Unruly Kids?
Send them to Tranquility!

Opened in 1997, Tranquility Bay is not a boot camp or a boarding school but a 'behaviour modification centre' for 11- to 18-year-olds. An American Time magazine journalist visited in 1998, and since then no media have been allowed inside.

Doesn't sound so bad, right?

Jay Kay is 33 years old, and the son of Wwasp's chief director. He opened the facility at the age of 27, after four years as administrator of a Wwasp-run juvenile psychiatric hospital in Utah. Previously he had been a night guard there, and before that a petrol-pump attendant, having dropped out of college. He has no qualifications in child development, but considers this unimportant.

Ok, so we can forgive that... keep reading.

The strategy of coercing children to rewire themselves is the concept Kay is most proud of, for he believes it places troubled teenagers' redemption in their own hands. The choice is theirs.

'For years, we just believed if you make the kids do what you want them to do, then they will make the change. But what we figured out was, why not get them to come to the conclusion that they need to make the change themselves? That's what makes this programme special. It's up to them.'

Students who fail to grasp this formula are forcefully encouraged to get the message. One girl currently has to wear a sign around her neck at all times, which reads: 'I've been in this programme for three years, and I am still pulling crap.'

It goes downhill from there. The closest analogy I can think of would be something along the lines of Clockwork Orange.

Would I send my kid there? Not on your life. The $40,000 price tag simply seals the deal.  ¶ 7:14 p.m.