If you’re reading this, you’ve probably been through a lot in life. Whatever cards you were dealt, you did the best you could with what you were given. In the world we live in, there’s different levels to our situations and circumstances when it comes to socioeconomic status, household income, our neighborhood, city, culture and upbringing. We were all given facts of our lives at birth. We didn’t choose our circumstance. We didn’t choose our family. We didn’t choose our race, nor did we choose our surroundings. So, the ability to sympathize with a certain group of people or cause may depend on what you’ve overcome. However, no matter what you’ve gone through, you were always going through it while dealing with your emotions.

Social emotional learning (SEL) is probably the less discussed topic in the classroom and dinner table compared to basic subjects required to pass a grade. Yet, children experience emotions all throughout the day at home and at school. Our schools deal with the time frames the students are at school. However, children can experience some forms of dysfunction or trauma, but we expect them to attend school and excel in every subject. Are they equipped to compartmentalize how they are impacted by certain occurrences and truly focus and learn what’s being taught? Is it healthy to compartmentalize emotions to get through the day? 

SEL is one of the topics we hope to discuss and foster at our Parent University this school year. It has been integrated in our schools and we hope to further the education on it to our families and our community. According to casel.org, the image below is “the Collaborative Academic Social Emotional Learning wheel. The five core competencies, interrelated areas that support learning and development are at the center. Circling them are four key settings where students live and grow. School-family-community partnerships coordinate SEL practices and establish equitable learning environments across all of these contexts.”

Our goal is to build partnerships between families, our schools and community organizations to equip our children with the tools they need to not only excel in the classroom, but also in life. We acknowledge that families and caregivers are kids’ first teachers. The work at school becomes more challenging if there is a breakdown in the home. All involved in teacher-family partnerships benefit including the child. Our Parent University will focus on building multiple ongoing two-way communication avenues for teachers and families that allow them to work together for educational success.

We invite you to send ideas for roundtable topics and discussions for our Parent University. School is almost in, and we’d like to jumpstart the new academic year with momentum, new ideas, new goals, new tools and new resources. 

To help support our programs for Pekin Altrusa, please send checks to PO Box 3, Pekin, IL 61554.