At the Tuesday meeting of the Tyrone Area School District Board of Directors, the Board voted to enter an agreement with Pyramid Healthcare Inc. to provide residential and treatment services as well as educational services, to school-age students effective for the 2002-03 school term.
\nJon Wolf the Chief Executive Officer of Pyramid Health Care and Jim Vernarsky were at the meeting to address the concerns of Bald Eagle residents who live near where the new facility will be located.
\n\u201cIt is not a halfway house, not a drug and alcohol treatment facility, not a juvenile home or a prison,\u201d Wolf said to those in attendance. \u201cThis facility is designed to offer a full educational program that is sanctioned by the Tyrone School District in conjunction with a therapeutic component that offers group and individual counseling to deal with emotional health and behavioral issues.\u201d
\nPyramid has facilities in the area at Clearfield and Blandburg. and were given high accolades from Pennsylvania\u2019s Deputy Secretary of the Department of Welfare Gerald Radke.
\n\u201cThese kids are victims,\u201d said Vernarsky. \u201cThey haven\u2019t been in a good situation. A lot of the kids we treat have had histories of sexual or physical abuse. We bring them in and give them a unique and structured environment. It is a therapeutic school that is staff intensive. We have one staff member for every patient.\u201d
\nThe School District was impressed with Pyramid when members of the administration visited the facilities in Blandburg and Clearfield.
\n\u201cWe liked what this program offers,\u201d said Tyrone Assistant Superintendent Joann Lang. \u201cWe have 27 students who go outside of our District for programs similar to this. We believe that Pyramid provides a full education. We\u2019ve never seen a program like this before. Pyramid was interested in coming to Tyrone and was looking at the Ames building or working out of church basements. The facility in Bald Eagle happened to come open. The people at Pyramid share a common vision with the School District.\u201d
\nDuring the meeting, Dr. William Miller, Tyrone Superintendent of Schools said the services of Pyramid would save the District a significant amount of money.
\n\u201cHaving a Pyramid facility in our community could save the District $50,000 this year and maybe more,\u201d said Miller. \u201cThe transportation costs to send students to other programs and the educational costs make this program a good alternative program.\u201d
\nThere is a need for a facility like this in Tyrone.
\n\u201cThe people at Pyramid have made Tyrone a priority,\u201d said Lang. \u201cIt takes special people to run a program like this. To put a child in this program, we need to have the support of the parents.
\n\u201cThe parents have the option,\u201d said Lang. \u201cThe District sets up a mediation with children that need severe help. With the new Pyramid facility here, more parents are likely to take advantage of the program that is offers. Many of the students are referred through Children\u2019s and Youth Services of Blair County. It also helps students who have outbursts and are chronically truant.\u201d
\nWolf added that Pyramid has Drug and Alcohol treatment facilities, but it is in Altoona and the facility in Bald Eagle will not be one.
\n\u201cWe have never had a problem in our Blandburg and Clearfield facilities,\u201d said Wolf. \u201cWe are right in the middle of the community. We believe in being good neighbors. We do things to help in the neighborhood we are in. Our kids shovel the sidewalks of elderly people both in Clearfield and Blandburg. We want to make the neighborhood better.\u201d
\nPyramid will begin its educational and therapeutic program on August 26th at their new facility in Bald Eagle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
At the Tuesday meeting of the Tyrone Area School District Board of Directors, the Board voted to enter an agreement with Pyramid Healthcare Inc. to provide residential and treatment services as well as educational services, to school-age students effective for the 2002-03 school term. Jon Wolf the Chief Executive Officer of Pyramid Health Care and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-48335","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news-in-the-tyrone-pennsylvania-area"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48335","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=48335"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48335\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=48335"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=48335"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyronepa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=48335"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}