How to Build Resilience in College Students: Developing a Trauma-informed, Strengths-based Approach Student Success

This insightful How to guide provides clear, evidence-based guidelines for activating and cultivating resilience in college students. Drawing on extensive research, Cynthia Lietz and Breanna Carpenter Lietz outline ten of the most important strengths that help college students overcome loss, trauma and other challenges which impact their well-being and academic performance. The authors argue that student services must be approached through a growth mindset. They propose actionable, student-focused strategies using social support structures, boundary setting, fostering belonging and personal value systems. Readers will be inspired by the personal narratives of resilience from ten current and recent college students and the authors’ own lived experience as a college administrator and a first generation student with a background in foster care, making this a nuanced and highly practical book. Readers are shown how institutions can implement organizational-wide changes to reinforce individual interactions that are strengths-based and trauma-informed, creating an open and supportive ecosystem. How to Build Resilience in College Students is a crucial resource for college and university administrators, counselors and student services staff members. Faculty teaching in higher education and researchers focusing on young people will also benefit from the evidence-based insights and practical recommendations.