Struggles in the Hong Kong school: Supporting students from divorced families

The rising trend of divorce in both the West and Hong Kong has called for programs aiming at fostering children's resilience to face the adversities in life. The current study uses the Assessment Program for Social and Affective Outcomes (APASO) instrument to measure the affective and social performance of students with family problems in a Hong Kong primary school, with qualitative data in subsequent interviews with school personnel to triangulate the findings. Results indicate that students with family problems have higher level of negative affect, poorer teacher-student relationship, poorer social integration, and lower level of sense of achievement and academic self-concepts. Although a resilience-building programme is provided by the education authority to help these students, school personnel find that there is a gap between the policy and its implementation. Recommendations on programme implementation are made. Copyright © 2015 by Nova Science Publishers.