Exploring the Dynamics of Resilience in an Elementary School

? This article was adapted from a Center for Research on the Education of Students Placed At Risk (CRESPAR) 1998 report. Reprinted with permission. Inner-city schools are populated by many students eager to learn and succeed academically despite the chronic stress of poverty and the conditions that can accompany lack of resources. Such schools can represent places of hope within communities whose vitality is tested daily by violence, poor health of residents, lack of political clout, deteriorating and boarded-up housing, and substance abuse. An extensive tradition of research on the schools these students attend has been conducted with the intent of identifying effective instructional practices and effective schools.