Opinion: Social-emotional learning key to improving educational outcomes
While explicit mentions of education in the State of the Union on Feb. 5 were scarce, the speech did manage to briefly highlight one important factor about our education system: the need for social and emotional learning (SEL) to be systemically embedded in schools across the country.
Leaders on both sides of the aisle can agree that some of the issues raised – the opioid epidemic and the need for criminal justice reform in particular – have a profound impact on children, especially those who are already most in danger of slipping through the cracks.
And these issues hit home. In the past five years, deaths relating to synthetic opioids have seen a 1,000 percent increase in Hamilton County. Educators in our community are constantly faced with the challenges of having to support children whose parents have been imprisoned, disappeared, or even died.
Research shows that traumatic stress like this "hijacks the brain," making it incapable of learning. But, when educators are aware of the students’ needs and can equip them with the social-emotional tools and strategies they need to address it, these barriers to learning can be reduced or removed.
Implementation of social-emotional learning in schools has been proven to have a positive impact on mental health, social skills and academic performance in students. In fact, a 2015 report from the American Enterprise Institute and the Brookings Institution cited social-emotional and character development as a key to improving educational outcomes and supporting students in poverty.
Federal education policies can and should maintain a focus on giving states and districts the resources and flexibility they need to empower educators to implement quality social-emotional learning practices in schools.
Whether intentional or not, the speech pointed to the need for our children to be equipped to overcome current and future challenges, understand themselves and others, and develop healthy relationships with those different and alike.
Schools need to continue strengthening SEL policies and programs to support our children, and our future, but they also need federal support to make it happen.
Terrance Sullivan is the director of state policy at KnowledgeWorks in Cincinnati.