Across Africa, competency-based education reforms have advanced, but a critical gap remains: life skills and values such as collaboration, self-awareness, and ethical judgment are not measured in ways that are credible, contextual, or useful for improving practice. Most systems still rely on academic examinations or imported self-report tools that fail to capture how learners actually demonstrate these competencies in real contexts. As a result, what matters most for social cohesion, employability, and responsible citizenship remains largely invisible in teaching, assessment, and system decision-making.
Evidence from ALiVE’s assessment of over 45,000 learners across East Africa confirms this systemic challenge, showing persistently low demonstrated proficiency in foundational social and emotional competencies. This reflects a deeper structural issue: what is not measured is not consistently taught, supported, or valued. AliVE was created to address this gap by transforming how education systems see learning. Rather than adding another programme, it redefines assessment itself through contextualised, behaviour-based tools that capture how learners think, relate, and act in real situations making life skills visible and measurable. With this, AliVE enables education systems to move from policy aspiration to actionable evidence, strengthening teaching practice and enabling more coherent, system-wide improvement of holistic learning outcomes.
An ALiVE SEL tool is a contextualised assessment system that measures social and emotional competencies as demonstrated behaviours in real learning contexts, rather than abstract traits or self-reported perceptions. It uses a multi-method design combining:
• Scenario-based tasks that present real-life dilemmas to assess ethical reasoning and decision-making
• Performance-based group activities that observe collaboration and problem-solving in action
• Structured observation rubrics that capture learner behaviours in authentic classroom and social settings
These tools are co-developed with educators, researchers, and governments to ensure cultural relevance and system ownership. Competencies are clearly defined, broken into observable indicators, and structured through learning progressions that show how skills develop over time. Beyond measurement, ALiVE redefines the role of assessment in education systems. It shifts from ranking learners to generating actionable evidence that informs teaching, curriculum design, and policy decisions. Assessment data is fed back into structured reflection processes for educators and system actors, strengthening pedagogy and system alignment. In practice, ALiVE SEL tools makes previously invisible skills visible, enabling education systems to finally see, and therefore strengthen, the competencies they already prioritise.
ALiVE SEL tools are embedded within government education systems across Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, and Zanzibar through partnerships with ministries of education, curriculum agencies, and assessment bodies.
To date, it has:
• Assessed over 45,000 learners using contextualised, behaviour-based SEL tools
• Engaged and strengthened the capacity of more than 1,000 system actors, including curriculum developers, teachers, and assessment specialists
• Supported the integration of learning progressions into national curriculum and assessment reform processes
• Influenced the adoption of SEL-informed approaches across multiple jurisdictions
These achievements demonstrate growing system ownership of contextualised SEL measurement and its use for improving teaching and learning practice.
In the next phase, ALiVE aims to deepen and scale this impact by:
• Institutionalising SEL assessment within national education and examination systems
• Expanding implementation to additional African countries through regional collaboration
• Strengthening the integration of assessment, pedagogy, and teacher professional development
• Building stronger regional evidence to inform global approaches to SEL measurement and system reform
Through this trajectory, ALiVE is moving from pilot innovation to sustained system infrastructure for measuring and improving life skills at scale.
The innovation has evolved through three iterative phases of refinement based on field learning and system feedback. The initial set of tools developed in 2022 focused primarily on household-based SEL assessment, designed to capture social and emotional competencies outside formal schooling contexts. While these tools provided valuable insights into learner behaviours in home environments, implementation experience revealed limited direct usability for teachers in classroom instruction.
In 2024, we significantly adapted and expanded the innovation by adapting the tools for classroom application. This included embedding within subjects, aligning items with observable classroom behaviours, and redesigning them for ease of use by teachers within regular lesson cycles. This shift made the tools more practical for instructional decision-making and integrated them more closely with teaching practice.
Building on this, we further strengthened the innovation by incorporating learning progressions, enabling a clearer developmental pathway for SEL competencies. This allowed educators to assess discrete behaviors, as well as understand how learners progress over time and how instruction can be adjusted accordingly. The learning progression approach also improved coherence between assessment, pedagogy, and curriculum expectations. Across all iterations, continuous engagement with teachers and education systems has ensured that the tools remain grounded in real classroom reality and use.
To try it, start by identifying a priority SEL competency that aligns with your classroom or system needs and existing curriculum. Work with relevant education actors—such as teachers, school leaders, or curriculum/assessment support teams—to define what that competency looks like in observable, real classroom behaviours.
Next, adapt or develop simple SEL assessment tools that can be used during normal lessons to capture evidence of learner behaviour and progress. Pilot these tools in classroom practice, allowing teachers to use them during teaching and reflect on what they observe.
Then, create structured opportunities for teachers to discuss this evidence within peer learning groups or Communities of Practice, using it to adjust instruction and improve learner support.
Finally, gradually embed the tools and practices into routine teaching, teacher training, and assessment processes so they become part of everyday instructional practice rather than a separate activity.
