ESSA and Social Emotional Learning: Indicators and Funding

By the Transforming Education editorial team. Reviewed for accuracy against the sources listed below.

The Every Student Succeeds Act opened a door for social emotional learning by requiring every state to judge schools on at least one measure beyond test scores and graduation, and it left the choice of what goes through that door to states. A decade on, the pattern is clear: states measure attendance and climate, not students' SEL skills, and districts fund SEL mostly through existing Title programs. This guide explains the law, what states did with it, where the money is, and what district leaders should do.

What ESSA requires

ESSA is Public Law 114-95, the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act approved on December 10, 2015. Its accountability provisions live in 20 U.S.C. 6311(c)(4). Each state must build a system of annual meaningful differentiation of schools using:

1. Academic achievement, measured by proficiency on state assessments, with growth optional for high schools.
2. For elementary and middle schools, student growth or another valid, reliable statewide academic indicator.
3. For high schools, the four-year adjusted cohort graduation rate, with an extended-year rate optional.
4. Progress in achieving English language proficiency.
5. Not less than one indicator of school quality or student success that allows for meaningful differentiation, is valid, reliable, comparable and statewide, and is used for each grade span. The statute says it may include student engagement, educator engagement, student access to and completion of advanced coursework, postsecondary readiness, school climate and safety, or any other indicator the state chooses that meets those requirements.

Section (c)(4)(C) sets the weights: each of the first four indicators gets substantial weight, and in the aggregate they must receive much greater weight than the school quality or student success indicator. State report cards must show the indicator disaggregated by student subgroup.

Nothing in the statute mentions social and emotional learning by name. The opening was the phrase "school climate and safety" and the catch-all "any other indicator."

What states actually chose for the fifth indicator

Several organizations tracked state plans as they were approved in 2017 and 2018. The counts differ slightly by date and definition, so we report them side by side.

Sources: Learning Policy Institute, Education Evolving, Education Commission of the States.

The Learning Policy Institute also found that only five states committed to using all five of its tracked equity measures for identification or improvement, and that 10 of the 24 states with a school climate measure explicitly mentioned providing resources and support for students' social and emotional learning.

Surveys specifically got a closer look from FutureEd. Its December 2019 report Walking a Fine Line, by Phyllis Jordan and Laura Hamilton, found 13 states gauging school climate or engagement through annual surveys of students, teachers and parents, of which eight (Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Maryland, Montana, New Mexico, North Dakota and South Carolina) included survey results in accountability. Weights were low: typically 5 to 10 percent of a school's score, with Iowa at 18 percent for elementary and middle schools and 8 percent for high schools, and North Dakota at 30 and 20 percent. Illinois counts only participation in its survey, not results. Nevada initially gave a small bonus for administering surveys and then filed amendments to remove them. The 74 reported in August 2018 that only eight states adopted a climate measure at all, quoting Linda Darling-Hammond that climate is hard to add to accountability if a state is not already measuring it statewide.

What no state did, as far as we could verify, was rate schools on students' SEL skill scores. The 74's December 2017 coverage of the RAND evidence review noted that most states left SEL out of accountability, citing fears the data could be corrupted under high stakes. The research behind that fear is covered below.

Funding streams that can support SEL

RAND's evidence review for The Wallace Foundation, led by Sean Grant and Laura Hamilton, maps the three main ESSA titles that can fund SEL. The statutory language, which we checked directly, is summarized with it.

Title I, Part A

RAND reports that Title I authorized about $62.5 billion between 2017 and 2020 in formula grants. SEL fits in three places. Schoolwide programs under 20 U.S.C. 6314(b)(7)(A)(iii) may include counseling, school-based mental health programs, specialized instructional support services, mentoring services, and other strategies to improve students' skills outside the academic subject areas, as well as a schoolwide tiered model to prevent and address problem behavior. Targeted assistance programs can do the same for identified students. And states must set aside 7 percent of Title I for school improvement in the lowest-performing schools; RAND notes that a school whose needs assessment shows discipline, absenteeism, engagement or climate problems can write SEL interventions into its improvement plan, but every federally funded improvement plan must include at least one intervention with strong, moderate or promising evidence.

Title II, Part A

RAND reports about $11.1 billion authorized over 2017 to 2020 for educator preparation, training, recruitment and retention. The local uses of funds in 20 U.S.C. 6613(b)(3) include high-quality personalized professional development; training on when and how to refer students affected by trauma or at risk of mental illness and on linking them to services; addressing issues related to school conditions for student learning, such as safety, peer interaction, drug and alcohol abuse and chronic absenteeism; programs that may include multi-tier systems of support and positive behavioral interventions and supports; and feedback mechanisms to improve school working conditions. Most uses must be evidence-based to the extent the state determines such evidence is reasonably available. This is the stream districts most often use for SEL coaching; Austin Independent School District paid some of its SEL coaches from federal Title II professional development funds, according to a Bridgespan profile.

