A page-turning dispatch from inside the most daring andpotentially transformative social experiment of our time Geoffrey Canada is a driven, brilliant crusader ...for children whosebold approach to inner-city poverty has been called by BarackObama an all-hands-on-deck anti-poverty effort that is literally savinga generation of children. Canada's radical new idea: if you really wantto change the lives of poor children, you have to change everything --their schools, their families, their neighborhoods - all at once. Paul Tough gained exclusive, behind-the-scenes access to GeoffreyCanada as the Harlem Children's Zone grew to become a $58-million-a-year organization, encompassing 97 city blocks and reaching morethan 7,000 children. In Tough's inspired portrait, sure to be as deeplyinfluential as Tracy Kidder's of Paul Farmer, Canada shares center stagewith the parents and children of Harlem as they hopefully, anxiouslyenter a conveyor belt of integrated programs, from Baby College toHarlem Gems to Promise Academy. There's Victor Boria, nineteen, who enters Baby College on theverge of breaking up with his pregnant teenage girlfriend - and then, nine weeks later, proposes to her onstage in front of a jubilant crowd.And there's Wilma Jure, waiting and praying that her four-year-oldniece, whose mother is homeless, will win a spot in Canada's newkindergarten class. Finally, Tough vividly describes Canada's passionfor change and how it is playing out in real time - as educators andpolicymakers from across the country keenly watch. Whatever It Takesis a tour de force of suspenseful and brilliantlyinformed reporting.Detailed info »« Brief info