Pace Center for Girls

PACE Center for Girls in West Palm Beach is a well respected education and behavioral treatment facility that receives the majority of its funding through the Department of Juvenile Justice. The rest of funding and resources come from private donations and school board funding. They have programs throughout Florida and help more than 4000 young women each year.

PACE has been providing educational, emotional and behavioral support to delinquent teenaged young women. Their treatment, therapy, and educational programming are designed to help these girls get their lives on the right track, to overcome and heal from trauma, and to set healthy educational and life goals with the life skills needed to succeed.

More than three quarters of the girls that attend PACE come from a background of poverty and have faced trauma or abuse in their short lives. The program at PACE helps them learn healthy choices. This includes in all areas of life so they can identify and protect themselves from abuse and violence, make positive choices when it comes to alcohol, drugs, nutrition, relationships and sexual activity. They are also supported with educational and vocational choices and given the ability to make positive decisions and build self esteem and confidence.

PACE has an open referral policy and can be an option for any teenage girl referred by the courts, family, teachers, therapists or another caregiver. It is often an alternative to incarceration for many of the girls here. They are given a full needs assessment. This involves a home visit to assess the environment they live in and the supports they are in need of. Participants in the PACE program for girls are given full resources for school and counseling with therpy, group activities, community service projects and education filling approximately six hours a day. The program funs four or five days a week and can provide transitional support and resources for up to three years after a client graduates or leaves the program.