Taking the Challenge

Teens credit program at Fort McCoy for changing their lives. Leader-Telegram

Not too long ago, 17-year-old Jacob Peterson was a troubled student at Bloomer High School , rarely considering his future as he wallowed in a four-year addiction to methamphetamine. Today he's the top graduate of his class at Wisconsin Challenge Academy and plans to work with his father and pursue a college education and a career in marketing. "I didn't have very much structure in my life, very much discipline," he said, "It wasn't a life I wanted to live." Peterson is one of 76 cadets who graduated from the academy at Fort McCoy on June 10. Funded by state and federal tax money, the academy tries to provide direction to troubled young men. Improved relationships with friends and family often accompany the transformation successful cadets undergo, Deputy Director Peter Blum said. "What we find is that it's often a byproduct of what we do," Blum said. "It starts with the cadets and often turns into that." Peterson's father, Jim, who raised Jacob and his sister for roughly four years on his own after his divorce, said some of his son's difficulty may have stemmed from the divorce and that he could have been more attentive. "Maybe I didn't pay enough attention," Jim Peterson said. "He was pretty hard to deal with." Jacob and Jim agreed the underlying problem was a lack of communication. "I always thought we had a good relationship," Jim Peterson said. "But it got to a point where we couldn't communicate anymore." Jacob Peterson said his difficulties had to do with his own social decisions, a lack of structure in his life and his parents' divorce. The academy, he said, pushed him to overcome those challenges, which led to a healthier relationship with his parents. "They actually trust me for once now," he said. The academy, which offers 22-week sessions beginning in January and July, subjects its cadets to a detailed daily schedule, including physical training, education and character-building sessions. Cadets vary in their socioeconomic status and in the specific problems they face, Blum said Those who succeed receive their high school equivalency degree and hopefully leave with better decision-making skills, he said. "We try to teach them to choose that harder right over that easier wrong," he said. "Typically in life the good decisions are the hard decisions." Though the academy sometimes receives cadets by court order, Blum said, participation is voluntary, with roughly 30 percent of students dropping out or being expelled from each class. Refusal to participate at the academy, Blum said, often stems from an inability to face one's problems. Dylan Marsh, 18, another academy graduate who used to attend Bloomer High School , experienced similar difficulties with his life and his parents. Marsh had trouble in school and abused various substances, from alcohol to marijuana to pills. A pill overdose on school grounds once got him expelled. Like Jacob Peterson, he credited his problems to his own decisions, as well as his parents' divorce. "I kind of realized that I wasn't going anywhere with my life," he said. Marsh's father, Bruce, echoed the Petersons, saying a lack of communication was a large part of his problems with his son. "I tried to talk, but he would always kind of clam up," he said. "I guess maybe the feelings between his mom and me didn't really help either." Today, Dylan Marsh hopes to enroll somewhere in the UW System and study forestry, working at area parks until then. But Marsh and Jacob Peterson anticipate challenges upon returning home. Without the structure the academy provided, they said, old temptations could again surface. "I have to make some changes, leave some of the old things behind," Marsh said. "I have to show everybody that I've changed." Jim Peterson hopes to help his son by moving the family to a new home in Chippewa Falls and removing him from the environment that, in part, put him on the wrong path. But as both cadets return to the outside world, one thing is certain - the pride their loved ones feel. "I'm really proud, I really am," Bruce Marsh said. "The whole family is really."