Social and emotional well-being and academics should get equal time during school, parents and teachers say in a new Education Next survey. The numbers largely hold up across the political divide. It’s a big shift from 2019, when the survey found that social and emotional well-being should be limited to just 38% of students’ time in school.

The survey results reflect a growing awareness outside of school buildings that students’ academic needs can’t be met without first attending to their social and emotional needs. In late 2021, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy sounded the alarm on the dire need to prioritize kids’ mental health as a response to the pandemic, calling on schools to “expand social and emotional learning programs and other evidence-based approaches that promote healthy development.”

Language matters: For SEL programs to stick, they need to be clearly linked to academic outcomes. A 2021 Fordham Institute report found that parents support SEL lessons only when they are connected to specific skills and are explicitly linked to academic programs—but reject them outright when they feel “nebulous” or threaten to replace rigorous academic work.