Not long ago, kindness, gratitude, and empathy were taught in our nation’s schools without controversy. For nearly three decades, these skills were referred to as Social and Emotional Learning, or SEL, and they helped millions of students, teachers, and families to thrive.
This year, SEL has been criticized as both race evasive and antiracist, depending on which political camp the critic belongs to. Despite the confusion, new research uncovering the representation of minoritized youth in SEL demonstrates that these two very complex narratives warrant much deeper attention than the countless headlines that pop up from Googling SEL.
The basics of SEL, like managing stress, problem solving, decision making, and communication, have strong associations with academic benefits for students. And, although self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and responsible decision-making are widely considered standard for SEL, there are more than 136 frameworks that can comprise more than 700 other life skills. This begs the question: If schools ban social and emotional learning, what are they left with?
And to be sure, not all SEL is in a textbook. Actually, most of it isn’t. For example, Florida banned programs and textbooks with SEL content, but recent data suggests that only one-fourth of educators in the state use textbooks to teach SEL. I suppose now Florida will need to look at what the nearly 75 percent of educators are doing in their classrooms to support students’ social and emotional health and censor them.
If schools ban social and emotional learning, what are they left with?
And what about sports? What about the huddles at the pitcher’s mound? The pep talk before the game? Is teamwork and perseverance and respect and sportsmanship only allowed to be taught by coaches to athletes? Oh, and what about the relaxation, reframing, and downregulating strategies that support the highest achieving students through their high stakes testing? Are we banning those too, or is it okay for only the youth in advanced placement classes—the majority of whom are white and affluent—to have access to skills to regulate their test anxiety?
Speaking of privilege, the discourse of emotional learning in schools is situated within the politics of the education system, a system that historically marginalized students on the basis of their race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, and disability. Special educators have been teaching SEL long before it was an acronym. So, what about the 7 million students— 14 percent of the entire U.S. public school population—who have social and emotional goals as part of their 504 or Individual Education Plans (IEPs)? Are they no longer allowed to access these services?
The anti-SEL movement itself highlights the importance of social and emotional learning. The last few years have been a time of historic “learning loss” for students, amid continuous evolving threats to their health and safety. The ironic response to these challenges has been for leaders to politicize and remove books and programming from schools that support young people to manage strong emotions, develop good friendships, and cope—skills that are critical for all of us to flourish in life, no matter what our politics.