What is a Recovery High School?

According to the Association of Recovery Schools, founded in 2002, the primary purpose of a recovery high school is to educate and support students in recovery from substance use or co-occurring disorders. Students enrolled in a recovery high school are working an abstinence-focused recovery program as agreed upon by the student and the school. Each recovery high school meets state requirements for awarding a school diploma. Recovery high schools are also available to any student in recovery who meets state or district eligibility requirements for attendance, which means students do not have to go through a particular treatment program to enroll, and the schools are not simply the academic component of a primary or extended-care treatment facility or therapeutic boarding school.

Abstinence focused recovery?

A process of change focused on substance use abstinence, through which individuals improve their health and wellness, live a self-directed life, and strive to reach their full potential.

How many Recovery High Schools are there in the U.S.?

There are currently 44 recovery high schools in 21 states.

When did the first Recovery High School open?

Recovery High Schools operated differently in the early days of recovery-based education, but the school most closely resembling the standards of today’s RHSs was a joint effort between the Charleston County (SC) School District and the public Franklin C. Fetter Family Health Center in Charleston, SC, in 1973. The Palmer Drug Abuse Program started a private GED school in 1976, and the first recovery high school not affiliated with a treatment program opened in 1979 in Silver Spring, Maryland, as a publicly funded alternative school.

Are Recovery High Schools publicly funded?

While almost all 44 recovery high schools rely on multiple sources of funding, most are publicly funded:

• Public/Contracted Alternative School – 21
• Public/Charter School – 12
• Private – 11

Are there any standards governing recovery high schools?

The Association of Recovery Schools has established standards for the accreditation of recovery high schools, and ARS accredited its first school in 2013.

What does the evidence say about Recovery High Schools?

• Promising evidence is emerging that shows, compared to students in non-recovery high schools who have received substance use treatment, students in recovery high schools:
  1. have higher graduation rates;
  2. report significantly lower absenteeism;
  3. are more likely to abstain from using substances; and
  4. have significantly fewer days using marijuana and other drugs.
A recent study from Finch, Tanner-Smith, Hennessy, & Moberg (2017)demonstrated the effectiveness of Recovery High School (RHS) attendance in improving student outcomes. Results from this provide strong evidence of a positive effect of RHSs for adolescents who have received treatment for SUDs.
• This article emerges from an NIH-funded study of recovery high schools (RHS). This study followed students for six months to examine the effects of RHS attendance compared to statistically similar recovering students who attend school in other settings.
• A cost-benefit analysis indicated that the high school graduation ratefor recovery high school (RHS) students is at least 20 percentage points higher than the graduation rate for similar students who have had SUD treatment but did not participate in a RHS for at least 30 days.
• Students who attended RHSs had significantly lower odds of dropping out of high school compared to students attending non-RHSs. The predicted probability of high school dropout was 10% for RHS students and 27% for non-RHS students.
• Students who attended RHSs reported significantly less overall absenteeism. RHS attendance was thus associated with over one-half a standard deviation improvement in absenteeism—an effect equivalent to 5 fewer absences from school over the past 90 days.
• Recovery high school students were significantly more likely to report being completely abstinent from alcohol, marijuana, and other drugs at the 6-month and 12-month follow-ups. At 6-month follow-up, RHS students were twice as likely (59% versus 30%) to report complete abstinence from alcohol, marijuana, and other drugs.
• Over the 12-month follow-up period of the study, adolescents who attended RHSs had significantly greater declines in alcohol, marijuana, and other drug use, compared to students attending non-RHSs.