The Packback platform demonstrates strong alignment with key social and emotional competencies outlined in the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning (CASEL) framework, including self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship skills. Specifically, Packback’s student-driven environment centered around inquiry-based discussion provides opportunities for students to gain greater awareness of their own strengths, values and emotions through reflective questioning and analysis of complex topics. Additionally, features like real-time feedback and mentoring help students build self-discipline, goal-setting abilities, and organizational skills to successfully participate in thoughtful discourse.

Packback helps actualize CASEL’s vision for integrative learning that bridges students’ intellectual and interpersonal development. The platform’s versatile tools equip students with essential life skills to manage themselves and relate to others in productive ways.

CASEL Wheel Components

CASEL Wheel Component	About Component	Packback’s Alignment
1. Self-Awareness	The abilities to understand one’s own emotions, thoughts, and values and how they influence behavior across contexts.	Strong Alignment: Students’ immediate access to impartial academic feedback helps develop their self-awareness around their academic strengths and areas for improvement. As students apply the feedback and see their writing improve on Packback, they develop more confidence around their writing and see the connections between their thoughts and actions and how it influences their skill-development across contexts.
2. Social Awareness	The abilities to understand the perspectives of and empathize with others, including those from diverse backgrounds, cultures, & contexts.	Strong Alignment: The student-led discussion encourages social awareness of peer perspectives on a variety of topics. Instead of a limited number of students participating in class or students responding to the teacher alone, students on Packback respond to their peers’ inquiries, prompting them to become aware of diverse perspectives and creating equitable opportunities for social interactions in the academic setting.
3. Self-Management	The abilities to manage one’s emotions, thoughts, and behaviors effectively in different situations and to achieve goals and aspirations.	Strong Alignment: Students have an active role in demonstrating their learning because they have real-time access to Packback’s A.I.-powered feedback. Instead of waiting for an instructor to provide feedback, students are empowered to seek writing feedback in the platform to make improvements on their work.
4. Relationship Skills	The abilities to establish and maintain healthy and supportive relationships and to effectively navigate settings with diverse individuals and groups.	Strong Alignment: The platform uses AI to perform content moderation that ensures a safe and conducive environment for students to practice key relationship skills, like learning how to constructively disagree with peers, learning how to effectively communicate ideas in writing to peers, and learning how their engagement has a direct positive impact of the quality of the learning environment.
5. Responsible Decision-Making	The abilities to make caring and constructive choices about personal behavior and social interactions across diverse situations.	Strong Alignment: The platform’s mastery-based writing experience fosters responsible decision making by giving students feedback which they can choose to apply in real-time to improve their work and which provides them proactive warnings to avoid negative behaviors like plagiarism.

Applicable across the curriculum for (almost) any course

Packback is applicable to any course with a writing component. Packback has been used by over 2 million students, at more than 700 institutions, across thousands of different courses and subject areas.

Popular subjects of courses using Packback include: