Elim Young's director Qiu Mingguo (second from left) leads a group of professional volunteers and counselors. For more than seven years, they have guided many teenagers through rebellious episodes in their troubled lives. (Hsueh Chi-kuang)

Teenagers going astray, wandering the fringes of school and society, unthinkingly labeled as dropouts. They have mean tempers and have often suffered terrible trauma, and they're learning to grow up. They suffer wounds that must be fully healed before they can be completely accepted by society, so experiencing hard work and gaining self-affirmation from farm work could signal a new beginning.

It's early summer around the mountain areas of Pinglin, New Taipei City, and several young farmers are at work on their farm. Xiao Jie, 15 years old, is rearranging pots of maidenhair fern to make the most of the sunshine and watering. Nearby, colleagues Ah Gou and Xiao Ya are filling small pots with peat soil mixed with perlite ready for planting.

"We specialize in potted plants, and because of our cold, wet climate here, it's especially good for ferns. These are maidenhair and Boston ferns, and that's crab cactus and spider fern," says Bee, a young man aged 20, the most experienced of the farm's young workforce.