More schools are now investing in social-emotional learning curricula than were just a few years ago, concludes a new report.
Eighty-three percent of principals reported that their schools use an SEL curriculum or program, up from 73 percent in 2021-22 school year, and from 46 percent in 2017-18, according to a nationally representative survey by RAND and the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning, or CASEL.
That’s notable, because in that same time frame, SEL became embroiled in political battles in a some communities.
Those battles came after SEL experienced a surge of interest at the height of the pandemic as educators looked to fortify students’ mental health and social skills. But as some conservatives likened SEL to critical race theory and claimed it was indoctrinating students with liberal values, it wasn’t clear how this would affect schools’ adoption and continued use of SEL programs and curricula.
It seems the concept, which aims to teach students soft skills such as empathy, managing their emotions, and setting goals, has weathered the storm and even thrived, at least based on findings from the RAND/CASEL report. CASEL has been a leading voice in the promotion and standardization of social-emotional learning.
A major problem with SEL programs has been that they are often shrouded in so much jargon that almost no one knows what the programs really do.
The reason? Educators see SEL as a means to address some of the most pressing problems they are dealing with in schools, said Alexandra Skoog-Hoffman, the senior director of research and learning at CASEL and one of the lead authors on the report.
“I think with technology, and AI, and social media and all of the research that is coming out with regards to how youth are interacting in the digital space and these links to more depressive symptoms, greater emotional distress, and so forth, that of course permeates the educational experience,” she said. “Their academics and social systems are all enmeshed and folks look to SEL as a universal prevention centered, evidence-based strategy for how to combat that.”
Another major focus for educators in recent years has been catching students up academically after falling behind during the pandemic, and research has linked SEL to improved academic outcomes, said Skoog-Hoffman. And a temporary infusion of federal aid during the pandemic also helped fuel the growth of SEL in recent years, she said.
Most parents prefer to call it ‘life skills’ rather than SEL
However, as the report shows, SEL adoption was already on the rise before schools received federal pandemic-era aid. In the 2017-18 school year, 46 percent of principals said their schools were using an SEL curriculum or program.
SEL’s durability isn’t necessarily surprising given parents’ attitudes toward it, said Adam Tyner, the national research director for the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, a conservative think tank. Even as the term “social-emotional learning” became politicized in recent years, the core concepts behind it remained popular with parents, he said.
A 2021 survey by the Fordham Institute found that the term “social and emotional learning” was not popular with parents, who generally preferred the label “life skills.” However, many of the skills taught through SEL, such as setting goals, controlling emotions, and being informed citizens, were popular with parents, regardless of political party.
Since then, districts have gotten better about messaging what SEL represents to parents and other community members, said Tyner.
“A major problem with SEL programs has been that they are often shrouded in so much jargon that almost no one knows what the programs really do,” Tyner said in an email to Education Week.
Tyner encourages school and district leaders to be specific and concrete about SEL so that “at least people are arguing about the same thing,” he said. “As it becomes more transparent what an SEL program actually looks like in a school, the community can discuss it more frankly and any legitimate problems are more likely to be surfaced and addressed.”
SEL growth is highest in secondary schools
While SEL has expanded across all types of schools, the growth in secondary schools has been the greatest. Traditionally, SEL implementation has lagged in middle and high schools, due in part to a perception that it is more developmentally appropriate for elementary students. That is the case even though experts in SEL and adolescent development say it can be very beneficial for older students.
In the 2017-18 school year, 37 percent of middle and high school principals reported that their school used an SEL curriculum. In 2023-24, that number had more than doubled to 77 percent, according to the RAND/CASEL survey.
“As a former middle and high school English teacher myself, SEL happens throughout our life span,” said Skoog-Hoffman. “I think that has caught on in the field, and research has brought that more to life. Programming can be adopted and implemented in 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th grade classrooms and of course in high school classrooms.”
Despite the growth, fully implementing SEL remains difficult, the report noted. Sixty-two percent of principals said that teachers don’t have enough time to integrate it, half of school leaders said that there isn’t enough training or professional learning, and 45 percent said their schools lack dedicated funding.
The report also examined state-level policies and how they might be contributing to SEL implementation in schools.
Forty-nine states have at least one policy or condition that the report defines as being supportive of SEL. Those measures can vary from statewide SEL standards to relatively low student-counselor ratios. Supportive policies and conditions at the state level, the report found, lead to efforts to implement SEL at the school level, such as putting in place an SEL curriculum or giving teachers training in SEL. Whether a state’s government was controlled by Democrats, Republicans, or split between the two major parties did not appear to have a clear connection to how supportive the states policies and conditions were toward SEL, the report found.
