comment.
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Born and raised in Southie, Heather Foley has seen her neighborhood morph over the past three decades of scrubbing, renovation, and new construction for higher-income new arrivals.
But even Foley was surprised to discover that her South Boston, where kids once went to the corner to buy milk and cigarettes for parents, has emerged with the city’s second-highest average income, even ahead of Charlestown and Beacon Hill.
Her first thought?: “I gotta start being nicer to my neighbors if that’s the kind of money they’re making.”
What’s a household?
Decades ago, when “Good Will Hunting” was filmed in the neighborhood and Southie was known as a working-class area, there were more kids around and maybe just a single breadwinner in some homes.
Since then, Southie saw more two-earner households, fewer kids, and spiffier rental units where three or four roommates could contribute to a “household.” The changes, along with spillover from the adjacent, pricier Seaport, or South Boston waterfront, are factors in Census data showing more than 40 percent of Southie households earn more than $200,000 a year.
Staying put
Foley, 46, a photo shoot producer, considers herself lucky. She didn’t move out to the South Shore like many neighborhood longtimers. She’s living in a family home on a block with residents — oldtimers and newer arrivals — who aren’t flipping properties for big bucks.
Another blessing, particularly valuable this winter? She has a driveway.
As a kid, she went to church and school at Gate of Heaven, St. Brigid, and St. Peter, and jokes that she’s “so sad I didn’t buy a three-decker with my First Communion money, because I probably could have.”
Waves of gentrification
She remembers the earlier waves of newcomers, when glassy sports bars like Stats Bar & Grille muscled in among longtime restaurants like Amrheins.
But now, even the popular Stats is moving out at the end of the month. The property owner is developing a five-story, mixed-use residential building at the site.
A small silver lining
Foley notes that some of the onetime “newcomers” have been here for three decades — and in some ways, have stabilized the place. Many have raised kids, who, like her son, may return to the neighborhood as young adults (albeit splitting a rented apartment with friends). Stats, the sports bar, says it will also return to the neighborhood’s thriving food scene.
“We have a lot of great restaurants now,” Foley says, “and everyone cleans up after their dog.”
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