Author of 'Reform at Victory' spent year in fundamentalist school

It's been 22 years, but Michele Ulriksen remembers that day with perfect clarity.

She thought she was going to the San Diego Zoo for a fun family trip. But when her parents pulled into a gated compound in the middle of the desert, she knew that fun was the last thing on their mind.

Minutes later, the 16-year-old was being dragged through the doors of Victory Christian Academy and put into solitary confinement as she begged her parents not to send her away. Soon she would learn that she was going to be stuck at the fundamentalist reform school for an entire year, and longer, if she didn't agree to toe the line, all for what she considers some ordinary teen mistakes.

Ulriksen, now 38, vividly recalls her days as a California teenager when her world switched from sneaking out of the house to drink and party, to full-time incarceration with a group of other troubled teens who were being "reformed" for everything from drug abuse to homosexuality to bipolar disorder. The cure for all their ills? Jesus.

"(Parents) are putting all their faith and trust in (Christianity) to fix this child," she said.

But for Ulriksen's parents and others, putting their faith in the unlicensed reform school turned out to be a big mistake. In 1988, 15-year-old Carey Dunn was killed by a falling stack of lumber while working on a construction project at the facility. At this point, the state of California began taking a closer look at the academy.

Finally, in 1992, the academy was shut down after the State of California Department of Social Services discovered a long list of violations, including a 4-foot-by-4-foot solitary confinement chamber, no sprinkler systems, malfunctioning smoke detectors, deadbolted exit doors, and boxes full of unlabeled medications. It turned out that the facility had never been licensed.

During her year at the academy, Ulriksen learned that to survive and to escape solitary confinement, she had to refrain from swearing, follow orders, never wear pants or makeup and, most of all, to profess her conversion to Christianity. And even when following all the rules, girls were subjected to daily tirades by the pastor who owned and operated the center.

"I look at it as spiritual rape," Ulriksen said. The teens were systematically verbally attacked and degraded, she said, and had no outside support. Phone calls were rare, letters in and out were monitored, and the compound was fenced and far from civilization.

A full year later, Ulriksen went home to her family, only to learn that the education she'd received, and that her parents had paid for, was roughly the equivalent of a sixth-grade curriculum. She was forced to pursue a GED rather than finish her senior year in high school.

She also quickly realized that the mental damage done at the academy would not quickly be undone. In fact, estranged from her family and confused by her year of indoctrination, Ulriksen got involved in drugs and other dangerous activities, and spiraled out of control.

Years later, far away from that life, Ulriksen experiences severe bouts of depression, panic attacks and night terrors that she attributes to her time at the academy, and she's heard from other women having similar problems. But now the mom of a soon-to-be teenager, she has come to terms with her experiences and, after 10 years of struggle, has published a memoir of her time at the academy, even though she suffered a nervous breakdown in the middle of writing.

"I just had to finish," she said. "I've got to finish what I start."

Ulriksen said for years, she was so traumatized that she was afraid of, and hated, Christians and anything related to Christianity. But she gradually realized that her experience was not representative of Christianity.

She struggled a long time with her own beliefs, and now considers herself a secular humanist, but she is pleased that the response of Christian friends to her book has been positive. She's also received more than 50 e-mails from other women who were sent to the academy and other similar reform schools, all with nearly identical horror stories, and similar difficulties adjusting to life on the outside.

Ulriksen never made peace with her mother, who died of cancer shortly after Ulriksen returned from the academy, but she did get to talk with her father about her experiences before he died. As the mother of a nearly 13-year-old, she is taking a very different view of how to raise a teen.

"Being a mom helped me think about all this stuff and about my own failed relationship with my mother," Ulriksen said. And she's been very open about her own past, and willing to share the mistakes she made as a teen.

"I want (my daughter) to feel comfortable coming to me and asking controversial questions," she said. "I've told her what happens to you, the negative ramifications of drugs and alcohol … she gets it, she understands."

Ulriksen said there are plenty of similar unlicensed reform schools in existence which fly under the radar of public scrutiny. She hopes other parents considering sending their children to such a place are careful about investigating the institutions before letting their teens into someone else's hands.

"Do research, check these places out," she said. "Have social services check it out before you leave your kid there."

Ulriksen will be reading from her book, "Reform at Victory," at 4 p.m. Sunday at Grass Roots Books & Music, 227 S.W. Second St., Corvallis. She also will be doing a reading at noon Wednesday at Linn-Benton Community College in Albany in the Fireside Room (CC-211).

For more information on her work, see www.reformatvictory.com.

reading

Michele Ulriksen will be reading from her book, "Reform at Victory," at 4 p.m. Sunday at Grass Roots Books & Music, 227 S.W. Second St., Corvallis. She also will be doing a reading at noon Wednesday at Linn-Benton Community College in Albany in the Fireside Room (CC-211).