Through focus group interviews, this study explores at risk high school students' perceptions of their communities. Participants are members of a Maine Upward Bound program that pre-identified them as low SES, and first-generation college bound students. My purpose for this study is to discover if students who are at risk of public school failure based on environmental and social disadvantages will benefit if they feel a sense of belonging to their communities. Bronfenbrenner's systems of development, as well as the social concept gemeinschaft, often translated "community" are part of the conceptual frame-work of this study. This qualitative study used QSR-N6 to code for attributes of community and themes that emerged as important to students in their development of sense of belonging. Many students related a sense of community to having positive relationships with adults and peers within that community. Students reported a stronger "sense of belonging" to their Upward Bound community, commenting that the culture of the Upward Bound community offers them a "safe" place where they "can be themselves" while developing skills necessary to help them in the future. (Contains 6 footnotes.)