Living Hope Ranch almost ready to open again

The Living Hope Ranch residential program in southwest Saskatchewan is almost ready to re-open its doors to assist teenage girls to grow and to deal in a positive way with the challenges in their lives.

The program’s board and staff have carried out a lot of work since 2016 to prepare for the relaunch of this 12-month faith-based residential program for teenage girls between the ages of 13 and 17 who are struggling with life controlling issues.

“We're on the very cusp of re-opening our doors,” Living Hope Ranch Director of Communications Kristen Zilkie said. “It really felt all along that we've basically been waiting on God's timing for re-opening our doors, and that can come with a lot of unanswered questions and a lot of unknowns, but we've always had this strong stance that we just need to wait to see a few important things come together, such as our finances and our staff and rewriting our program.”

These preparations have now reached an advanced stage. The Living Hope Ranch staff are ready to welcome teenagers waiting to start the program, which has been reviewed and improved. The only outstanding matter is the funds that are still required to enable them to open.

“Financially a program like this does not come cheap,” she said. “It costs a lot of money to operate that and one of the biggest challenges with opening or starting a program like this is how do we fund it.”

The sustainable business plan for Living Hope Ranch requires that there are sufficient funds available for three months of operating expenses before doors can re-open.

“We've operated it up to this point and everything prior by the generosity and donations of private donors,” she said. “We're not a government funded entity. So people who just believe in us and who believe in this program and in the need for this program have funded us until this point and we really believe and are trusting that will continue. We've been incredibly grateful and entirely surprised all along the way at how those needs have always been filled and that's always been provided for.”

She acknowledged that some potential donors might be hesitant to become involved, because it is a new initiative that previously only operated for six months, but they are convinced there is a real need for this type of program.

“We all have at different times our own moments of wondering how much harder do we work, do we keep going, is it worth it, but our staff and our board are amazing people,” she said. “We've really bonded together to carry each other through those moments. … In the moments where we've wondered is this even possible, should we keep trying, is this worth it, the ranch’s phone has never stopped ringing with interested clients. The e-mails continue to come in from families who need help. Even in our most frustrating moments or moments of extreme doubt, it's been our source of hope and reminded us why we're doing what we're doing and why we felt this was important in the first place.”

The Living Hope Ranch program is based at Diamond Willow Retreat on a quarter section of land near Cypress Hills Interprovincial Park. Formal education for program participants will be provided through the Sun West Distance Learning Centre, an online school in Kenaston.

“It allows us to offer schooling remotely under Saskatchewan curriculum to all of our residents,” Zilkie said. “They can be registered at any time and stay enrolled in school for the duration of their time at the ranch, even through the summer months.”

The program will give participants an opportunity to grow through a focus on mentoring, life skills, education and faith. The intention is to provide them with confidence to deal with life’s challenges.

The program’s mentoring system will focus on teaching gratitude, responsibility, respect, leadership, time management and decision-making skills. Students will receive more privileges, freedoms and responsibility as they advance through the different levels of the mentoring program.

“Each level comes with its own requirements, its own restrictions, its own privileges, its own new learning capacities,” she explained. “It's designed to challenge a girl relationally and individually and emotionally based upon where she is in the program and that increases as she goes through it.”

Living Hope Ranch was previously opened from January to June 2016 and there were three program participants during that period.

“Due to a variety of reasons all of the clients ended up either being withdrawn from the program or going home all around at the same time,” she said. “So at that point, instead of pushing forward to take on more clients and to keep operating, our board decided to seize the opportunity to just take a step back from operation and halt our program and then restructure based upon what we had learned.”

That review resulted in various changes to program policies and procedures, but the core values of the program are still the same. An important new addition to the fourth and final level is an after-care program to prepare participants for the moment when they leave the ranch to return home.

“One of the things we say to our residents the day they arrive is this is not your home and everything that you're going to learn here is in preparation of you going back home and being with your family in real life,” she said. “It's easy when you're in a program to do well. It's when you go home that it gets hard. So we want to set them up as successfully as possible and put a strong emphasis on real life going home, because the point isn't behaviour modification, it's lifestyle change. You can only successfully carry out those lifestyle changes when you've made decisions to surround yourself with a positive environment.”

A distinctive feature of the program is the use of horses for therapy and learning purposes. The review of the program indicated that this equine component was a real success in 2016.

“It was absolutely amazing to see that component of our program in action and to basically affirm within us how important it really is to have that and why we chose to have it,” she said. “The girls bonded with the horses almost immediately. They loved going outside to make sure their horses were OK and that was part of the original design behind having the equine program to give our residents something to be responsible for outside of themselves to learn to care for something and it was incredible.”

The program review also included an evaluation of their staffing needs and an assessment of the knowledge and experience required by staff.

“We learned that our staffing base needs to be large and we need to have the right people in place in order for it to be successful,” she said. “We have found those people and we're really excited about them and the team that we've put together and I think they'll really excel at the jobs that we've created.”

Living Hope Ranch will initially re-open with a maximum of three program participants to give staff time to ensure everything will operate as planned. This opening date will depend on the success of their ongoing fundraising efforts to secure the required funding for the program’s restart.

Living Hope Ranch is a registered non-profit with charitable status. For more information about the program, visit the website www.livinghoperanch.ca or their Facebook page (@livinghoperanch).