Guest Post: You can't spell WELS without SEL
A guest post... you, too, can submit a guest post to layman@nihilrule.com
Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) and WELS Teaching Standards
Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) has made a wide beachhead in the WELS, from high school (e.g. Wisconsin Lutheran High School delivers it “at each grade level”) to elementary schools, and even in Early Childhood Education. What is driving this campaign, in a documentary sense? What rule or mission statement has set the WELS on a seemingly-inevitable journey into SEL? The answer appears to be WELS Teaching Standard Two:
In particular, Standard Two states, "The
teacher understands how students learn and develop and provides instruction
that supports their spiritual, intellectual, physical, social, and emotional
growth." This would strongly imply that WELS schools must provide
“instruction that supports [students’] … social, and emotional growth” as a
matter of conformity to the Teaching Standard. From this perspective, the
Wisconsin Lutheran High School web site’s statement, “Social and emotional
learning and soft life skills are delivered at each grade level,” isn’t merely
an advertisement of services rendered, it comes across as a check-box assertion
of compliance.
The WELS Continuum of Teacher Development
expands upon Standard Two, as follows:
Note that item 2.1, which is incorporated directly from the WELS Teaching Standard, as previously shown, references assessments of “individual and group performance” for the purpose of designing instruction which meets student needs, to include social and emotional learning. At the highest-performing (Innovating) stage, this means the teacher “Promotes each student’s spiritual[,] intellectual, physical, social, and emotional development by selecting appropriate assessment tools, correctly interpreting results, and delivering effective instruction.”
The causal link between the WELS Teaching
Standard, its expanded form in the WELS Continuum of Teacher Development, and
its implementation by teachers at the individual WELS schools, is illustrated
in the WELS Ministerial Growth and Evaluation Process.
Training Module 2, titled “Supervision for Teacher Growth – A Formative
Process,” states, “Supervision for Teacher Growth concerns how principals,
early childhood directors, mentors, or instructional coaches observe teachers,
gather teaching data, and conduct post-observation conferences to help teachers
reflect on and grow in their ministries. The recorded data from observations
and coaching conversations provide context for individual ministry development
plans.” In “The Big Picture,” these Ministry Development Plans are downstream
from, and ultimately driven by, the WELS Teaching Standards, as illustrated in
Module 2:
Training Module 3, titled “Ministry
Development Plans,” contains a sub-section on MDP Format which necessitates
connecting a goal “to at least two of the WELS Teaching Standards.”
Thus, the WELS Teaching Standards, which include the promotion of Social and Emotional Learning (SEL), are influencing – and apparently driving – “Teacher Development” and the goals of such “Ministry Development Plans”. In other words, once the Teaching Standards were set, the processes underlying “Teaching Development” and “Ministry Development” have made it inevitable that such content would be disseminated thoroughly into the pedagogy of the WELS, as a matter of procedural compliance.
If, therefore, the development of WELS
teachers and their implementation of such plans in WELS schools is a direct
outgrowth of the WELS Teaching Standards, then the genesis of those standards
is of crucial importance. Where did they come from? The document itself
contains the answer:
In particular, “This document is based on the New Teacher Center Continuum of Teacher Development, 2009,” with modifications made under license by the WELS. As previously shown, the WELS Continuum of Teacher Development document likewise states, “Based on the New Teacher Center Continuum of Development, 2009.” Given that the New Teacher Center is ultimately the fountainhead of an educational philosophy being mainlined into the WELS through teacher development and the implementation of its standards in schools, it seems necessary to ask what this influential organization is and whether they have any sort of agenda.
Influence Watch lists the California-based New Teacher Center as an “Education-related advocacy group,” with the following summary:
"New Teacher Center is a left-leaning teacher training and advocacy group that was founded in the 1990s to provide training towards early-career teachers with the goal of increasing the average length of the career of a new teacher. The organization has continued to focus on coaching programs for teachers and has partnered with school districts to promote left-of-center diversity, equity, and inclusion training programs in public school systems across the United States. The organization receives federal funding as well as grants from many of the largest left-of-center grant making organizations in the United States, such as the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation."
With regard to Social and Emotional Learning (SEL), in particular, the New Teacher Center has apparently been at the forefront of this trend, because the NTC website states that they received a $7.9 million federal implementation grant in 2020:
“Through SEL-anchored instructional support for coaches, teachers, and school leaders, the data-driven approach opens up new pathways to steer instruction practices, improve learning, transform school culture, and retain teachers by meeting systemically underserved students’ needs.”
This is relatively recent, but presumably the 2020 grant was awarded in recognition of ongoing work the New Teacher Center had been doing, and it is clear that the fundamental concept of SEL was already incorporated in the 2009 Teaching Standards.
