‘You couldn’t talk’: Academy at Ivy Ridge student recounts horrific conditions

OGDENSBURG, N.Y. (WWTI) — It sounds similar to a horror movie.

Former students of the Academy at Ivy Ridge have spoken out. This shuttered boarding school in Northern New York was marketed as a program for troubled teens in the early 2000s.

However, the school is now under investigation following the debut of “The Program: Cons, Cults and Kidnapping” on Netflix. The true crime series alleged that students of Ivy Ridge were abused sexually, physically and psychologically.

Zachary Zeis was enrolled at Ivy Ridge for 15 months. He was taken to the school outside of Ogdensburg in the middle of the night.

“I woke up to two strangers in my bedroom standing in the doorway saying, ‘We can do this the easy way or the hard way,'” he recounted.

Living in Georgia at the time, these employees of Ivy Ridge had to take Zeis over state lines. He said he remembered being in the Syracuse Airport, while the employees had fingers in his belt loops.

Similar to what was described in “The Program,” Zeis said Ivy Ridge had dozens of strict rules. If students obeyed rules, they would gain points that would excel them through the program.

“You couldn’t talk to your roommates,” he said. “Even in a military school, you’re allowed to talk. Humans are social. You can’t survive without social interaction.”

If rules were disobeyed, Zeis explained that the consequences were often extreme.

“You could get put in isolation. Isolation was where you were in a five by eight room, with a chair, at least while I was there. And that was it,” he added.

Zeis said these tactics were emotionally taxing, as staff members would oversee all punishments. Although he said he was never physically abused at Ivy Ridge, Zeis witnessed violence inflicted on his peers.

One situation he remembered vividly was when his group was completing computer work. One of Zeis’ peers had attempted to clean the bottom of their computer mouse.

However, Zeis said a staff member witnessed this act and the student was subsequently punished.

“[The staff member saw] him with the mouse, basically half taken a part, reaches across two rows of computers and drags him across the computer screaming: ‘You want to break my stuff?’ ‘Think you’re big and bad for breaking my stuff?,'” Zeis recounted. “These were kids, some of them weren’t one hundred pounds, getting slammed by adults that were two, three or four hundred pounds.”

Zeis left the school when he turned 18 years old.

Although he has felt silenced for years, he wanted to share his story for those who can’t

“There are forty kids, possibly more kids that no longer have a voice. I think it’s telling if forty kids couldn’t cope,” Zeis expressed. “I want to talk to get justice for them.”

An official investigation into the Academy at Ivy Ridge began on March 11, 2024.

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