Title IV, Part A

The Student Support and Academic Enrichment grants are the stream written with school conditions in mind. RAND reports that Title IV authorized more than $7.3 billion over four years and that districts must spend at least 20 percent of their grant on a well-rounded education, at least 20 percent on safe and healthy students, and a portion on effective use of technology, with districts receiving more than $30,000 required to conduct a needs assessment. The safe and healthy students activities in 20 U.S.C. 7118 include school-based mental health services with early identification of symptoms; partnerships with mental health providers using evidence-based trauma-informed practices; mentoring and school counseling for all students; improving instructional practices for developing relationship-building skills such as effective communication; bullying and harassment prevention; suicide prevention and crisis management training; trauma-informed classroom management training; a plan to reduce exclusionary discipline; and schoolwide positive behavioral interventions and supports. The statute never says "social and emotional learning," but almost every component of a schoolwide SEL plan appears on this list.

What counts as evidence

ESSA's definition of evidence-based, in Title VIII section 8002(21)(A) and quoted in the RAND review, has four levels:

The What Works Clearinghouse maps its ratings to the tiers: Tier I requires a study meeting WWC standards without reservations, a statistically significant positive effect, at least 350 students and at least two sites; Tier II requires a study meeting standards with or without reservations plus the same sample and site conditions.

RAND's review searched more than 24,000 citations, assessed 4,943 in full text, and found 150 eligible studies evaluating 68 SEL interventions, of which 60 met Tiers I to III. Laura Hamilton told The 74 that more evidence-based programs exist for elementary than for middle and high schools, that the programs do better at building intrapersonal and interpersonal skills than at moving discipline, climate or attainment, and that Tier IV gives schools room to adopt research-informed programs when proven ones do not fit. RAND's own recommendation is to use the highest tier available and to take advantage of Tier IV flexibility while building capacity to gather evidence locally.

What the evidence says about SEL measures in accountability

The research consensus is consistent, and it is the reason the fifth indicator became an attendance indicator.

• Angela Duckworth and David Yeager's 2015 review, Measurement Matters, concluded that for most forms of accountability the answer is "not yet," that no available measure is suitable for between-school accountability judgments, and that reference bias could penalize the most effective schools while rewarding the least effective.
• Martin West's analysis of the CORE Districts' field test of more than 450,000 students, published by Brookings, found encouraging reliability and validity at a modest eight percent weight but said the results revealed nothing about how self-reports would perform in a high-stakes setting. Education Week framed the deeper point: even valid measures raise unanswered questions about how low-scoring schools would respond.
• The Learning Policy Institute, as summarized in the RAND review, recommended that states not use measures of students' social and emotional competence, at least in the short term, because most SEL measures were not designed for cross-school comparison.
• The CORE Districts themselves, per PACE, kept collecting SEL data for improvement after ESSA removed the accountability obligation, which is the model most researchers endorse.

The practical translation: measure SEL to improve it, use climate and attendance where a state needs a comparable indicator, and keep student skill scores out of ratings. Our Measuring MESH resource covers the measurement issues in depth.

Practical guidance for district leaders

1. Read your state's approved ESSA plan and its current amendments. Know your fifth indicator, its weight and whether a climate survey is part of it.
2. Build the needs assessment around conditions data. Chronic absenteeism, suspensions, climate survey results and engagement data are exactly what Title I school improvement and Title IV-A needs assessments ask for, and they make the case for SEL without using SEL skill scores.
3. Braid three streams. Use Title IV-A safe and healthy students funds for programs and mental health partnerships, Title II-A for coaching and professional learning, and Title I schoolwide funds for counseling, mentoring and tiered behavior supports in eligible schools.
4. Choose interventions by tier. For federally funded school improvement, you need at least one Tier I to III intervention. RAND's companion volume lists the 60 that qualified. Document the rationale and evaluation plan for anything at Tier IV.
5. Write SEL into the district improvement plan, not a separate SEL plan. Districts that sustained SEL through leadership turnover tied it to attendance, discipline and graduation goals; see the case study compilation.
6. Keep SEL assessment low-stakes and local. Use it for program improvement under the guardrails in Data-Informed SEL.
7. Watch the evidence requirement on Title II. Most allowable uses must be evidence-based where the state determines evidence is reasonably available, so document the research base for your professional learning.
8. Plan for grant exit. Formula funds recur; competitive and foundation grants end. Put recurring costs such as coaches on recurring funds.

Common pitfalls

• Assuming "school climate and safety" in the statute means states must survey students. It is one example among several.
• Proposing SEL survey scores as a state indicator. The weight rules, validity requirements and research all argue against it.
• Treating Tier IV as "no evidence needed." It requires a research-based rationale and an evaluation effort.
• Comparing your district's fifth-indicator results with another state's. Definitions differ.

Where ESSA leaves SEL

The law did not put SEL into accountability, and the research says that was the right call. What ESSA did provide is a legitimate place for SEL in every needs assessment, three funding streams whose statutory language reads like an SEL implementation checklist, and an evidence framework that rewards programs with real studies behind them.