KALAMAZOO, MI -- Hours after receiving word that a 16-year-old student had died after being restrained by a Lakeside Academy staff member, board chair Jeff Palmer watched teenage boys run from one side of the campus to the other.
“Nothing like this has happened before,” said Palmer, reflecting on the student’s death.
Police were dispatched to the academy on Oakland Drive at 1:11 p.m. Thursday on a report of a student who was unresponsive. Upon arrival officers found the teenager in cardiac arrest.
The boy had been restrained after throwing a sandwich, Kalamazoo Department of Public Safety Capt. Craig Habel confirmed.
The boy died at Bronson Methodist Hospital on Friday morning after being transported there Thursday, according to Kalamazoo Department of Public Safety.
Palmer invited MLive to tour the campus Friday afternoon after the death had been reported. He declined to discuss the specifics of the incident, citing the ongoing police investigation, but wanted to offer a glimpse into the service the academy has provided for over 100 years.
“The entire campus community is heartbroken that one of our own members has died. Our hearts go out to his family and loved ones," Palmer said in a statement he had prepared for the media.
The facility was established as a boys orphanage in 1907. It now houses and educates up to 126 vulnerable boys between the ages of 12 and 18 who live on the 48-acre campus off Oakland Drive in Kalamazoo.
After days of rain and gray skies, Friday was a warm spring day and boys sat in the shade as the sun glimmered across Whites Lake.
Already restless from being cooped up on campus without visitors due to the stay-at-home order, students jogged around the campus popping in and out of buildings. The staff recently bought $10,000 worth of board games, video games and sports equipment to keep students busy during quarantine, Palmer said.
The facility is full with the exception of one open bed in case of emergency, Palmer said.
The majority of the boys housed there have offended the law and were sent to Lakeside as an alternative to juvenile detention center, he said.
Others have been removed from their homes for their own safety or the safety of others, he said.
About half of the student population is from Michigan and the rest come from a handful of other states — some as far as California. In some cases, taking the boys out of their environment is considered part of their rehabilitation, Palmer said.
“Some students need to be as far away from their families, or their street corner, as they can get,” he said. “It’s a bad influence for some of them.”
On average the boys stay for six to nine months before they are reunited with family or guardians, he said. Each student gets an individualized education plan when they arrive and complete 30 hours of school a week, all year round. Many earn their high school diplomas or General Education Development while they’re at Lakeside.
Every year the academy celebrates a graduation in its cultural center. The boys get caps and gowns and act as their own commencement speakers, Palmer said.
“The staff have trouble keeping it together,” Palmer said. “Kind of teary in there.”
Lakeside operates as a charter school with a basketball and soccer teams. Three years ago the academy started offering wrestling and half the school signed up to join the roster, Palmer said.
“I think one of the kids had actually had any experience doing it,” he said. “They’re eager to learn new stuff and it’s a safe environment for them here. They’re not being ridiculed, if they’re in a gang or something. They don’t have to worry about any of that.”
In addition to education, individual and group counseling is offered, Palmer said.
A separate session for grief counseling or a memorial service to cope with the student’s death wasn’t set up as of Friday afternoon, Palmer said.
“It’s important that they stay in their routines as best they possibly can,” he said. “We incorporate grief counseling into regular group and individual therapy. But if a boy wants to talk, there’s people he can find to talk to, including his peers.”
Peer-to-peer development and mentoring are key to the academy’s mission, Palmer said. The mission to provide at-risk youth with new skills and behaviors was one that drew Palmer to the organization seven years ago, he said.
“I’m not a religious person, but I kind of feel like they’re doing the Lord’s work here," he said. “I really believed in the mission, still do. And all the staff members do as well. So this really hurts.”
Lakeside issued a statement expressing its condolences to the boy’s family and commitment to cooperating with the police investigation.
Lakeside partners with Sequel Youth and Family Services for its staff. A Sequel representative could not be reached to comment on the staff member who restrained the boy or staff protocols.
The death investigation is ongoing and the autopsy is scheduled for Friday, Habel said.
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