Education Committee
JOINT FAVORABLE REPORT
Bill No.: HB-6557
Title: AN ACT CONCERNING SOCIAL AND EMOTIONAL LEARNING.
Vote Date: 3/29/2021
Vote Action: Joint Favorable Substitute Change of Reference to Appropriations
PH Date: 3/8/2021
File No.:
Disclaimer: The following JOINT FAVORABLE Report is prepared for the benefit of the
members of the General Assembly, solely for purposes of information, summarization and
explanation and does not represent the intent of the General Assembly or either chamber
thereof for any purpose.
SPONSORS OF BILL:
Education Committee
REASONS FOR BILL:
Section 1: Requires boards of education to annually administer a universal mental health and
resiliency screening, including a COVID-19 pandemic stress and trauma assessment, to all
students.
Section 2, 8: Require each board of education to maintain, within available resources, the
following staffing ratios beginning with the 2021-2022 school year: a minimum of one school
counselor, one social worker, and one family therapist for every 250 students, as well as a
minimum of one school psychologist for every 500 students and a paraeducator to student ratio
as recommended by a nationally recognized paraeducator effectiveness organization. BOEs can
apply for an SDE grant for funding to hire additional staff. Also requires all memos of
understanding between BOEs and local law enforcement agencies to require SROs to complete
the same social-emotional training provided to teachers and administrators.
Sections 3, 5: Requires SDE to establish a state-wide social-emotional support program that
provides support and assistance to local BOEs and, by Oct. 2021, student social emotional
learning standards for grades 4 through 12.
Section 4: Requires each local BOE to develop and implement a comprehensive school
counseling program.
Section 6-7: Adds measures of social-emotional learning to the state-wide performance plan and
requires the SEL Collaborative to convene a working group to study the state statute related to
school bullying and school climate plans and make recommendations and provide technical
support to local districts regarding adoption of the CT Model School Climate Policy.
Sections 9-11: Integrates social-emotional learning into teacher professional development and
requires school districts educational goals to include social-emotional learning in professional
development.
Sections 12-13: School Paraeducator Advisory Council study of standards, pay, and other issues
related to paraeducators.
Section 14: Requires safe school climate committees to include at least one teacher appointed by
the teachers union and medical and mental health staff assigned to the school
Section 15: SBE in collaboration with the Social-Emotional Learning Collaborative will develop
and adopt a model curriculum that integrates social-emotional learning, including strategies to
help students who have experienced trauma
Section 16: Appropriates $10 million in each year FY of the biennium (FYs 22 and 23) to
implement the statewide social-emotional learning program.
RESPONSE FROM ADMINISTRATION/AGENCY:
Charlene Russell-Tucker, Acting Commissioner, State Department of Education:
Mandating specific ratios ignores the need for districts flexibility to determine and acquire the
specific expertise found in student support personnel according to the needs of their student
population. District leadership must be able to maintain staffing that is responsive to the
needs of their students and families. Social-emotional learning measures need greater
evidence of psychometric validity and reliability before they can be considered for inclusion in
high state accountability systems. Removing multiple academic indicators without revisiting
the overall approach to evaluations could create challenges with summative ratings, placing
greater emphasis on the observation and performance portion of the guidelines. Student
learning objectives should be created by individual educators, informed by data from their
specific students. The role of school counselors should not be dictated uniformly. (Many of
these concerns seem to have been addressed by the substitute language)
Sarah Healy Eagan, Acting Child Advocate, Office of the Child Advocate:
We are long overdue for the meaningful investment in social-emotional learning that our
children, and educators, need and deserve. Many schools in Connecticut, including
elementary schools, do not have access to school counselors and do not have
comprehensive school counseling programs. Teachers and other educational staff also need
to us to make sure that support staff is available in schools to meet individually with children,
help connect families to needed resources, and offer support and strategies to educators and
administrators so they can best meet the needs of their students.
Steven Hernndez, Executive Director, CWCSEO:
This bill directly aligns with their priorities, including eliminating disparities regarding
educational opportunities and child wellbeing. Evidence-based SEL programming correlates
to long-term success, reduced poverty and improved economic mobility. SEL is also a tool for
improving school climate, building connectedness, and addressing forms of inequity. This bill
would expand on the work many teachers and schools are already doing to bring SEL into
the classroom, while aiming to provide equitable access to an important, life-long skillset.
