How you approach a challenge has a great deal to do with how successful you’ll be at solving it. At Cal Farley’s Boys Ranch, we don’t see the young people who come to us as problems in need of a solution. Instead, we approach them from a completely different perspective.

We see their strengths.

Many of the youth Boys Ranch serves come from very difficult backgrounds that have forced them to develop methods to cope with their environments. These coping mechanisms allow a child to get through challenging circumstances, but can create obstacles for the child in other areas of their life. Boys Ranch caring professionals identify areas of a child’s life that are working well for them, and use those areas as a foundation on which to rebuild a healthy, well-adjusted child.

For example, consider a child who’s struggling in school, but who excels in an activity outside of class. A common approach might be to limit his involvement in that activity until his grades improve. And, while there might be times when that’s appropriate, Boys Ranch approach is to examine the child’s area of strength, called “islands of competence”, and determine if there’s something there the child can apply to improve his performance in the area where he is struggling.

Instead of a punitive approach, Boys Ranch always seeks to understand why a child behaves as he does. After all, our purpose isn’t to punish poor behavior or lackluster performance. Instead, Boys Ranch wants to equip the child with what he or she needs to choose better behavior or increase his performance through his own choices.

Boys Ranch sees the promise in every child we serve, and we’re committed to helping them achieve it.