Indeed, already prior to the grant, there was a clear and troubling indicator that the intent to “transform school culture” was to be understood in light of an avowedly-racist philosophy adopted by the New Teacher Center:
“NTC wrote a new
mission statement: ‘to disrupt the predictability of educational inequities for
systemically underserved students by accelerating educator effectiveness.’ The
executive team was reformed to comprise entirely people of color, with decades
of experience in the work of educational equity and justice.”
The New Teacher Center’s 2021 Annual Report elaborates on this. The following excerpts are from pages 23-25:
“SEL is a critical mechanism to disrupt the predictable inequities experienced by our priority student communities: BIPOC students, immigrant students, multilingual learners, students with learning differences, and students experiencing poverty. NTC’s Education Innovation and Research grant amplifies our Centering Students Tool alongside our Analyzing Student Learning dashboard by incorporating student feedback and assembling whole-person data to inform instructional practices….
“We’re empowering teachers to document and understand their students using academic performance and contextual factors. By integrating motivators, social-emotional competencies, and personal narratives alongside classroom performance, teachers are well-positioned to plan strengths-based and asset-minded learning goals for each student….
“The five-year grant will explore how to support district leaders in creating and sustaining the enabling structures and conditions for success. In addition, it will provide educators and school leaders with professional learning support that anchors SEL in instructional practice through the use of data….
“Traditionally, school systems analyze summative data in isolation. This approach provides a limited understanding of students; they’re unique and complex people. Students drop breadcrumbs of data every day through their work — interim assessment performance, behavior patterns, and more. Stitching the summative, interim, and daily data together with student perspectives provides a clearer picture of our students’ unique learner profiles. Such a powerful, holistic view helps us identify the best instructional path forward.
“Starting last year,
Smarter Balanced and NTC are working across three state education departments
to connect assessment system data to professional learning opportunities that
support student needs and learning. We believe this approach empowers educators
to consume, curate, and interpret data and increase school systems’ capacity
for impact.”
Thus, SEL is at least in part about gathering data on students, ostensibly for use by educators, but with the promise of taking the data out of “isolation” in a particular school system, “Stitching the summative, interim, and daily data together with student perspectives” to form a “powerful, holistic view” – but toward disruptive ends, in accordance with their agenda.
On the personnel level, one example of an executive at New Teacher Center is Mary Kelly Persyn “(She/Her)”, whose professional profile indicates a tenure at NTC of nearly 5 years, rising to the position of Vice President of Legal & Strategic Advocacy. Her “About” statement on LinkedIn includes the following:
“As a lawyer,
advocate, speaker, and author, I’m deeply passionate about racial and social
justice, education equity, children’s rights, and LGBTQ rights…. As a lawyer,
I’ve handled government enforcement litigation and appellate practice at Am Law
100 firms as well as a combination of in-house counsel and amicus/advocacy work
for civil rights, social justice, and children’s rights. I bring extensive
knowledge about adverse childhood experiences and toxic stress, as well as
critical race theory and social justice knowledge (and orientation), to my
matters…. As of August 2024, I am a Commissioner of the Sexual Orientation and
Gender Identity Commission of the American Bar Association.”
In 2021, while serving in her capacity as Vice President of the New Teacher Center, Persyn moderated a conference hosted by her chapter of “the nation’s leading progressive legal organization” (https://getinvolved.acslaw.org/component/events/event/927), the American Constitution Society, on the following topic:
"Across the nation, the battle over public school districts allegedly teaching Critical Race Theory is raging, but the students themselves are glaringly missing from the adults' battle.... Partisans claim that concepts and practices like equity, culturally responsive teacing, and social-emotional learning are 'Marxist' and inappropriate for the classroom. What does the evidence say?"
One can only assume that the question is answered in the title of the event itself: "Children in Crossfire: How the Battle over 'Critical Race Theory' In K-12 Education Hurts Students."
The New Teacher Center’s founder and CEO, Ellen Moir, retired in 2018. There was an outward shift in focus thereafter, with the 2019 mission statement and related developments, but to what extent this represented a break with the past or simply a more-open acknowledgment of the direction and philosophy that had been underlying the organization is unclear. 2019 was the year of the “1619 Project” that stoked the intellectual fires which ultimately manifested themselves in the real burning of cities the following summer, in the wake of the death of George Floyd. In that context, the adoption of racially-charged language by the NTC could simply have been a reflection of a trend that made it safe, or even politically expedient, for those in left-leaning educational circles to be less guarded with respect to their philosophy.
This may be substantiated by a more recent
trend in the other direction. The previously-reproduced quote and excerpt from
the New Teacher Center’s organizational history was initially accessed in
December 2024 and January 2025. As of February 2025, under the new presidential
administration of Donald Trump, key aspects have been deleted (https://newteachercenter.org/about-us/our-history/).
