MEDIA ADVISORY
Jan. 24, 2006

CONTACT: Amy Smit, (515) 271-2293, amy.smit@drake.edu

ORCHARD PLACE SHARES CHARACTER COUNTS! SUCCESS

CHARACTER COUNTS! founder Michael Josephson will visit Orchard Place on Thursday, Jan. 26, to see how the program has benefited the Des Moines facility, which provides mental health and juvenile justice services to more than 5,600 children each year.

Orchard Place first introduced CHARACTER COUNTS! into its educational facility in 2002. Over the past year, Orchard Place has begun to compare behavioral incidents each year that it uses CHARACTER COUNTS!. Orchard Place documented positive results including a 60 percent decrease in living setting behavioral incidents and a 47 percent decrease in academic setting behavioral incidents.

Josephson will take a private tour of Orchard Place and meet with youth and staff to discuss the impact of CHARACTER COUNTS! there.
Following the tour, Josephson, Brock Wolff, chief executive officer of Orchard Place, and Butch Moss, Milieu Treatment Coordinator, will be available for media interviews from 3:30 to 4 p.m.in the atrium at Orchard Place, 925 S.W. Porter Ave.

CHARACTER COUNTS! is a process of teaching, encouraging, advocating and modeling six universal ethical values, the Six Pillars of Character: Trustworthiness, Respect, Responsibility, Fairness, Caring and Citizenship.

NOTE TO PHOTOGRAPHERS: To preserve the anonymity of children at Orchard Place, members of the media are asked not to take pictures of or video of any students at the facility.

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