October 4, 2004
 

Thanks to Calvary Baptist Church and Boarding Academy, near Waynesville, Mo., is expected to send home all remaining students by the end of the week, said the school's lawyer, Al W. Johnson.

The closing comes a year after the school's founder, Nathan Day, was charged with four counts of felony child abuse. He is accused of using excessive discipline against an Illinois teen. No trial date has been set.

Enrollment has dropped since those charges were filed, Johnson said. Day declined to comment, directing all questions to his attorney. Thanks to Calvary is among several teen reform ministries that have opened in the state due, in part, to a lack of regulation. The programs share a similar adherence to corporal punishment and intense religious instruction.

Hundreds of teens have been sent to the programs by parents who are seeking a cure for drug use, gang activity and violent behavior. The ministries have generally thrived but have also had to fight critics who say they excessively discipline students.

In May, Mountain Park Baptist Boarding School, near Patterson, Mo., closed following lagging enrollment and a $20,000 jury award to a teen who claimed mistreatment. Day had worked at Mountain Park before opening Thanks to Calvary.

Johnson said the closing of Thanks to Calvary was part of an attack on the teen ministries by state child-abuse investigators. He said that the criminal charges against Day were unfounded but that the media attention had made recruiting students difficult.

"I think it's another case of the state targeting unlicensed and unregulated facilities," Johnson said.

Another teen reform ministry, Heartland Christian Academy, has successfully fought off allegations of abuse, with charges against the school's employees either being dropped or dismissed by juries. A judge recently awarded $800,000 to Heartland, saying that a raid by abuse investigators was unjustified.

At Thanks to Calvary, Day is accused of paddling Christopher Jensen of Marseilles, Ill., until he developed deep bruises on his legs and buttocks. A civil suit filed by his mother, Deborah Stedman, claimed that the punishment placed the boy in a catatonic state and that he has required hospitalization.

Stedman's attorney, Tyce Smith of Waynesville, said he had dropped the suit to await the criminal trial but planned to refile it.

Enrollment at Thanks to Calvary reached nearly 70 students two years ago, and at the time, Day was expanding buildings. Day, a former Marine, opened the school six years ago, basing his approach both on military-style discipline and Bible teaching.

An auction of the school's property is scheduled for Saturday at the school site in Devil's Elbow, Mo.