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NATURE AND SOURCES OF SUPPORT:
School Counselors: Leonard J. Adams; Heather Casale, Coventry High School;
Kostandina DeRosa, Shelton Public Schools; Edward Hilser, Shelton High School;
Sarah Magilnick; Suzanne R. Robinson, H. C. Wilcox Technical High School;
Mary Schone; Patricia Thomas, Helen Keller Middle School
Counselors are reaching out daily to reconnect and re-engage students to school. They are
learning of unique family circumstances brought about by Covid-19, and they are
communicating these issues to school administration and teaching staff while always playing
a role in subsequent intervention strategies and academic support. This bill will allow all our
students in Connecticut can have access to a school counselor and comprehensive
programs.
Stephen Anderson, President, CSEA SEIU Local 2001;
Carl Chisem, President, Municipal Employees Union Independent, SEIU Local 506;
Jennifer Corbiel, Paraprofessional; Malissa Harber, Paraprofessional;
Shellye Davis, President, Hartford Federation of Paraeducators Local 2221;
Zak Leavy, Legislative & Political Coordinator, AFSCME Council 4;
Loretta Lechner, ParaProfessional; John Murphy, United Auto Workers Local 376;
Linda Pasquariello, Paraprofessional;
Cynthia Ross Zweig, President, Paraeducator Council, CSEA SEIU Local 2001;
Marta Shepard, EVP, Hartford Federation of Paraeducators Local 2221;
Mary Yordon, Divisional Vice President, AFT Connecticut
Although paraeducators perform some of the most important duties in our schools, they are
consistently underpaid, undertrained, and underappreciated. This bill will begin to improve the
work and career development of paraeducators. It will start the process of designing
program-specific minimum employment standards, professional development opportunities
that will support the standards, and teacher professional development on how to maximize
the use of paraeducators in the classroom.
Kristine Anthis, Professor of Psychology, Southern Connecticut State University;
Jennifer Babb, Teacher; Brianna Barkauskas, Wolcott High School; Gabriel Chase;
Danielle Cornish; Sarah L. Evans Zalewski, Clinical Counselor; Arielle Holloway;
Kathryn Goldberg, ADCCA, Achievement First Amistad High School; Wilson Lima;
June Kozloski, Teacher; Christina Lavigne; Joseph Luchene; McKenzie Newton;
Erik Martire Interim K-12 School Counseling Curriculum Leader, SPS; Cory Rioux;
Marte Ostvik-de Wilde, Director of School Counseling, University of Saint Joseph;
Jennifer Parzych, School Counseling Program Coordinator, SCSU; Rae Slattery
Jill Portera, Teacher; Nicole Swan, Teacher; Andrea Woodman Osker
Fewer than 25% of elementary schools in CT have a school counselor. Counselors impact
positively the academic achievement of their students; students greater success turns into
later greater successes, which is good for the students, their families, and all citizens. When
school counselors have enough time to engage in direct services with their students the data
show they clearly provide invaluable career and emotional support. Our students need more
from their school counselors, and their counselors can give them more if the state supports
bills like this one.
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John Board: Coming out of the pandemic it is essential that we have support systems in
place for our k-12 students, so then we can set them up for success and they can reach their
full potential. If we have learned anything from the last year it is the importance of human
connection and to be more compassionate towards each other.
Amanda Brenner, National Alliance on Mental Illness Connecticut; Tom Lawless;
Robert Keder, Developmental-Behavioral Pediatrician, CT Childrens Medical Center;
Hilary Meza; Daniel Pearson, State Director, Educators for Excellence-Connecticut;
Rakshita Ramakrishna, Mayors Youth Leadership Council
By providing SEL education, we are investing in our states youth. We are putting faith in their
goodness and talents. Not only is this the right thing to do to improve quality of life for
everyone in the school system and the secondary actors who have relationships with these
children, but it will save the state a considerable sum. This bill will establish a universal
behavioral health and resiliency screening and include in student success plans an
assessment of students school connectedness and risk of suicide, are positive steps that
have the potential to help children.
Connecticut School Counselor Association: Samantha Collins, Board of Directors;
Michelle Catucci, Director of School Counseling; Lisa Kilcourse, VP Fairfield County;
Virginia A. DeLong, Government Relations & Advocacy Chairman; Erin Severns
Eileen Melody, Governing Board; Kaitlin Smedberg, Treasurer; Sharon Veatch,
Executive Board; Curtis Darragh IV, Middle Level Liaison;
Kiley Flynn, Graduate Student Liaison
Connecticut is 37th in the nation in student to school counselor ratios at 457:1. School
counseling positions were cut in some districts during a global pandemic in which the
students of Connecticut need access to social emotional, academic, and career support more
than ever. Funding needs to be directed towards student support services. It is unfair and
unethical that students must bear economic and health-related stress with less support.
