The Company We Keep, and Why It Matters
Dear Diane,
Everything that needs to be said you said last week—and succinctly. You said it so well that it's hard to know what more you and I can say that might convince the unconvinced. But I always rhetorically claim that (1) I might be misunderstanding my "opponents" and, therefore, (2) I might be wrong, so I keep at it. In real life, I often get too annoyed to do this well.
The other day at a meeting sponsored by the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning, or CASEL, on "social and emotional learning," I lost my temper with several allies. One, a congressman I admire—Tim Ryan from Ohio—and the other, Special Olympics Chairman and CEO Tim Shriver. Both take tests seriously, even as they decry them for having narrowed the curriculum and missed the "social and emotional." They want "better tests," and more of them so that we can test social and emotional health.
I went back and forth feeling I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Of course, I favor healthy and socially
