Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) is one of the most popular tools in education today. Promoted as a way to build emotional intelligence, empathy, and communication skills in the classroom, SEL programs like CharacterStrong and Second Step are being widely adopted in schools across the country. These curricula emphasize values like kindness, respect, and inclusion.
But when these programs are implemented without an honest, direct conversation about race and power, “kindness” can become a cover. A shield. A distraction. In too many classrooms, SEL is not a bridge to justice – it’s a bypass.
In majority-white districts and schools, SEL is often marketed as “unifying” and “safe.” But that safety often comes at the cost of truth. These programs tend to avoid naming racism, white supremacy, or the systems that continue to harm Black and Brown students. Instead, they emphasize “positive behavior,” “relationship building,” and “emotional control” – coded language that encourages conformity rather than critical thinking or resistance.
In these contexts, SEL can easily become a tool for tone-policing students of color. A Black student expressing justified anger about discrimination may be told to “stay calm” or “be respectful.” Meanwhile, the deeper issue is ignored.
When Kindness Is Weaponized:
“Just be kind.”
“We’re all human.”
“It won’t happen again.”
These sound nice. But when they’re used to silence students of color or sidestep conversations about injustice, they stop being kind. They become oppressive.
Many Black students know what it feels like to speak out and be told they’re being “too emotional,” “too aggressive,” or “too negative.” Their pain is reframed as a problem to manage rather than a reality to confront. The language of SEL is used to gaslight.
Without applying a socio-cultural lens to students’ lived experiences, acts of bias and bigotry risk being met with tolerance or silent acceptance and it reassures white students and staff that equity work is simply about being nice, not about interrupting and disrupting problematic situations rooted in racism, bigotry, and prejudice.
SEL that negates these realities adds insult to injury, operating on the false assumption that kindness alone – without transparency or a genuine willingness to understand – is enough. This default perspective comes from a lens untested by certain ugly and harmful human experiences, common for some and non-existent for others. These are experiences we have too often been conditioned to bypass or sweep under the rug.
If SEL is to serve all students – especially Black students – it must be rooted in anti-racism. This means naming racism when it happens. It means equipping students with the tools to call out injustice, not just manage their emotions in its wake. It means teaching adults to listen and respond, not dismiss and deflect.
True SEL includes emotional intelligence, yes. But also cultural awareness. Cultural competence. Restorative justice. Critical consciousness. And the understanding that feelings do not exist in a vacuum – they are shaped by power, privilege, and personal experience.
Classrooms should be where students are empowered to speak the truth and hold systems accountable. That’s the kind of emotional learning that changes lives and restrictive systems.
We don’t need less kindness – we need kindness with teeth and grit. Kindness that doesn’t crumble at hard truths. Kindness that sides with the hurt, not the comfortable. Kindness that makes room for righteous anger and insists on repair.
Because if our version of kindness requires silence, submission or the erasure of identity, then it’s not kindness at all. It’s control.