Peg Donohue, School Counseling Program Coordinator, CCSU:
We're ready to train the next generation of school counselors at the 5 universities with
graduate programs that lead to 068 certification. Our current students are courageous,
generous, knowledgeable, patient, and well informed about what works in schools. They will
help diversify the profession in our state. Most importantly, they are ready to be the person
they needed when they were younger.
Special Education Equity for Kids in Connecticut: We have made schools the first
responders for students with emotional needs. Community mental health services are limited,
underfunded, and ill-equipped to deal with the tremendous need that exists. This bill creates
a needed screening mechanism and embeds social emotional learning and restorative justice
in all elements of the educational establishment. Social-emotional supports are a way to
finally rid Connecticut schools of exclusionary discipline.
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Connecticut Education Association: Tom Nicholas, Vice President; Robyn Kaplan-Cho;
Kate Field, Teacher Development Specialist
This bill 7 lays the foundation for the safe space schools need to explore innovative ways to
support students SEL needs. The overemphasis on testing, implicit bias, curriculum pacing
guides, developmentally inappropriate academic standards in the early grades, reduced
recess and play-time, more homework, and a punitive educator evaluation system has made
schools more stressful, less joyful places to learn and work.
Glenn Lungarini, Executive Director, CAS-CIAC:
Provide our boards of educations and superintendents with the fiscal resources necessary to
drive change. Reimagine educator evaluation to support principals in implementing innovative
pedagogical practices and school culture designs that inspire our teachers as well as our
students. Repurpose the use and pressures of standardized testing so that it becomes a
meaningful tool for our educators and students that drives learning experience beyond
individual limits, while providing structured support.
Hamish MacPhail, Policy and Research Director, ConnCAN;
Kathryn Scheinberg Meyer, Director, Speak Up Initiatives, CCA
This bill completes a mental health audit for all CT students, which helps professionals set a
baseline for student need. Our students will benefit from meeting, learning about and
receiving support from mental health professionals. This work will help support student
academic goals and outcomes as they will be in a better mental state to access lessons.
Rebecca Ruitto, Chair, Connecticut Association for Marriage and Family Therapy:
This bill would directly create supports for our students through the strengths that school
MFTs provide. As we recovery from the COVID-19, we anticipate our students emotional and
mental health needs will increase as well. They recommend the language in the bill be
modified from family therapists to marriage and family therapists to accurately reflect
qualifications and professional titles.
Lauren Ruth, Research & Policy Director, Connecticut Voices for Children:
They applaud language in this bill mandating that districts budget funding to support more
school counselors, family therapists, psychologists, and paraeducators in schools to partner
with families in supporting students mental health and social-emotional health needs. They
also suggest removing police from school staffing altogether. The intent of this bill is to
reduce the impact of trauma on childrens education and keeping SROs in schools works
against that goal.
NATURE AND SOURCES OF OPPOSITION:
Ronald Goodmaster; Anne Manusky, President, Connecticut Republican Assembly
This bill pushes non-academic teaching of emotional regulation under the guise of Social
Emotional Learning, now called Social and Emotional Learning, improvements, therein, as
well as increased data collection via surveys. SEL, is not education but is the psychological
manipulation of children. We need to repeal our Common Core Standards.
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Connecticut Association of Boards of Education, Inc.;
Fran Rabinowitz, Executive Director, CT Association of Public School Superintendents
As budgets are being developed, we know that many districts are seeking more positions to
support student and staff. Mandating ratios does not provide the flexibility needed by districts.
Additional mandates on the amount of time a counselor spends on different responsibilities in
their day will confine the delivery of services. (These concerns seem to have been addressed
by the substitute language)
Jennifer Jacobsen: This is a very well-intended, poorly thought out, poorly crafted piece of
legislation that has no hope of implementation by July 2021 in any district because there is no
time nor money to implement it. It does not fund its own purpose, is not rooted in any analysis
of a needs assessment, does not contain an evaluation of effectiveness provision for ongoing
support or lack thereof, amends our State Plan under ESSA of which there is no authority to
do, and will cause massive FY22 budget deficits in your districts and communities.
Reported by: Dallas Emerle Date: 4/5/2021
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Statutes affected:
Raised Bill: 10-233m, 10-203c, 10-155k
ED Joint Favorable Substitute Change of Reference: 10-233m, 10-155k