Information for clinicians
- Fresh Start is a TDSB program, therefore students must live in the City of Toronto – i.e., have a home postal code that begins with an ‘M’.
- Fresh Start is not equipped with resources to assist students with daily attendance. Students who come to Fresh Start need to be able to attend daily from their first day at Fresh Start.
- Bussing to and from Fresh Start may be arranged through the TDSB.
- The Fresh Start program has three core expectations of our students:
- Consistent daily attendance from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
- Actively working on therapeutic goals related to the mental health issues impacting their ability to function in a mainstream school setting
- Willingness to make Fresh Start a safe therapeutic environment for everyone. This includes:
- maintaining respect for others’ emotional and physical well-being
- not engaging in self-harm/substance or alcohol use/etc. during program hours
- maintaining program confidentiality
- If students are unable to meet these program expectations, the team will revisit whether or not Fresh Start is the right fit for them at this time.
- All external therapy and external coursework is expected to be put on hold while students are attending Fresh Start
- Duration:
- Enrolment is in 4-week blocks, with an expected minimum commitment of 8 weeks.
- There may be an opportunity to remain in program for up to 16 weeks, contingent on ongoing active engagement in the program.
- Because of ongoing demand for spaces at Fresh Start, students will typically not be kept in the program just to give them the opportunity to complete their credit if they are no longer actively working on mental health-focused goals.
- Therapeutic groups at Fresh Start include Life Skills, Social Skills, DBT Skills, Creative Expression, and Health and Well-Being
- Fresh Start offers the credit GLD2O1 (Grade 10 Discovering the Workplace)
- Credit recovery is not offered at Fresh Start
