The Pinkie Resilience Project: Enhancing Equality, Boosting Wellbeing and Realising Potential in Scottish Schools

This project sought to find ways to apply research findings in the areas of child mental health, education and child development to a very specific setting: a primary school. A gap often exists between academic research on child well-being (broadly defined) and what schools can actually do in practice. By bringing academics from a wide range of backgrounds together with school staff, we were able to troubleshoot potential interventions and determine which had the most
potential. Underlining the project was the assumption, borne out in both research and experience, that a wide range of often disparate factors impact upon an individual’s mental health. These may be based in socioeconomics (malnutrition; inadequate housing; minimal opportunities for sport and creative activities); the family (abusive and stressful home environment; ineffective parenting styles); the community (unsafe neighbourhoods; gang violence; minimal community cohesion); the environment (pollution; not enough time spent outdoors and in natural environments); and the school (lack of inclusive policies; minimal time
for exercise and the arts; too much focus on standardised assessment at the expense of nurturing well-being).