Preparing NOW to Address Students’ Social, Emotional, and Behavioral Needs Before They Transition Back to School (Part II)

Let’s Use Caring and Common Sense as Our Post-Pandemic Guides (A Bonus Podcast Included)

[CLICK HERE for the Full Blog Message]

Introduction

   Last time, in Part I of this Blog Series, I discussed concerns that some in the (popular) press are priming our schools for a post-pandemic rush of child and adolescent post-traumatic stress syndrome.

[CLICK HERE for Part I of this Blog Series]

   This sensationalism is being projected without objective data or past comparable experience.  As such, it creates a negative, perhaps self-fulfilling, search-for-the-deficits mindset, and it may result in a defensive, pathology-driven climate as our students walk back into their schools for the first time in five, six, or more months.

   As a school psychologist wanting to objectify the school re-entry process, I recommend—based, in part, on the Part I discussion, that—in August, September, or whenever our students return—educators need to:

• Plan from a strength-based perspective that recognizes and utilizes students’ social, emotional, and behavioral strengths. . . leaning in and building on these assets;

• Recognize the importance of creating immediate and sustained safe and supportive climates—from staff to students, students to students, and school to home;

• Allow students to discuss and debrief the pandemic’s past and present effects on their lives, to socially and emotionally re-connect with their peers and staff, and to (re-)establish the supportive interpersonal and academic routines and protocols that will help them successfully navigate the re-entry process and beyond;

• Realize that we will still be living in the shadow and context of the pandemic, that students (and staff) will need ongoing understanding and support, and that everyone has their own “timeline” relative to emotional response, recovery, and “normalization;”

• Prepare to formally or informally screen students for social, emotional, and/or behavioral distress. . . but ensure that such screenings involve multiple, objective, data-based assessments (including student interviews and observations) reflecting multiple school settings taken from multiple validating sources;

• Have a continuum of in-school and community-based social, emotional, and behavioral services, supports, strategies, and interventions prepared for students who demonstrate significant or persistent challenges (before and) during the post-pandemic transition back to school; and

• Understand that this “new normal” post-pandemic school and schooling world includes a “new normal” relative to the social, emotional, and behavioral status and needs of students (and staff)—and that these new norms will vary by students’ age, gender, culture, race, socio-economic backgrounds, home and family supports, and presence of medical conditions and other disabilities.

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   Critically, districts and schools need to begin (or continue their) planning right now to address these recommendations.

   But in doing so, they also need to recognize that there are no (social, emotional, behavioral, or SEL) programs to purchase or download to accomplish these tasks.

   Success here will require planning and implementing effective practices that are individualized to the students, staff, and families in everyone’s respective district or school.

   Success will not be accomplished by purchasing or downloading a generic program that has not been field-tested or proven for these conditions, and that may miss, be insensitive to, or exacerbate your needs.

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   Recall the point made in Part I of this Blog series. There are more than 40 different SEL frameworks—most that have never been extensively field-tested, and most that have not objectively demonstrated their ability to produce meaningful, observable student-centered success. . . much less sustained student social, emotional, or behavioral success.

   Indeed, in the last Blog, we quoted a Harvard Graduate School of Education group doing research in this area. They note on their website:

Throughout its history, the field of social and emotional learning (SEL) has been defined or characterized in a variety of ways. In some respects, the term SEL serves as an umbrella for many subfields with which many educators, researchers, and policy-makers are familiar (e.g., bullying prevention, civic and character education and development, conflict resolution, social skills training, life skills, “soft” or “non-cognitive” skills, 21st century skills). However, discussion of this broad non-academic domain lacks clarity about what we mean and is beset by dilemmas about how best to measure and promote skills in this area. Underlying this challenge, and in some ways compounding it, is the fact that the field more generally is structured around a large number of organizational systems or frameworks that often use different or even conflicting terminology to talk about a similar set of skills.

