Dr. Kelley Munger and Megan Marcus

All learning happens through relationships, and our education system has the potential to grow whole children. But educators’ social-emotional development is a critical foundation to student social-emotional development.

Educators cannot possibly address the social-emotional needs of students or be truly “trauma-informed” if they have not processed and acknowledged their own trauma and social-emotional needs. We support educators as they do the “inner work” of exploring their triggers, attachment styles, and early childhood experiences.

Like student social-emotional learning, educator social emotional learning is not, and can’t be, a flash in the pan. Growing educators as whole people requires schools to become places where secure relationships and adult development happen every day in the regular course of work. In reality, many educators talk to us about the relational gaps they experience at school- the stress of loneliness, isolation, and toxic adult cultures, on top of sharing the burdens and trauma that students carry.