The James Company, LLC

“So we suggest you sit quietly, behave yourselves, and study in the schools we provide as a holding

pen until we are ready to accept you into the adult world.”

-Harold Howe IIPositive Peer Culture

the challenges

Transition from Childhood to Adulthood

Loss of adult influence

Development of a “Negative Peer Culture”

“What a man actually needs in life is not a tensionless state, but rather the striving and

struggling for some worthy goal.”-Victor Frankl

Foundations of Positive Peer Culture

The PPC model acts on the premise that youth

can develop:• Self-worth• Significance• Dignity• Responsibility

This is accomplished through a commitment to the positive values of helping and caring for others.

“How many things, which for our own sake we would never do, do we perform for the sake of our

friends.”-Cicero

The Peer Group

The peer group has the strongest influence over the values, attitudes, and behavior of most youth after the age of 12-13.

This influence can be positive or negative and depends on factors such as:

• Home environment• History of abuse• Exposure to alcohol and/or drugs• Self esteem

“You have to expect great things of yourself before you can do them.”

-Michael Jordan

PPC Design

Adults are in control without controlling Control is given over as youth demonstrate the ability to self regulate

in positive ways Demand for greatness

Greatness is defined as showing positive caring values

• PPC groups help members learn helpful and non-delinquent ways of handling themselves and meeting their needs

• Rejection of behavior that hurts self or others• Reward for behavior that shows care and concern for others

“He who helps in the saving of others saves himself as well.”

-Hartman von Aue

PPC Principles

The two guiding principles of the Positive Peer Culture model are:

1.) Giving and Receiving Help2.) Acting with Care and Concern for others

The primary focus of the groups during the 5.5 months in AMYA:

•Assist the Cadets in developing new culture•Expose them to the rewards and positive feelings that go along with helping others•Create relationships that are based on care, concern, cooperation, and positive regard.

“The path of duty lies in what is near at hand, but men

seek it in what is remote.”-Japanese Proverb

PPC Groups do:

Focus on the direct and immediate problems of an individual

Ask youth to concentrate on their own behavior and feelings in current, real-life situations

Solve real life problems in the “here and now”

View problems as opportunities for change

View problems as a normal part of everyone’s life

Focus on tangible, relevant, present problems

“Our life is what our minds make of it.”-Buddha

PPC Groups do not:

Delve into or become entangled in an analysis of the details of a person’s life history

Look for answers to a person’s problems by looking “outside” the person to family pathology or social status

Engage in philosophical discussions

Engage in psychoanalysis or spend significant time reliving past events or traumas

“You can get everything in life you want if you will just help enough other people get what they want.”

-Zig Zigler

PPC Groups in practice

Group Implementation:

Set up an environment in which the youth give help

As the youth gives help, he becomes of value to others

This increases his feelings of worthiness and builds a positive self concept

Redirect the rebellious and strong willed individual to use their strengths to assist others

Telling of the life story

“If any man can convince me, and bring home to me, that I do not think or act right, gladly I will

change.”-Marcus Antonius

Meeting Format

• Reporting problems

• Awarding the meeting

• Problem Solving

• The Summary

“They certainly do give very strange and newfangled

names to diseases.”-Plato

ToolsPPC problem list consists of 12 identified problems:

General 1) Low Self image

2) Inconsiderate of others

3) Inconsiderate of self

“I’m not out here sweating three hours every day just to find out what it feels like to sweat.”

-Michael Jordan

Role of Staff

The primary roll of staff in a PPC program is to be fully committed to the caring process

Overpowering and subduing youth creates compliance but has limited lasting change

Staff members are asked to invest themselves fully in helping youth to develop their potential

Caring will be best shown when staff place strong positive expectations upon youth

Care and concern enhances rather than weakens the influence of the adult Staff must be firm, strong, fair, and not easily manipulated Never show anger and do not engage in retribution Work together to consistently support the positive behavior of the group

and to confront negative behavior

“We have forty million reason for failure but not a single excuse.”-Rudyard Kipling

Reversal of Responsibility

Reversing is the process of placing responsibility for action back on those

who must do the changing rather than allowing them to project it

outside themselves.

Example:

Youth: I have emotional and behavioral problems because my father was always drunk and beat me and my mother all the time.

Staff: Are you saying that all people who grow up in a abusive homes have emotional and behavioral problems?

• The youth was trying to use his parents problems as justification for his behavior.

• The reversal process places the responsibility back on the youth.

• It does not allow him to use his childhood as an excuse for his current troubles.

“We have forty million reason for failure but not a single excuse.”-Rudyard Kipling

Reversal of Responsibility

In a PPC program, staff view everything that youth say and do (or fail to do) as potential material for reversal.

This communicates to the youth in a continuous process that:•We know you have the potential to change•We believe so fully in your potential that we will permit no instances of hurting behavior to go unnoticed•We believe you can learn to assume full responsibility for helping yourself and your peers.

The goal of the reversal process is always the same:•To show our care and concern•To demand the best that is within these young people