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Identifying Student Groups for Your Post-Pandemic Social, Emotional, and Behavioral Plan

   Districts and schools need to immediately begin (or continue) the planning for how to address students’ social, emotional, and behavioral post-pandemic transition and Fall re-entry back into school.

   This should involve administrators, related service personnel (i.e., counselors, school psychologists, social workers, and relevant community-based professionals), general and special education teacher representatives, and important others.

   Using a multi-tiered approach, the initial discussion should focus on preparing the services, supports, strategies, and interventions for students who had social, emotional, behavioral, or mental health needs prior to the January/February, 2020 “start” of the pandemic.

   Added to this preparation should be students known to develop similar needs during or due to the mid-March closing of school and/or to the concurrent sequestration or related COVID-19 events at home. These events might involve issues related to hunger and food insecurity, parental unemployment, nuclear or extended family members or friends becoming ill or hospitalized due to COVID-19, isolation from peers or the death of relative, or anxiety around school and academic standing.

   Finally, the planning should involve how to prepare, train, motivate, guide, and support all school staff in the activities and interactions that will, in turn, support students’ successful social, emotional, and behavioral transitions back to school, as well as their stability and progress beyond the first days and weeks.

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Important Activities to Include in Your Post-Pandemic Social, Emotional, and Behavioral Plan

   Beyond identifying—as recommended above—the different groups of students that will need services, supports, strategies, and interventions, some additional activities need to be included in the planning and preparation process.

   Here, both the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the National Association of School Psychologists (NASP) have provided great resources and guidance that districts and schools should integrate into their plans. Many of these resources are specific to the current pandemic, while others adapt long-standing work in how to assist students involved in medical and other large-scale crises or disasters.

   In one section, the CDC and NASP recommendations—as well as others—have been integrated into recommendations to help districts and schools best prepare for the first days and weeks when staff and students physically return to school—and then for the following second and third months.

[CLICK HERE for the Full Blog Message]

   In order to accomplish these activities, districts need to (a) have memoranda of understanding (MOUs) with agencies that have support personnel to help provide continuous social, emotional, behavioral, or mental health services; (b) systematically review the data from the data management tracking system discussed above; (c) continue to provide both individual and group services and interventions so that students can process and share their experiences in appropriate and supportive formats and settings; and (d) maintain effective communications with individual and groups of parents and other community leaders.

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Planning Resources: Talking with Students About the Pandemic during the School Re-Entry Process, and Helping Them Cope

   In a second and third section, the Full Blog Message provides links to and synthesizes the CDC and NASP resources and handouts—outlining the developmental differences across different student groups, what activities should occur, how to talk with students, and how to best help them cope with the social, emotional, and behavioral conditions that they are experiencing.

   In addition, the Full Blog Message provides an “advanced screening” of an upcoming podcast that I recently taped with Dr. Christopher Balow, the Chief Academic Officer at SchoolMint.

   The title of the podcast is:

Re-Opening Schools During the Pandemic: Students’ Social, Emotional, and Behavioral Needs

[CLICK HERE for the Full Blog Message]

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Summary

   In Part I of this Blog Series, we discussed concerns that some in the (popular) press are priming our schools for a post-pandemic rush of child and adolescent post-traumatic stress syndrome, but that such projections were not based on objective data or past comparable experiences.

[CLICK HERE for Part I of this Blog Series]

   In this Blog Part II, we provide detailed blueprints or check-lists on what district and school personnel need to (continue to) do now to plan and prepare staff for the most effective ways to address students’ social, emotional, and behavioral post-pandemic transition and Fall re-entry back into school.

   These blueprints include (a) how to identify different groups of students with social, emotional, behavioral, or mental health needs; (b) important activities that need to be included in the post-pandemic social, emotional, and behavioral plan; and (c) how to approach and talk with students during the initial re-entry process and thereafter.

