Eva Carlston Academy is a residential mental health treatment center in Salt Lake City, Utah.  ECA has been running for over 10 years, and has yet to have any formal record of the horrible abuse and trauma that they inflict on their victims.  Founded by Kristi Ragsdale and now directed by Sue Hoffman, these program executives not only allow staff to harass, abuse, and manipulate the children, but they also partake in it themselves.  Below are survivor stories from Eva Carlston Academy.  We cannot continue to allow Eva to cover up the piles of illegal activity, and we must let them know that as survivors, our voices will be heard.  Please consider signing this petition to not only bring closure to present and past students, but the generations to come.  We deserve better.

Survivor Stories:

Eva Calrson Academy page on Facebook:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Breaking Code Silence Survivor Stories:

•  “Nightmares and panic attacks are commonplace among my friends after having left. No matter how girls who were there behaved, they left with regrets. The girls who spoke out against the program regretted doing so because it lengthened their stay and lead to shaming and being ostracized, while girls who cooperated felt like they lost themselves because they weren’t speaking their truth. To me, this demonstrates how this place is toxic from top to bottom – the only way girls could feel like no matter how they behaved they were doing something wrong is if the treatment center operates around shaming them. Communication with parents is restricted and constantly monitored – I’ve seen and heard of girls doing things like self-harm and starving themselves just to be able to go to the hospital so they could tell their parents the truth about how they were being treated without fear of repercussions.” - Anonymous, 2021
• “Over a year ago, I willingly came into this program depressed, anxious, and suffering from an eating disorder and dissociative identity disorder (the latter was, at the time, undiagnosed) — no behavioral problems. Despite the fact that the program was created to help adolescents with behavioral issues, I was forced to stay for an entire year. The program manipulated my parents into trusting them over their own daughter. I have seen girls ask staff for emotional support and be rejected, being told that there were more important things for the student to do. I have gotten in trouble for having a panic attack when I should have been doing chores. The staff’s job is to keep us safe, and emotional safety is just as important as physical safety, especially in a mental health program. The only part of this program that was helpful was the individual therapy. The rest of it was not only unhelpful for me but harmful and traumatic.” - Anonymous, 2020
• "the skills card. the most disciplining, most strict, and unhumane piece of cardstock I have ever seen. so when you get there, you’re on the daily level, it’s the first level of four. You have to make 10,000 points day. to earn your privileges, (dessert, listening to music, socialize, watch tv, having free time) so if you didn’t have your privs, you have to do SODAs. SODAs stand for situation, options, disadvantages, advantages. so an example would be (a “family teacher gave me this once which triggered me extremely because I am a victim of rape) you’re alone with a boy and he tries getting in your pants. so I had to come up with three options, disadvantages and advantages. I was taking a longer time that was normal for me and the girl said let me see and snatched my paper and then our interaction ended in -2,000 points because I was taking too long. " - Kelsey, 2020
• “I was at Eva Carlston back in 2013. I am 25 now and this place still causes me extreme emotional distress. I was in a juvenile detention center before ECA and I can honestly say I got treated better there and had more rights. While at ECA, I was shamed for my drug addiction and forced to read aloud to a group of girls the details of my rape and sexual abuse. I was still in the process of reporting this to the police. I told staff I wasn’t ready to talk about it and it caused me flashbacks. I got in severe trouble and was forced to sit in the basement every night for weeks writing essays about what I did “wrong”. The staff make girls work out every day, yet don’t feed us enough food. My stomach was constantly grumbling and I lost maybe 15 pounds while I was there. If a girl is underweight, they don’t allow her to eat more food..." - Anonymous, 2020
• "Staff are manipulative, condescending, and power hungry. The “rewards system” is punitive and akin to something in a 1st grade classroom. Points are deducted for the smallest, most minor transgressions like leaving a pair of shoes out or having a corner of your bed spread poking out. Save your daughter the trauma of going here. " - Sofia, 2020
•  “I spent 11 months at Eva Carlston Academy. It was the worse 11 months of my life. Eva Carlston treats mental health like a gardener treats a dandelion/weed. Except Eva Carlston Academy punishes the gardener for months and brainwashes them into thinking the dandelion is a flower instead of a weed. Then when the gardener leaves they slowly realize that the flower is a weed and the weeds have spread. And the sad part part about Eva Carlston is that everyone who works there thinks that everything they do is in the interest of the girls. But its so emotionally abusive...I once lost the right to free time, hanging out with friends, and talking because my pant zipper was down." -  Anonymous, 2018
• " Every day I counted my card every 5 minutes and brainstormed constantly about how I was going to make enough points for the day so I could eat an extra 100 calories or so after dinner and chat nervously with my friends. When I say this place was a nightmare..." - Anonymous, 2016

Parent Accounts:

• "This pertains to our daughter’s 4 month stay at Eva Carlston Academy located in Salt Lake City, Utah. After researching this facility we had the impression this would be a nurturing and supportive environment for our child to continue her growth and development as she was exhibiting depression and anxiety. She was supposed to attend for 12 months, however after 4 months spent at this facility we saw how it significantly impacted her in a negative and damaging way, so we decided to remove her from the program." - Tara, 2020
• " “Our daughter was a resident at Eva Carlston Academy. This program appears to be terrific but our daughter came out of the program deeply traumatized. This is a punishment based program, to an extreme." - Anonymous, 2020

Ex-Staff Stories:

• “Hi, I’m previous staff at this institution. I only lasted about a month because of how absolutely awful it was. Anyone who attended, I am so deeply sorry. I started at the same time a few girls were admitted to the wasatch house, and just want to passively make sure they are okay since we connected and the rest of the staff was rather cruel to them. If anyone who was there August/September 2018 feels comfortable reaching out to me I would really appreciate it.” - Anonymous,  2020

"BREAKING CODE SILENCE - Eva Carlston Academy." BREAKING CODE SILENCE, 2 Jan. 2021, www.breakingcodesilence.org/eva-carlston-academy/ Accessed 31 Dec. 2022.

*IF ANYONE HAS ANY OTHER STORIES THEY WOULD LIKE TO ADD, PLEASE SEND THEM IN TO evacarlstonsurvivorstories@gmail.com*