Toward an Inclusive Social and Emotional Learning

• In Event: Promoting Inclusive Mindsets and Practices With Social and Emotional Learning

Abstract

Understanding the effectiveness of universal school-based (USB) SEL interventions for minoritized students in K-12 settings is an area of critical inquiry. The past decade has seen diminished emotional well-being and increased suicidal thoughts among Black, Hispanic, female, and LGBQ+ students as well as individuals with disabilities concurrent to an uptick in racial and discriminatory attacks on marginalized students within and outside of schools (CSC 2022; 2023). Despite the success of SEL programs on the social and emotional development of K-12 students, there is little attention given to discrete populations of students, particularly those who historically have been found to be at greatest risk for diminished mental health and achievement across the academic lifespan.To advance equitable and inclusive best practices in USB SEL interventions, we must carefully attend to the discourse that USB SEL programs, however inadvertently, could be exclusionary in their practices and impacts. It is therefore necessary that we, as a field, evaluate current USB SEL programs, and those in development, to determine not just their efficacy with marginalized students, but also how students receive and interact with program content in order to ensure meaningful and impactful engagement.Towards this end, this conceptual paper draws on a subset of data from a recent systematic review and meta-analysis documenting minoritized students who participated in K-12 USB SEL programs. In this paper, we discuss who minoritized students are and the evidence of SEL programs effectiveness for them. We then discuss the urgent need for the SEL field to focus on program design, implementation, and research to better determine whether and how minoritized students are included in and benefiting from current USB SEL programming. Finally, we provide recommendations for improved research and practice to support a truly inclusive SEL hereafter. We report that little is reported on how USB SEL programs impact students with varying gender, disability, ethnic, racial, and linguistic identities and learning profiles. Nearly all studies in the review reported student gender in the binary, and not a single one reported student sexual orientation. Native language and disability status were also largely overlooked. Students with disabilities were predominately categorized using general identifiers such as Special Education Needs, Individual Education Plan, and students with disabilities, which ultimately undermines the diverse learning needs and abilities associated with differing disability types. Likewise, the complexity of racial, ethnic, and cultural identity was also not adequately represented in the data. We conclude by providing evidence-based suggestions for future program design, practice, and research to move toward more inclusive USB SEL programming: knowledge, flexibility, and representation. As marginalized youth become more represented in USB SEL programming and research, the field will benefit from new knowledge that can help shape the future directions of the field. Developing more inclusive SEL programs is and will continue to be a cyclical process that requires constant evaluation and reevaluation of whether and how programs are designed and implemented in ways that ensure gender-, racially-, ethnically-, linguistically-, and ability-minoritized youth benefit.

Authors

• Christina Cipriano, Yale University

• Michael McCarthy, Yale Child Study Center