I urge leaders in Virginia government and leaders at the VDOE to reject the SEL standards. Politics needs to stay out of our public-school systems. You are pushing an agenda that is highly subjective in nature and does not contribute to the academic advancement of our children. Public school leaders and policy makers must focus on academics and creating a safe learning environment.  You say the goal of this SEL is to provide equity within a safe and healthy learning environment, yet you do not define what equity truly is and how it will be applied to every student in Virginia. This curriculum does not prompt a safe learning environment, it prompts a partisan viewpoint and students will never be able to demonstrate success and meet the graduation requirement until they succumb to one side of the viewpoint. What teaching materials will guide these standards? Will parents be able to review these materials and opt their student(s) out if the materials do not align with their morals and values taught in their home? Will teachers be able to pull lessons from partisan sources to guide their lessons based on their personal political beliefs and push their own agenda? For example, in SoA2: 7-8a, is to recognize and describe unfairness and injustice in many forms including attitudes, speech, behaviors, policies, practices, and laws. Who gets to decide what attitude, speech, behaviors, policies, laws, etc. are unfair and unjust? This would be very subjective. What if I have raised my child with opinions that differ from the teacher, does my child fail? Will he/she be told they are wrong or worse made to feel like less of person? Who gets to decide what is right or wrong? Will all viewpoints be allowed and discussed with equal respect and consideration as stated in the SEL? What metrics are going to be used to say a student has successfully demonstrated these “skills”? How will teachers be expected to teach and grade such subjective topics? All children should be taught respect each other and taught kindness. This curriculum only serves to point out differences and draw attention to the “haves” and “have nots”. What if I have worked hard to make sure my child has all that he/she needs, are you going to make my child state he/she has privilege and should feel guilty? What ever happened to promoting hard work and personal responsibility? School is hard enough on young people, now you are just going to draw more attention to the inequalities and the bullying will only get worse. If social justice is the desired outcome, how about teaching children to treat everyone kindly, no matter their station in life, skin color, ethnicity, or income level without separating students into categories. We want to share a common goal of educating our children, but they should not be taught that things like skin color, ethnicity, incomes, etc. matter…you should teach them it is all about the person they are in the inside and how they treat others that matters. Equity is about ALL students. This curriculum is all about division.