The Huffington Post – Traci Donnelly
“…to really find lasting solutions for chronic unemployment, we can’t focus only on the unemployed. We have to start in childhood, with measures that help children build on their strengths and thrive despite difficult circumstances. Some of these approaches have already garnered broad support, like universal pre-kindergarten, which closes the gap for children in poverty and helps them enter kindergarten at the level of their peers…Surprisingly, one of our best opportunities to help children find a path to a happy, healthy adulthood is still not widely used, despite a relatively low cost and years of research that shows how well it works. This is an approach based on resilience, the inner strengths, skills and attitudes that help children handle challenges. Resilience has been shown to be crucial for academic as well as lifelong success. Highly resilient students feel more confident and in control, and have better attendance and better grades…Often, children in poverty don’t get the support and nurturing they need to find their inner resources. But the best thing about resilience is that it is easily taught.”(more)