Wellbeing, Work Climate, and Levers of Transformation for Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) Implementation among California Educational Leaders in Spring 2024

High-quality social and emotional learning (SEL) initiatives have been demonstrated to prevent problems and promote wellbeing among youth. Educational leaders are tasked with implementing SEL to help create conditions for students to thrive. SEL initiatives, intended to facilitate healthy development and address inequities, often face implementation challenges that threaten their success. To overcome these challenges, CalHOPE Student Support was established as an effort to build capacity for implementation of SEL in K-12 public schools across all counties in the state of California. As part of CalHOPE, County Offices of Education (COEs) work closely with focal schools and districts to support them in sustainable SEL implementation with an equity lens. Specific CalHOPE implementation activities to build statewide capacity for SEL through CalHOPE began in 2021 and are ongoing. To capture the state of SEL in California as of Spring 2024, 514 educational leaders (69% non-Hispanic White, 81% female) from 56 counties (167 COE leaders, 61 district office leaders, 286 school leaders) reported on their own wellbeing, conditions associated with their wellbeing (e.g., work climate), and their work to engage levers of SEL system transformation. Overall, most educational leaders self-reported strong wellbeing (experiencing positive emotions) and resources for coping with work-related stressors, positive work climate (in the domains of safety and connection as well as opportunities for leadership, though less favorable in the domain of cultural/linguistic responsiveness), and an overall strong presence of specific levers of SEL system transformation (e.g., supports received and provided, capacities built). A focus of the current report is on measuring change in wellbeing, work climate, and SEL implementation among educational leaders. Mean-level responses from the current sample (Spring 2024) were compared with responses from a Fall 2023 sample of 676 leaders (69% non-Hispanic White, 80% female) from 54 counties (155 COE leaders, 97 district office leaders, 424 school leaders). Among COE leadership, outcomes from Fall 2023 to Spring 2024 were consistently favorable. Among district and school leadership, small change in a positive direction was observed for all outcomes, most saliently among district leaders in the domains of supports received, supports provided, and structures and routines for SEL implementation, and most saliently among school site leaders in the domains of wellbeing, supports received, capacities, and structures and routines for SEL implementation. Consistent with the CalHOPE theory of action, it appears county office leaders “went first” and the ongoing investment in CalHOPE has now been associated with positive change in district and school leaders. The CalHOPE team continues to make progress in building statewide capacity to advance wellbeing in schools.