Growth and Lasting Change Are Possible for Your Teen

At Discovery Ranch South, your child can experience growth and lasting change. Your child can experience a home-like atmosphere along with the opportunity to take advantage of our large campus and professional staff. She will live in a cottage with a small number of other teens. There are 24-hour professional staff members to help support your child through her therapeutic journey.

The Campus

Troubled teens come to the ranch to heal from across the world. Every element of the campus was chosen with healing in mind.

When your child comes to Discovery Ranch South, she will stay in one of three private homes that serve as student dorms. Each house features a living area, a small kitchen, bedrooms, and baths. She will also have access to the lodge.

The lodge features a commercial kitchen, dining area, and game room. There is also a theater room, an indoor pool, and a sauna. Your child will be able to relax as she recovers in this peaceful environment.

Your child will attend school in a waterfront building. There are beautiful views of the mountains to the east and the water area to the northwest.

There are many places for your child to explore on the 66-acre closed campus. The campus includes stables and a riding arena. She can relax on the putting green. Or she might prefer to relax by a waterfall with an artificial pond stocked with native fish.

Discovery Ranch South provides a perfect balance of disconnection and accessibility. There are many therapeutic and recreational opportunities for our students and their families. The teens have the opportunity to become stable and then begin to transition to a community.

While our facility provides lots of fun activities, each one plays a role in the therapy process. Residential living is a critical part of our experiential, action-oriented therapy approach. Caring, well-trained staff members are available to support your child 24 hours a day.

Everyone works together to create an environment where the students feel safe. More than that, they are respected and supported. The school has a four-to-one ratio of students to staff. The emphasis is not on managing behaviors. Instead, the focus is on building positive relationships that inspire change. Residential activities reinforce what students are learning.

Discovery Ranch for Girls campus

The Students

Rachel Platten autograph Discovery Ranch

While all the teens have come to the ranch to heal, they won't necessarily share the same diagnosis. This diversity encourages our students to make connections based on their strengths, not their diagnosis.

Because teens come to Discovery Ranch South for various reasons, they have a variety of different therapeutic needs. Settings that only focus on one issue risk confusing the person with their diagnosis. Teens are challenged to address their core issues. Addressing what is underneath the behavior will create lasting, healthy change.

Treatment settings that exclusively address specific diagnoses or clinical issues often create a culture of connecting to pathology. The clinically heterogeneous environment at Discovery Ranch treats a diverse range of therapeutic issues. In this environment, your child can let go of her unhealthy identity and instead identify with others and herself based on her strengths. Students that are treated in a heterogeneous environment are challenged to address the core issues of their unhealthy behaviors instead of just the symptoms. Addressing what is underneath the behavior will create lasting, healthy change.

In this environment, your child can let go of her unhealthy identity. She will learn that she is more than her diagnosis. She will discover the strong, unique woman that she is inside.

The Community

Cedar City is approximately 10 minutes from the ranch. It is a college town with more than 30,000 people. Cedar City offers recreational and therapeutic opportunities. For example, there is access to art festivals and academic events.

The Utah Shakespeare Festival takes place in Cedar City. Each summer and fall, the festival draws lovers of Shakespeare and theater from around the world. The festival features famous and lesser-known plays by the Bard. There are also modern plays by a variety of different playwrights. The Utah Shakespeare Festival also offers many different classes. People can come to learn about topics like stage combat or designing scenery.

Students from Discovery Ranch South have both attended the plays and classes offered at the festival. To take part in events like this, students must be level appropriate.

Your child will be blocks away from hiking, mountain biking, horseback riding, and repelling. This is because southern Utah has some of the world's most unique geography.

Bryce Canyon National Park is located near Cedar City. The park features unique geography. For example, the world's most extensive collection of hoodoos, or irregularly eroded rock spires, is located in Bryce Canyon.

Cedar Breaks National Monument is also located near Cedar City. This national monument stretches across three miles and is more than 20,000 feet deep. The geographic formation looks like an amphitheater.

Discovery Ranch South is the right place for your child to experience lasting change. She will have the opportunity to take advantage of the large campus. She will live in a cottage with a small number of other students.

When your child is ready, she will be able to enjoy all the activities that the wider community has to offer with the support of caring, well-trained staff members.

Rachel Platten concert at Discovery Ranch for Girls

The Right Place

Discovery Ranch South is the right place for your child to experience lasting change. She will have the opportunity to take advantage of the large campus. She will live in a cottage with a small number of other students.

While all the teens have come to the ranch to heal, they won't necessarily share the same diagnosis. This encourages students to make connections based on their strengths, not their diagnosis.

When your child is ready, she will be able to enjoy all the activities that the wider community has to offer with the support of caring, well-trained staff members. 

To schedule a tour of our campus or to ask any questions, feel free to call our admissions department at 855-667-9388.