   Critically, the recommended plans should involve how to prepare, train, motivate, guide, and support all school staff in the activities and interactions that will, in turn, support students’ successful social, emotional, and behavioral transitions back to school. . . as well as their stability and progress beyond the first days and weeks.

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   I hope that these two Blog messages are helpful to you. As an underlying theme, I want to emphasize that, while we need to prepare for this social, emotional, and behavioral transition on behalf of our students, we need to take an objective, developmentally-sensitive, and data-based perspective in how we plan and eventually respond to the real behaviors and needs that our students exhibit.

   Related to this is an emphasis that districts and schools need to prepare and implement effective, locally-sensitive, and student-focused practices. . . not global, canned, untested, or heavily marketed and frameworks or programs. And, once again, that the planning needs to occur now. . . so that the resources, preparation, and training can occur before our students come back.

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   As always, I appreciate the time that you invest in reading these Blogs, and your dedication to your students, your colleagues, and effective school and schooling practices—especially in the face of the challenges and competing priorities that we all are experiencing.

   Please feel free to send me your thoughts and questions. 

   And please know that I am always available to you through Zoom calls. . . if and when you need me. Contact me at any time.

Best,

Howie

Why is Education Week Sensationalizing Student Trauma During this Pandemic? (Part I)

Will Schools Re-Open Without Pathologizing their Students’ Emotional Needs?

[CLICK HERE for the Full Blog Article]

Introduction

   As a school psychologist and Past-President of the National Association of School Psychologists (NASP), the social, emotional, behavioral, and mental health reactions and needs of all children and adolescents (and their parents and families) during this pandemic is of great concern.

   But as I continue to virtually consult with my school districts and colleagues around the country, and as I lead three weekly MasterClass PLCs—helping administrators, teachers, and related service professionals plan for the post-pandemic re-opening of our schools. . .

. . . I consistently reassert the science-to-practice decision-making processes advocated by Dr. Anthony Fauci, Dr. Deborah Birx, and Governor Andrew Cuomo of New York.

   And yet, the popular education press—whether consciously or not—has not always practiced objective, data-based reporting especially when related to the social, emotional, behavioral, and mental health status of our nation’s students. 

The Continuum of Unobjective Reporting

   When faulty, unobjective reporting occurs (and note, it does not always happen), it occurs along a “continuum of culpability.”

   At one end of the continuum, some educational publications have (perhaps, inadvertently) practiced “sloppy writing.” This results in the appearance that the publication supports one or more specific social-emotional learning frameworks—including some that have never been validated or are not needed for the conditions described.

   For example, a promotional description of an Education Dive article published on May 15, summarizing a National Education Poll of 1,936 members about their top concerns as schools open post-pandemic, stated:

“As some schools reopen and others weigh the option, top concerns (among the NEA members in the poll) like widening equity gaps and lack of SEL supports as some students drop off the radar are being taken into consideration.”

   While the actual NEA Poll Analysis noted that 78% of the participating NEA members thought that the “Lack of built-in supports & social-emotional well-being of students” was a serious or very serious problem in their respective schools, the article never used the term or acronym SEL.

[CLICK HERE for the NEA document]

   Critically, if someone had not read the actual NEA article, the Education Dive description and article might have led them to believe that the NEA was endorsing the SEL framework—not a generic collection of social-emotional supports.

_ _ _ _ _

   In the middle of the continuum are publications that advocate for specific social-emotional learning frameworks because (a) they, for example, receive advertising, foundation, grant, or federal/state funding that influences this advocacy; or (b) they amass political, public, or social media attention for the same reason.

   Included here, for example, are a handful of professional education news organizations, foundations or independent thinktanks, and professional associations that publish news briefs or newsletters that appear objective, but are influenced for the reasons immediately above.

   Given their orientations and the current popularity of the term SEL, many of these groups reframe everything possible into that acronym—even though their real focus is on students’ social, emotional, and behavioral skills, functioning, and interactions.

   This can get quite confusing for the typical educator as a Harvard Graduate School of Education research group recently identified 40 different SEL frameworks.