These include the entire 2019-specific entry discussing the new mission
statement and the reference to SEL regarding the 2020 grant:
In other words, with the political winds having shifted to the right for the time being, and federal grants receiving significant scrutiny, the New Teacher Center is redacting its previous-published history in order to make it look less radical. This lends credence to the possibility its pre-2019 leanings were similarly concealed, until the time appeared socially and politically expedient to reveal them.
Why is any of this important for the WELS? It would seem that the WELS adopted a pedagogical framework from a left-wing organization with a level of scrutiny or oversight that appears to have been wholly inadequate. Perhaps it could be argued that, at one point, the New Teacher Center had enough of a fig leaf over their ideas to make them seem harmless. However, by the time of the 2020s-era push for SEL in WELS schools, the corrupt ideology of the New Teacher Center was openly on display.
The fountainhead for the very Teaching
Standards, underlying the adoption of SEL at WLHS and other WELS schools, is
manifestly a poisoned tree. Regardless of whatever attempt may have been made
to add a Christian veneer to some of the details, the continued foisting of its
fruit upon schools throughout the WELS, and upon its children, represents – at
the very least – negligence of the highest order.
...
Appendix I: SEL and Artificial Intelligence (AI)
The collection of such broad and varied data, along with the desire to analyze it, may lend itself to an application for artificial intelligence (AI). The New Teacher Center website, per se, does not make this explicit, but various sources indicate that this is an ongoing research effort. One example is the following popularized article from eLearning Industry (“AI-Powered SEL: Nurturing Well-Rounded Students In K-12Education”,):
“With SEL becoming integral in K-12 education, schools across North America (NAM) are increasingly focusing on nurturing students' emotional intelligence alongside cognitive skills. Historically, education systems emphasized academic achievement over emotional development. However, modern educators now recognize the need for a balanced approach that fosters both intellectual and emotional growth. In this context, Artificial Intelligence (AI) is playing a transformative role, especially in K-12 education. Through AI-enhanced learning tools, educators can more effectively support students' social-emotional development, preparing them for success both in and out of the classroom….
“AI-powered tools can now assess students' emotional states by analyzing verbal responses, written text, and even facial expressions. Using Machine Learning models like Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) and Recurrent Neural Networks (RNNs), these tools detect emotional cues revealed when students feel frustrated, engaged, confused, or happy. This real-time analysis helps teachers identify when students may need additional emotional support, enabling timely interventions that promote a positive, supportive learning environment….
“One of the most impactful applications of AI-enhanced learning is the personalization of SEL learning plans. AI systems can analyze each student's interactions, behaviors, and emotional responses to tailor activities and reflections that support individual SEL goals. By examining past and present data, AI algorithms, including predictive analytics, offer targeted exercises for students who may need help managing stress, building self-regulation, or improving social skills…. This level of personalization ensures a unique SEL journey for each student, enhancing their emotional and social development.”
The foregoing is a summary article for the general public, but some examples of recent academic papers, published in 2024 and early 2025, include the following (listed chronologically):
Lipovec, et al., “AI Literacy Meets Socio-Emotional Learning: Assessing Transformative Educational Practices in Slovenia,” Proceedings of the 18th International Technology, Education and Development Conference (Valencia, Spain: March 4-6, 2024), pp. 4295-4299.
Akintayo, et al., “Integrating AI with emotional and social learning in primary education: Developing a holistic adaptive learning ecosystem,” Computer Science & IT Research Journal, Vol. 5, No. 5 (May 2024), pp. 1076-1089.
Sethi and Jain, “AI technologies for social emotional learning: recent research and future directions,” Journal of Research in Innovative Teaching & Learning, Vol. 17, No. 2 (May 2024), pp. 213-225.
Shi, “The Integration of Advanced AI-Enabled Emotion Detection and Adaptive Learning Systems for Improved Emotional Regulation,” Journal of Educational Computing Research, November 2024.
Indellicato, “Artificial Intelligence and Social-Emotional Learning: What Relationship?” Journal of Modern Science, Vol. 60, No. 6 (December 2024), pp. 460-470.
Yana-Salluca, “Integration of artificial intelligence and socio-emotional development in university students from southern Peru,” Sapienza: International Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies, Vol. 6, No. 1 (January 2025), e25006.
Henriksen, et al., “Social-Emotional Learning and Generative AI: A Critical Literature Review and Framework for Teacher Education,” Journal of Teacher Education, Vol. 76, No. 3 (March 2025), pp. 312-328.
Zong and Yang, “How AI-Enhanced Social-Emotional Learning Framework Transforms EFL Students’ Engagement and Emotional Well-Being,” European Journal of Education Research, Development and Policy, Vol. 60, No. 1 (March 2025), e12925.
Comments
Post a Comment