Learn About Our Agency
What is Harborcreek Youth Services?
Harborcreek Youth Services is accredited by the Council on Accreditation (COA), an international, independent, not-for-profit, child-and family-service and behavioral healthcare accrediting organization. 2022 marks our fifth consecutive successful accreditation cycle.
Harborcreek Youth Services is a trauma-informed behavioral healthcare agency that provides a wide range of residential and in-home services to children and their families from across Pennsylvania. Our 60-acre main campus is home to our Psychiatric Residential Treatment Facility for young men and is located in the township of Harborcreek, a rural suburb just east of Erie, Pennsylvania. We have been caring for boys since 1911 when our agency, then known as the Catholic Boys Protectory, was founded. The institution was originally intended as a home for youth too old to remain at the orphanage in Erie, Pennsylvania (learn more about our history here). We have since evolved to become a fully accredited, clinically-driven child and family service agency. In our Residential Program, we serve male youth, ages 10-18 (at time of admission) from across Pennsylvania who meet medical necessity criteria as determined by a licensed psychiatrist and who are referred by Mental Health agencies, Children and Youth agencies (dependent children), and Juvenile Justice agencies (delinquent children).
We are also proud to house a Community Program that serves both boys and girls in Erie County. Multisystemic Therapy (MST) is a family-centered and community-based treatment for kids ages 12-17 that teaches and supports parenting techniques that discourage adolescent truancy, disrespect, violence, and substance abuse.
Sanctuary® Certification
“The mission of Sanctuary® is to teach individuals and organizations the necessary skills for creating and sustaining nonviolent lives and nonviolent systems and to keep believing in the unexplored possibilities of peace.”
HYS adopted the Sanctuary Model® as a tool to work with children across a wide diagnostic spectrum. Sanctuary® stresses safety and healing for both clients and staff, and is a process of organizational change. It is a trauma-focused model more than a treatment intervention, and it’s the way we organize both our treatment and how we run our agency. It is an “everybody” model because it’s a way of guiding leaders, staff, children, and families to share the same values and language.