The basic premise behind Alpha Academy is this: it makes a lot more sense to work with young men who are only a few degrees off course, and help them get a solid plan for their lives, than to just watch them as they drift further and further off course. Alpha Academy students do a variety of work-from ag, to car sales, to pet care!
Mentoring at Alpha Academy
To that end, we work with our students on decision-making skills, vocational choices, spiritual growth, personal responsibility, work ethic, and goal-setting. We also focus on life skills, including financial management, time management, menu planning/cooking, and interpersonal relationships. We focus our curriculum toward long-term, lasting success, with mission statement and values as core components.
We try to make Alpha Academy as real-world as possible. This means, among other things, that our students work to support themselves while they are here. We have several business projects, and our students work half of each day on one of the projects.
While these projects are important for meeting our expenses, their real usefulness is as teaching tools. Our students learn the value of hard work, punctuality, planning, and follow-through. They also learn the “Law of the Harvest”; that is, you reap what you sow, and there is no free lunch. Additionally, these projects allow our students to gain exposure to several vocational fields.
While Alpha Academy is not affiliated with any particular church or denomination, we are a Christian program, based on Biblical principles, and Scripture is interwoven throughout our curriculum. Students need not be Christians to attend Alpha, but they must come with the understanding that we are Biblically based, and that Biblical teaching is integral to the program.
Students make a 6-month commitment to Alpha Academy, and the average stay is about 9 months. As long as they are demonstrating a continued commitment to learn and grow, students are welcome to stay beyond the 6-month commitment.