The Village Family Service Center in Fargo, North Dakota is expanding services with a teen addiction recovery program to address a significant unmet need for adolescent substance use treatment in the Fargo-Moorhead area. The Intensive Outpatient Program has recently launched for teens aged 14 to 17. Tonya Sorenson, Clinical Supervisor of the First Step Recovery Program, noted that “Adolescents program differently than adults. Their brains are still developing, and they have different needs where they’re at in life, so it was really important to have a program that was specific just for teens to be able to address their substance use.”
Teens participate in group sessions focusing on prevention, education, and self-reflection, with families invited to work alongside the teen using materials both in the program and at home. The program has been running for the past few weeks and recently received a Health Innovation Grant from Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Dakota Caring Foundation to support expansion. Amber Blomberg, Executive Director of the Caring Foundation for BCBSND, described the opportunity: “When the Village brought forth this idea of launching this adolescent intensive outpatient program, we just thought it was a really great opportunity.”
Currently, the program accommodates a maximum of twelve teens, though more have requested enrollment. This represents the first comprehensive adolescent addiction recovery program to launch in North Dakota in recent years.
This article is an AI-assisted summary. All facts and figures are drawn from the original report: https://www.kvrr.com/2026/03/12/village-family-service-center-expands-its-services-with-teen-addiction-recovery-program/