Half-Way House Will Aid Reform School Students

Philips Brooks House will help staff a half-way house for reform school graduates as soon as it acquires a $50,000 a-year grant for the project, a PBH official said yesterday.

Boys who have completed their terms but have no secure family situation will "re-acquaint themselves with normal living patterns" by living in the half-way house, according to Jon W. Clifton '63, a former PBH president now working with the Lyman Group, the PBH branch sponsoring the plan.

Students and former inmates will work together under a system similar to the Wellmet program for mental rehabilitants, Clifton explained. However, unlike at Wellment, volunteers will not actually live in the house.

"The family atmosphere we hope to create would be distrupted by resident students," Clifton stated. Instead, a married couple will live with the boys, and volunteers will visit regularly for informal as well as organized meetings.

The Boston Youth Service Board, which will refer boys to the house, has said that it will provide part of the necessary funds. Charity foundations, however, will be the primary source of support.

The present activities of the PBH group center on countering the tight discipline of the boys while they are still in school. "All they want is affection, and freedom from the schedule, the institution-in fact, just somebody to talk to," Clifton said.

Coaching in lifesaving and wrestling, tutorial programs, and seminars at the Lyman School for Boys help diminish "both frustration and friction" caused by limited contact with other than the teaching and custodial staffs.

Clifton noted that Cliffies will participate for the first time this year in a program which offers the only tenth grade instruction at Lyman.