Educators across the country are grappling with an unprecedented set of circumstances as they prepare to welcome students and adults back to school. We face the layered impact of schools closures (e.g., loss of school-based relationships, routines, and learning); COVID-19 (e.g., on health, isolation, stress, and trauma); economic crisis (e.g., unemployment, impact on school budgets), and persistent, pernicious racial inequities exacerbated by the pandemic and amplified by the nationwide mobilization for racial justice reflected in the Black Lives Matter movement. At the heart of this complex process is attending to the academic, social and emotional development; physical and mental health; cognitive development; and overall well-being of all students and adults in holistic ways that do not put these concerns in competition with one another. This moment also offers an opportunity to pause and imagine how to bring together educators, students, families and community partners to co-create transformative learning experiences that cultivate the social, emotional, and academic competencies needed to contribute to a caring, thriving, and just society. More than 40 organizations have come together to produce this roadmap to support the return to school with equity-focused Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) strategies centered on relationships and built on the existing strengths of a school community. Schools--in partnerships with their communities, districts, and states--can use these four SEL Critical Practices to foster the competencies and learning environments that students and adults need to reunite, renew, and thrive.