Positive youth development (PYD) is a strengths-based, positive psychology approach to fostering adolescents' educational engagement and achievement. It focuses not just on students' academic development but also on their vocational, social, and emotional development.

The PYD philosophy is at the heart of Cynthia Hazel's unique model of secondary school change, which is presented in this book. Hazel's model uses a multi-tiered system of support to challenge the status quo of widespread achievement gaps. Because students' own voices are critical to their empowerment and strong outcomes, the model calls for students to participate alongside parents, teachers, and administrators in designing and guiding the school's support structures.