Universal screening to evaluate social-emotional behavior (SEB) functioning is important in determining if students are on track to meet their developmental goals and whether or not they may benefit from additional supports, including mental health services.  We know that one in five students will exhibit symptoms of a mental health problem, yet upwards of 80% of those students will not receive timely treatment. Schools must rethink how to facilitate early intervention and prevention services. Universal screening can be a valuable tool in ensuring all students receive timely and effective ..read more

More and more research suggests that it’s not just students’ academic skills that lead to overall success in schools. Students’ social-emotional and behavioral (SEB) skills–their positive behaviors, as well as their suppression of more problematic behaviors–are just as important.  We can say that a student is exhibiting social-emotional behavior (SEB) competence when: They display certain skills that allow them to get along with adults and peers, as well as navigate the classroom contexts They are not displaying problematic behaviors Externalizing behaviors (ex: disruptive behavior, non ..read more

Our primary role in education has always been to ensure that students have the academic skills that they need. Over the past decade, we have seen students walk into our doors and into our schools, needing more instruction in the areas of social skills, emotion, regulation, and behavior. And now, more than ever, we need a way to address these needs in our students.  In this blog, we’ll dive into social-emotional learning (SEL), school climate and culture, and why these concepts are so important in our current school environment. What is Social-Emotional Learning (SEL), School Climate, and ..read more

Educators around the country are working to ensure all students are mentally and emotionally ready to restart learning. In order to do so, it’s important to understand and support social-emotional behavior (SEB) needs. In this blog, we’ll unpack how SEB functioning, growth, and equity connect to one another. Although it might sound a little surprising, especially in a year marked by remote and hybrid learning for many communities, this starts with school climate and culture. What is School Climate and Culture? School climate refers to the physical, social and emotional environment, or “feel” o ..read more

In the past, a traditional school of thought posited that students are successful in school if they’re academically successful, and that if students are demonstrating academic achievement, they’ll be “fine” overall.  More and more, researchers are pointing to the short-sightedness of the view (Taylor & Kilgus, 2014). Research in fact shows that students are more successful in school when they are also able to demonstrate social-emotional and behavioral (SEB) competence (Denham, 2006; Kwon et al., 2012).   What is social emotional behavior (SEB)? SEB competence is defined by the p ..read more

  Let’s talk about something that we’re probably all hearing about a lot, and maybe we don’t have a lot of information about it. Let’s dig into the topics of mental health needs for our students and the effects of trauma on students as well as social-emotional learning.  What is social-emotional learning (SEL)? Social-emotional learning is how well a student is able to practice and demonstrate the skills that are needed to regulate their emotions and to know how to interact with people. There are the social and emotional aspects that come together. Some students are more able to do ..read more

The virus outbreak has resulted in an increase of students who are now experiencing trauma. As a result of general disruptions to normalcy, changes in their daily schedules, or even unsafe home situations, many students are operating in a “fight or flight” mode and shifting their focus from thriving to simply getting through the day.  In light of this, it’s vital that educators approach students and remote learning through a trauma-informed lens. What practices can you implement to support a safe and stable learning environment for vulnerable students?  In this post, we list five sug ..read more

Within an MTSS framework, we have a great opportunity to understand the intersection of all student data—including academic, attendance, behavior, social-emotional, and intervention data—and dig deeper to find the meaning within our evidence and understand the stories our data tell. But in order to do that, we must have a working understanding of our data. We hear a lot about developing assessment literacy, but within the context of MTSS, we really need to develop whole child data literacy. In this post, we’ll recommend two main steps to take when growing your data literacy around whole child ..read more

This article was co-written with Debra Russell “Student achievement never matters more than student well-being.” This was the message Superintendent Dr. Gregory Franklin shared with all faculty and staff to usher in the 2018-19 school year at Tustin Unified School District, a district of 24,000 students in suburban Southern California. And it is a much easier sentiment to express in words than it is to implement with concrete actions, as anyone working at the district-level of a school system knows well. But that is precisely what we did at Tustin this year: administered social-emotional lear ..read more

With the release of a new survey published recently by the National Association of Elementary School Principals, school principals in K-8 schools say their top concern is the rising numbers of students with emotional problems and mental health needs. To put it in perspective, this survey has been conducted since 1928; in the 2008 report—just 10 years ago—students’ social-emotional needs did not rank among the top 10 student issues about which the majority of principals expressed “high” or “extreme” concern. Clearly, something has changed in the minds of school principals. Alongside student emo ..read more