Open Future Institute Founder Gerard Senehi, Principal Michael Barakat of The Bronx High School for Law and Community Service (“Bronx Law”), and Marjorie Malpiede, Editor-in-Chief of LearningWell Magazine recently engaged in a conversation focused on the QUESTion Project at the Presidents’ Convening on College Student Mental Health and Wellbeing at New York University.
Recognizing that high school students face many of the same challenges as students in higher education, Marjorie Malpiede facilitated a session entitled Purpose and Belonging, The QUESTion Project, which followed up on her LearningWell Magazine article, “Questions to Live By: A different take on social and emotional learning in high schools prepares students for college and life.” 
Responding to her question as to why he thinks the QUESTion Project is so important, “not only in general but also for the higher ed audience as well,” Gerard stated, “We are really engaging young people, engaging teachers, on a human journey, and as we bring in different programs, I think it’s so important to reach into the core of what makes us human, especially at this time when there’s so much risk of disconnection, fragmentation and division.” Principal Barakat also underscored the importance of the QUESTion Project support of students at the deepest level of their humanity by exploring “questions about who are we, why are we here, why are we doing any of this; [questions] that really unite us far beyond any of the social-emotional programing that seems to be performative.”
Gerard Senehi’s article, “Expanding Education’s Role in Shaping the Future: The Unseen Promise of Whole Child Education and Social-Emotional Learning,” was distributed to attendees of this event, which was hosted by The Coalition for Transformational Education (CTE), LearningWell, and NYU, and sponsored by Ruderman Family Foundation.
