Socio-Emotional Learning: contextualization, assessment and growth trajectories – findings from Lebanon and Senegal

Group Submission Type: Formal Panel Session

Proposal

Research suggests that children in education in crisis settings may be at particular risk for difficulties with social, cognitive, and emotional development with challenges stemming from their crisis and trauma experiences of loss, displacement, neglect, as well as myriad daily stressors , all of which can interfere with their ability to learn and to connect with their teachers and peers.

The classroom setting is where many school-age children can develop and maintain relationships; for example, social adjustment is related to positive academic outcomes , and to social competence, emotional health, and positive school behaviors ; whereas social difficulties put children at increased risk of maladaptive social-emotional functioning, both in the present and over time.
The cognitive aspects of self-regulation skills are often represented as executive function skills, a broad set of cognitive capacities, including working memory (i.e., the ability to keep in mind goal-relevant information); extensive research suggests that executive function is a key mechanism for children’s self-regulation in school, which is also foundational to their learning and school success . Awareness and regulation of emotions is another aspect of self-regulation that represents the capacity to regulate one’s emotions and behavior to produce adaptive responses to given situations.

In this panel, the presenters will delve into the use of socio-emotional learning interventions in two contexts affected by crisis: Lebanon and Southern Senegal.

Over the last 15 years, Lebanon has faced a cascade of challenges that have placed enormous stress on its public education system. Lebanon hosts the largest per-capita concentration of refugees in the world . The Lebanese Ministry of Education and Higher Education (MEHE) has sought to include Syrian refugee children in its already-strained formal education system, which doubled the public-school population within five years . The combination of over 279,000 Syrian students currently enrolled in Lebanon’s public schools, the unprecedented economic crisis exacerbated by COVID-19, political instability, and the devastating 2020 Beirut port explosion have created uniquely challenging learning environments for children. Given the protracted nature of the crisis in Lebanon, there is a growing need for long-term, systematic, “preventive” approaches to develop students’ social and emotional learning (SEL) skills.

Senegal stands out as an example of stability and democracy in Sub Saharan Africa. Since its independence in 1960, it has experienced three peaceful transitions to power, and has never experienced a military coup. However, extended low-level conflict in the Southern region of Casamance remains an issue and continues to hamper its economic development. Over the past three decades, the Casamance region wavered between war and peace, with the conflict characterized by low level insecurity punctuated by occasional upsurges of violence and ceasefires. Key drivers of conflict include regional isolation and poor social service delivery, limited livelihoods opportunities, lack of transparency in land allocation, ethnic tensions and disaffected youth. Overall, significant challenges remain for equitable access to education, including insecurity and poverty, as well as lack of formal primary school in some communities, or a preference for religious education which parents can find in the koranic schools, called daara. There are also pockets of children who dropped out or never went to school (and may now be overage) and who lack a clear pathway for reintegrating formal schools. There is a need to provide all students with access to a quality education that not only contributes to students’ academic outcomes but also promotes the well-being of children.

This panel will start with a presentation on the development of the School Social and Emotional Learning Plan in Lebanon, based on the national SEL framework, followed by a presentation from the first SEL assessment in Lebanon designed to inform future SEL activities to ensure students’ well-being and learning in healthy and safe learning spaces. The panel will conclude with a presentation on the growth trajectories of SEL and academic outcomes for different non-formal education modalities implemented in Southern Senegal and offer insights into what factors contribute to the transition of students from the non-formal into the formal education system.

Sub Unit

• General Pool

Chair

• Yvonne Cao, FHI 360

Individual Presentations

• Piloting a School Social and Emotional Learning Plan (SSELP) in Lebanon - Lama Marji, World Learning; Samar Tawm, Ministry of Education and Higher Education of Lebanon

• Lebanon’s Social Emotional Learning Baseline - Mirvat Said Merhi, World Learning; Taline Tontian, World Learning; Georgia Hachem, Ministry of Education and Higher Education of Lebanon

• Growth trajectories in SEL and academic outcomes across non-formal education modalities in Southern Senegal - Yvonne Cao, FHI 360; Rafael Eduardo Contreras Gomez, FHI 360

Discussant

• Wendi Carman, World Learning