I was a teacher, a principal, and a mother, and now I’m an expert in suicide prevention. After my 21-year-old son died by suicide, I wanted to know how that could have happened. In the years since then, I have passed on what I learned by teaching educators and parents how to prevent suicide.

One of the most important things I have learned is that social-emotional learning is just as important as academics and sports. Why? Because that’s how children learn coping skills, problem-solving skills, and resilience. It’s a way for children to know that mental health is as important as physical health. It should be part of the curriculum K-12.

If you have children in a public school in Arizona, you might already know that our new superintendent of schools plans to eliminate SEL in schools.

Tom Horne does not believe in SEL. And he doesn’t want to talk about it. He has vowed to remove SEL from every school in Arizona. His reasoning is based entirely on this statement:

“My heroes are math teachers who love math, history teachers who love history, and so on. A number have complained to me that they want to teach their subjects bell to bell but can’t because, under social-emotional learning, they have to play what they describe as ‘dumb games’ during class time.”

The following letter from a teacher written during his previous term in office, 2003-2011, is the source of his opinion:

“The end of the quarter is Friday. We have been focusing on social-emotional learning for weeks. Not a rigorous curriculum. Kids simply waste time digging deep into their identities. This has been going on for weeks. If parents knew our English curriculum is zero they would probably pull their students out. I am very concerned. It is as if America wants us to have dumb uneducated students in English class.”

“No wonder test scores dropped.” I’m not sure it this was Mr.  Horne’s comment or a teacher’s. The truth is, that if students are not emotionally and mentally healthy, they will not perform well academically. So maybe their scores dropped because the teachers did not care about the students, but only about their curriculum.

In spite of multiple attempts, Mr. Horne’s office refused to schedule a meeting with me to discuss my concerns about removing SEL from schools. I was hoping to learn if he was willing to show any flexibility since times have changed a great deal in the past 12 years, and we are currently experiencing a youth mental health crisis.

As a teacher and principal, I understand the frustration that some teachers have about all the instruction they have to pack into each class period. But I also believe SEL can be woven into the daily curriculum and is a vital component of education today. Schools can blend SEL into anything they teach during the day in many ways.

We cannot live in the past. We are experiencing a youth mental health crisis right now. The purpose of teaching SEL is to support students’ mental health, as well as help them build resilience and develop coping skills. Take a look at this report and share it with other teachers and parents: Youth Risk Behavior Survey: Data Summary & Trends Report (2011-2021). Also, this message from the CDC: CDC calls on schools to help address historic high teen trauma. We need to help Mr. Horne understand the current data.

Please call or write to Tom Horne to explain why he risks harming Arizona’s children by refusing to allow social and emotional learning programs in schools.

Theodora Schiro is the author of A Culture of Caring: A Suicide Prevention Guide for Schools (K-12).