   Representing this state of confusion, they stated:

Throughout its history, the field of social and emotional learning (SEL) has been defined or characterized in a variety of ways. In some respects, the term SEL serves as an umbrella for many subfields with which many educators, researchers, and policy-makers are familiar (e.g., bullying prevention, civic and character education and development, conflict resolution, social skills training, life skills, “soft” or “non-cognitive” skills, 21st century skills). However, discussion of this broad non-academic domain lacks clarity about what we mean and is beset by dilemmas about how best to measure and promote skills in this area. Underlying this challenge, and in some ways compounding it, is the fact that the field more generally is structured around a large number of organizational systems or frameworks that often use different or even conflicting terminology to talk about a similar set of skills.

   And yet often, the professional education news organizations, foundations or independent thinktanks, and professional associations that publish “new stories” that fit “their” conceptualization of “SEL” rarely:

• Discuss the complexity and confusion around this term;

• Disclose their financial supporters; or

• Describe the potential conflicts of interest around their work, or the fact that their goal is to guide readers toward their beliefs, or toward related publications that are being sold to generate profits.

_ _ _ _ _

   At the opposite end of the continuum are publications that knowingly promote or lead readers to (a) inaccurate conclusions; or (b) sensationalized or panic-driven emotions and decisions; and/or that encourage or reinforce (c) stereotypes, biases, or clinically perilous implications.

   For unsuspecting readers who trust these publications and/or who do not have the time or capacity to “fact check,” these conclusions, emotions, or stereotypes can lead to unfortunate or inappropriate decisions or actions that can harm students and/or delay the delivery of appropriate services, supports, programs, or interventions.

_ _ _ _ _

   But ultimately, the issue here is not the publishers, associations, organizations, or publications. Clearly, the First Amendment allows these publications, and a “public relations battle” with these groups is futile.

   The issue is the potential harm done to students, staff, and schools, and that educators must be vigilant for the misleading or biased publications, and must avoid their service delivery traps.

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Why is Education Week Sensationalizing the Pandemic’s Effects on Students ?

   So how did the topic for this Blog message originate?

   Last week (May 6, 2020), Dr. Kathleen Minke, a school psychologist and Executive Director of the National Association of School Psychologists, wrote a piece for Education Week.

   The substance and content in the article was excellent as it encouraged readers to recognize that school psychologists are available to help:

• Teachers adapt to virtual instruction, the delivery of services to students with disabilities, and ways to provide emotional support to students and their families;

• Parents and guardians create the best “home and school” schedules, structures, and settings to facilitate students’ academic progress and physical and emotional well-being;

• Students find the informal and formal supports they need when, for example, experiencing stress, loss, abuse, panic, or feelings of self-harm; and

• Schools get ready to evaluate the presence of students’ general and pandemic-specific social, emotional, behavioral, or mental health challenges when they return to school, and to address their root causes through strategic or intensive interventions.

   At the end of the article, Dr. Minke suggested that Districts must consciously address the psychological and emotional needs of both students and staff when planning the post-pandemic re-opening of their schools.

[CLICK HERE for the Full Blog Article with Dr. Minke’s Recommendations]

_ _ _ _ _

   So where’s the problem?

   The “problem” is the title of the piece:

The Pandemic Is Causing Widespread Emotional Trauma. Schools Must Be Ready to Help

   This title is sensationalized and irresponsible.

   This is because no one knows how many students have actually been traumatized by the pandemic.

   My points:

• First of all: I know of no schools in this country where students—at this point in time—have been formally and/or accurately evaluated to validate the clinical presence of emotional trauma.

• Second: Without these assessments—and a definition of “widespread”—no school psychologist that I know would characterize the current needs of our students as “widespread.”

• Third: Any assessment would need to review a student’s pre-existing social, emotional, and behavioral history and status, include observations and interviews, and involve multiple assessment instruments to “rule out” or “weigh in” any independent, comorbid, or combined physical, medical, or emotional factors or conditions related to the pandemic.

