Teacher and Social and Emotional Learning

The Teacher and Social and Emotional Learning 

Graduate Certificate 

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Engage students in social emotional learning.

During the last three decades, public schools have focused almost exclusively on cognitive academic outcomes. While some progress has been achieved, the consensus seems to be that a renewed emphasis on the whole student needs to be restored.

The Teacher and Social and Emotional Learning certificate provides you with requisite background knowledge, understanding and preparation to center social emotional learning to support your teaching and student learning.

At the end of this certificate, you should:

  • be better able to understand your own emotions in order to enable students to become more aware and understanding of their own and others’ emotions;
  • understand the concept of social-emotional well-being;
  • understand how to tailor social-emotional learning approaches for your own classroom.

We strongly encourage students to take the core courses in sequence.

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Paula Battistelli

Paula Battistelli

Course Descriptions

Asynchronous Subject Courses (2 Credits Each)

In this course, we elaborate on the need for the teacher to enhance their own knowledge of self, especially their own social and emotional terrain. A guiding premise is that deeper teacher self-understanding facilitates and enhances deeper student relations and creates greater chances for transformative possibilities for student and teacher. A related premise is that by examining our deeply held cherished beliefs and emotional responses to situations and texts, we create opportunities for further insights into ‘why’ and the ways we teach.

This course focuses on SEL for its most common audience––students in P-12 school-based contexts. We begin this exploration by introducing the concept of social-emotional well-being in week one. We explore what social-emotional well-being is and investigate the relationship between it and the current emphasis on "achievement" in educational reform. Then, we highlight SEL as one means of developing social-emotional well-being, positioning it in relation to other approaches. This course explores SEL for students and how programs and theories align.

This course invites critical questions related to traditional frameworks for SEL particularly in relation to race and culture. We dig deeper into how SEL has been taken up in schools and we explore ways in which teachers can tailor SEL approaches for their own classrooms. In addition, participants will critique current outcomes and assessment practices in SEL in light of race, class and culture in order to develop a nuanced set of competencies and assessment tools that are beneficial for your own classroom.

Synchronous Capstone Course (4 Credits)

This 4-credit course serves as the culminating experience for the certificate in Social and Emotional Learning. It builds upon the previous courses in the capstone by asking you to synthesize past course ideas and topics like outcomes and assessment in SEL, critiques of traditional SEL programs for teachers and students and the role of testimonio and other strategies as culturally responsive alternatives. You will create a showcase tool or plan that represents the learning you achieved throughout the certificate.

Visit the University Catalog for a complete summary of the program as well as its requirements, course descriptions and learning outcomes.