Quality of education offered by Mountain Park:

If you look at the staff of Mountain Park and Palm Lane, you'll see that 90% of them were students of the schools at one time, or relatives.

Staff at Mountain Park, according to the website and Messenger (MP Newsletter), consists of about 4 couples. Let me give you a quick run-down of these people--

Couple #1- Sam and Debby Gerhardt
Daughter and son-in-law to the owners
Couple #2- Rachel & Aaron Smith-
Daughter and son-in-law to the Gerhardt’s
Couple #3- Bo & Julie Gerhardt-
Son & daughter-in-law to the Gerhardt’s-

(both were students of MP, Bo being a son of the Gerhardt’s)
Couple #4- Jason & Heather Lowe-
I believe both of these were students. However, from what I've been told, they recently quit. There were allegations of Jason having an affair with a female student.

Residential Single staff-
Monica Combs, Jessica Denton, Sharon Goodman, and Andrea Hill-
All former students

The hourly staff shown on there are a groundskeeper and 3 kitchen workers from the local area. And the students usually don't have much to do with the hourly staff beyond asking what's for lunch.
There is another member of the residential staff, a young by the name of Kennedy, he is the cousin of Aaron Smith- Rachel's husband.

Now, to take a closer look- these people are basically creating their own hiring network from within by offering positions of authority to students in order to get them to stay as staff. What 17 yr old graduate wouldn't want to hear 100+ students saying "Yes, Ma'am" or "Yes, Sir" to their every beckoned call? Kids like to think they're in charge, and they're offering the illusion of being in charge to these kids as a way to get out of paying qualified staff workers. I know I felt that when I stayed. It’s what kept me there for 2 months after graduation.

I understand they say "Well, who would be better qualified to deal with a troubled teen than someone whose been there and been helped out?" I can tell you-- a trained adult with the knowledge needed to work with troubled youth. Someone who has an education directed toward the psychological problems that these kids are coming in with, trained to deal with the emotional insecurity that is created in an environment like MP, trained medical personnel who could treat the sick or injured students, licensed teachers who could give a decent education. THOSE WOULD BE A FEW EXAMPLES OF WHO WOULD BE BETTER QUALIFIED. They obviously have the funds to afford those kinds of qualified educators and other trained staff, and yet they simply put children in charge of children and pay them slaves' wages under the table because it's easier on their budget. Is that really what should be important when trying to offer a QUALITY EDUCATION to these kids? They have enough problems when they come in, don't they deserve more than this, especially with what their parents are being charged?

But the problem with this solution is that if they were to start hiring qualified educators, qualified medical staff, qualified psychologists or counselors- and THERE ARE CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGISTS OUT THERE WHO WOULD DO THIS- and qualified staff to help in their carpentry and other maintenance work- instead of having the male students help in the building of their dormitories and other work- IF THEY WERE TO MAKE THESE CHANGES, THEY WOULDN'T HAVE AS MUCH MONEY TO SPLURGE ON WITH NEW HOUSES AND NEW BOATS AND NEW CARS AND AN RV PAINTED TO MATCH THE TOUR CHOIR BUS.

Mrs. Wills might not be able to get the $5000 shoe inserts to help her tired feet that they were bragging about in one of their recent newsletters. If she'd look at the fact that they've made the girls wear the same dress shoes everyday for the last "30 years" that they've been in business, maybe she'd see what she's doing to their feet as well.

The Wills and Gerhardts have recently bought 3 new houses in Ft. Myers, FL. You can see arial photos of two of them here-

Home of Bob & Betty Wills	Home of Sam & Debby Gerhardt

These are half-a-million dollar homes, ladies and gentlemen. If they're really using the money they get from the parents for the students, then how could they have bought 3 of them in the last year? If you look at the aerial view of the Wills' home, they have a 35 ft. boat dock in the back- on the waterfront side of their property- and you'll see the lovely boat that rests there. Boats aren't cheap. Neither are planes. Neither are new cars or RV's. Property really isn't cheap, and if you look at the Wills' home, they also own the empty lot next their home. I don't know what they're planning to put there, but we all know they love to build.

In 1993, the Wills, along with their son Brett and granddaughter Brooke, crashed their plane upside down in a field on the way home from a trip to Alabama. In a very short time, what I believe was 2 months or less, they replaced it. What type of cash must you have on hand to replace a plane?

How can you offer a quality school with a quality program if you do NOT have quality leaders? An HONORARY doctorate from a 3rd rate university doesn't make you qualified. And the funniest thing is that they take that honorary degree seriously enough that they want you to address Bob Wills as Dr. Wills!! I laughed for a good 20 minutes after I read that. He got a 3 yr diploma from Tennessee Temple, he doesn't even have a Bachelor's Degree, and they want him addressed as Dr. Wills! I think they all need their heads examined. And not only that, but also he and Betty Sue studied only theology, nothing whatsoever to do with working with young people. They haven't changed their tactics in the 30 years they've been abusing kids, and they wonder why we're still all saying the same things. Let's not forget that the man currently running the school, Sam Gerhardt, was a "student" of Shepard's Lane Boys Ranch, and got his GED, never graduated from High School. Even a substitute teacher in a public school system is required to have their High School Diploma!

They have the ability to offer a quality education, a quality program, but to do that would take away from what they're really focusing on- making their entire family rich. If they have roughly 250 students, then they are making roughly $3.6 million a year off of their parents. This does not include the thousands they receive each month in donations from churches where they've paraded those kids around to gain sympathy and support. Why do they need that much money to run a school if they've got enough to splurge the way they do? They're obviously not sacrificing to save souls. They're living quite nicely- much better than most of the parents who send their kids there and work hard, sacrificing to be able to afford the tuition- that has doubled in the last 12 years. In 1990 the tuition was $600 a month. Now it's $1200. I don't see a double in quality, do any of you?

Please think about this. If they wanted to offer quality, they could. They choose not to. Why? What do they have that is more important than their "Mission", or is their mission truly what they claim it to be?