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The phrase &quot;soft skills&quot; has always been an uncomfortable one. It implies malleability, imprecision, the kind of thing that matters in human relations but doesn't quite count in serious professional contexts. Emotional intelligence, the capacity to recognize, understand, and manage emotions in oneself and others, has long been filed under this heading, to the detriment of both learners and institutions.

The evidence has been accumulating for decades: emotional intelligence predicts professional outcomes across fields with a reliability that rivals technical skill. Healthcare providers with higher emotional intelligence have better patient outcomes. Leaders who can regulate their own emotions and read those of their teams consistently outperform those who can't. Teachers, counselors, negotiators, managers, the pattern holds.

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== Designing a curriculum that takes EI seriously ==

Teaching emotional intelligence effectively requires moving beyond awareness into practice. Reading about selfregulation is not the same as practicing it under conditions that actually trigger dysregulation. This means structured reflection, scenariobased learning, feedback loops, and, crucially, a classroom environment where students feel safe enough to engage honestly.

In practice, this means assignments that ask students to analyze their own emotional responses to real situations, not just describe theoretical frameworks. It means group work designed to surface interpersonal tension and then process it, not avoid it. It means instructors who model the capacities they're teaching, who regulate visibly, who name what's happening in the room, who take feedback nondefensively.

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== Assessment challenges ==

Assessing EI growth is harder than assessing factual recall, but not impossible. Pre/post selfreport instruments, behavioral observation rubrics, peer feedback protocols, and portfoliobased reflection all offer partial windows into development. No single measure is sufficient. The combination, triangulated across a semester, provides a meaningful picture.

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''Originally published October 17, 2020 on [https://docmoates.com/blog/teaching-emotional-intelligence-in-the-college-classroom/ docmoates.com].''