• Fourth: While a student might be traumatized by the pandemic itself (for example, due to an obsessive fear of getting sick), it is more likely that any confirmed traumas will be due to the effects of circumstances triggered by the pandemic.

Examples of such effects might include the death of a parent, domestic violence, physical abuse, witnessing illegal drug use, or the exacerbation of a pre-existing mental health condition due to social isolation.

• Finally: All of the principles and actions within the steps above are essential to determine (a) the actual presence of a student’s social, emotional, or behavioral concerns; (b) the root causes of any needs, and the depth, breadth, and severity of their impact; and (c) whether the needs can be successfully addressed by teachers as part of a whole-class intervention, or whether they require more specialized small group or individual interventions delivered by counselors, social workers, or school psychologists.

_ _ _ _ _

   Critically, the Education Week title increases the risk that educators will “pathologize” the emotional impact of how their students lived, learned, socialized, and survived their pandemic stay-at-home time and circumstances.

   And in this “frame of pathology,” it is likely that far too many students will be seen as being ill, having deficits, needing sympathy, or requiring “therapeutic” services “from the experts” than will actually be the case.

   Understand me clearly: When students have an objectively validated need for strategic or intensive clinical services—based on sound, multi-disciplinary assessments (see above), they should receive those services.

   But, as a school psychologist, understand that we need to immediately create and then sustain the positive, prosocial, relationship-driven school and classroom settings for all students on the first day that schools re-open. This should be a prerequisite to the multi-tiered, multi-disciplinary assessments that also should be available.

   Said a different way: Schools will need to consciously plan and help all students—from preschool through high school—to emotionally re-connect individually, socially, academically, within their peer and grade-level groups, and as a study body when they re-open.

   Schools need to approach their re-opening from a strengths-based perspective.

   Moreover, they need to understand that, when they return to school, students will exhibit different levels of social, emotional, and behavioral variability, and that this is normal and expected. We don't need to be giving them messages that they are somehow "emotionally broken."

   And so, our guiding planning templates and protocols should be similar to those used when students return to school from a natural disaster, a national or local tragedy, or a significantly stressful in-school event.

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Summary

   Lest you think that my critique above was aimed at my good colleague Dr. Minke, know that I e-mailed her earlier this week about the concerns expressed above. Moreover, I directly asked her where the headline in question originated.

   Her e-mail back stated:

Hi, Howie. I had nothing to do with either headline. Both were created by Ed Week. The point of the piece was preparation...for whatever a particular school and district might be facing. My current favorite metaphor from the online world: We are all in the same storm but we are not in the same boat. Kathy

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   There is an old adage in the media business: “If it bleeds, it leads.”

   This is not the time for the media to use fear, sensationalism, or emotional triggers to get attention, satisfy their funders or benefactors, or implicitly or explicitly “sell” their beliefs or orientations.

   This is the time for common sense, empathy, objectivity, facts, and data-based decision-making.

   We are all experiencing different social, emotional, and behavioral reactions and responses to the current pandemic and how it has affected our lives. We, as adults, understand what is happening far better than our children and adolescents.

   Let’s act as leaders and caring adults as we support our students through these times.

   Let’s understand and build on their existing and emerging strengths.

   Let’s “provide great benefits” and “do no harm” as we prepare to welcome our students back to school. . . socially, emotionally, behaviorally, as well as academically.

_ _ _ _ _

   I appreciate, as always, the time that you invest in reading these Blogs, and your dedication to your students, your colleagues, and the educational process— especially in the face of the challenges we all have recently experienced.

   Please feel free to send me your thoughts and questions. 

   And please know that—even during this time when most schools are closed for the rest of the year—I continue to be available to you through Zoom calls. . . if and when you need me. Contact me at any time.

Best,

Howie

[CLICK HERE for the Full Blog Article]