ABSTRACT
This book seeks to address these tandem issues of knowledge and concern, which are essential to creating powerful environments for redirecting young lives. Early leaders in youth work radiated an optimism in sharp contrast to many contemporary approaches, which concentrate on abnormality or pathology. Challenging prevailing attitudes of futility and cynicism, they approached difficult children with a powerful Pygmalion-like optimism, frequently achieving astonishing results. Perhaps the broadest taxonomy of the various educational and resi dential remediation models for emotionally disturbed children is that of Kristen Juul, who writes from an international perspective. Juul extends Rhodes' categories to nine different models and notes that they are not necessarily mutually exclusive. The abundance of theories can be confusing to the practitioner who is seeking for "the way." Wolfgang and Glickman conclude that although all models have their critics, there is not now and possibly will never be research that documents indisputably the superiority of one model over the others.
