Yes AWOLs (absent without official leave) do happen. The biggest thing in our organization to deter these is building relations with our youth. Building trust and relationships with our youth can really go a long way. I think our team at Rever House has done a great job doing that but we still get AWOLs.

Building relationships with the youth in our care can help us talk them down if we get wind of their AWOL plans. In other cases a youth will come up to us and let us know of plans in the works which we have time to deter. We don’t want them to feel as they are being snitches but to know that we are here for the youth and when they AWOL they don’t make the best decisions and could get hurt. We are here because we care about youth and don’t want to see them in harm’s way.

 Sometimes issues at school arise which causes kids to leave. Other times they leave because they haven’t talked to or seen their family in a long time regardless of our efforts to track them down. We work our hardest to get kids to see their family and eventually to get them back home. Sometimes they just want to see friends or party - even if it’s an 8 km walk into the city.

If a youth AWOLs on a nightshift – jumped out their window for example – we would first search their room and the bathroom. Some kids sleep walk and have been found in the floor on another youth’s room or in other odd places in the house. Once it’s determined that the youth has left you call the nightfloat who would also come over and check the house. Next you call the unit manager or the unit manager on call, the RCMP or police in the area, and CPIC (Canadian Police Information Centre) so that police all over will have the youth’s description.

The next day the AWOL is noticed by the youth but we just tell them that the person made the decision to leave and we hope they come back safe and soon. We also go over the safety reasons not to AWOL.

Some kids are found in a few hours later hiding in a bush, some kids will call or be picked up by the police the next day. Other kids might be gone weeks. After 30 days the youth loses their bed at the Ranch. Sometimes if the youth finds out about that policy it becomes their goal.

Most kids come back on their own because they are hungry, or something bad happened and they are crying and want to come back, or they just aren’t feeling good. We are caregivers, just like mom and dad, and that tugs on our heart and we go get them.