DELAYED by three days because of Hurricane Emily, a residential camp to rescue 300 teenagers on the verge of expulsion from high school began at Holmwood High in Manchester on Wednesday.

Camp Success, a $9 million joint programme of the National Youth Service and 12 private sector companies, is being held in two groups of 150 students each, from July 20 to August 9 and at Oberlin Conference Centre from August 12 to 30.

The students, about 70 per cent of whom are males, come from 27 schools in the Corporate Area. They were selected by their guidance counsellors and principals as a result of the youngsters’ increasingly disruptive behaviour, ranging from defiance, to stealing and attacking other students with weapons.

“There are some who are having problems at home, and some are not interested in education,” Sadie Wisdom, guidance counsellor from Mona High School, told the Observer during a pre-orientation session last Monday at Fellowship Tabernacle Church in Kingston.

“They are suffering from low self-esteem and some negative peer pressure,” she said. Mona High has 20 students participating in the programme.

Executive Director of the NYS Adinhair Jones told the students and their parents that the camp was in response to calls from principals and guidance counsellors of Region One who met in May this year, seeking solutions to the rising incidence of violence and disruptive behaviour in schools.

He told them that the camp would function in much the same way as Camp Nutshell in 2002, when 115 troubled boys were exposed to a one-month-long programme aimed at behaviour modification and character-building.

But unlike Camp Nutshell, parents will be required to spend a day at the camp site.

“We are not only focusing on students but on parents as well .so they can better assist their children to maximise their potential in the school system,” he said.

“It is not throwing money on a problem. It is providing the critical input and intervention for our students. My theory is if we don’t fix it (the problem) now, it is going to continue down the road,” said Jones.

At a press conference at the Knutsford Court Hotel in Kingston on Thursday, Peter Bunting, past president of the Jamaica Securities Dealers Association, said partnering with the NYS to sponsor such a well-needed social intervention programme was new for the association, but was well worth it.

“Those 300 boys being expelled this term are potentially 300 who will be sticking you up at your gate or on the road someday in the future,” he said.

He said the problem of anti-social behaviour was not confined to young people from lower income families.

“I see many of these behaviours in boys coming from Cherry Gardens and Jacks Hill…It is a national problem that cuts across all social classes.”