Social, Emotional, and Ethical (SEE) Learning Framework

• SEE Learning is purposefully designed as a broad, adaptable framework that can be tailored to various ages, educational settings, cultural contexts, and student needs. It is also a contextually flexible curriculum that has been embedded within national curricula in diverse countries and successfully implemented in localized, decentralized school systems, demonstrating its capacity for both systemic integration and context-sensitive adaptation.
• Grounded in secular ethics, SEE Learning promotes universal human values in a way that is compatible with all or no religious traditions, while emphasizing student development. For example, across many countries, educators across both secular and faith-based schools have used SEE Learning’s nonsectarian approach to foster inclusive classroom environments and student-led ethical reasoning.
• The curriculum fosters safe, emotionally attuned classrooms by offering strategies grounded in compassion and trauma- and resilience-informed practices that are responsive to diverse experiences. For example, it has been implemented in high-violence contexts, such as wartime Ukraine and post-conflict Colombia, with positive outcomes and no reported adverse or iatrogenic effects.
• SEE Learning emphasizes collaborative, culturally responsive implementation, encouraging educators to adapt its practices to local routines, norms, and resource realities. In the U.S., for example, teachers have effectively embedded SEE Learning into advisory periods, ELA classes, and whole-school SEL blocks, adapting delivery to meet district priorities and classroom structures. Beyond traditional classrooms, the framework has been implemented in diverse settings, including after-school and summer programs, NGOs, private and public schools, and juvenile detention centers, demonstrating flexibility across varied educational ecosystems.
• SEE Learning’s growing research base spans diverse cultural contexts, informing ongoing refinement and validating its effectiveness. Studies conducted in the United States, Vietnam, Colombia, Ukraine, Mongolia, India, Spain, and Kenya have demonstrated the program’s feasibility. In countries where impact evaluations have been conducted, findings indicate improvements in student empathy, teacher well-being, and classroom climate, reinforcing SEE Learning’s global relevance and cultural adaptability.

• While not specified in the framework, the curriculum that is connected to the framework includes a developmentally articulated sequence and educator resources that offer age-appropriate learning objectives, instructional guidance, and observation-based rubrics. These tools help educators recognize and support students’ social, emotional, and cognitive development across grade levels, reinforcing the program’s alignment with developmental science.
• The related curriculum includes a learning progression.

The SEE Learning curriculum connected to the framework has been studied across multiple countries. Below is a summary of the associated outcomes:

United States:

• Quasi-experimental study demonstrated gains in perspective-taking, empathic concern, academic goal setting, and prosocial intrinsic motivation.
• There was demonstrated robust feasibility and engagement reported, over 95%, for teachers.

Ukraine:

• SEE Learning supported emotional resilience and classroom stability during wartime.
• Teachers emphasized the need for trauma-sensitive adaptations and parental involvement.

Brazil:

• Online training improved teacher well-being, emotional regulation, and stress management.

• The components of the SEE Learning framework are informed by learning goals and observable learning outcomes that are described through behavioral traits that students demonstrate across the dimensions and domains of the SEE Learning framework. The SEE Learning Enduring Capabilities provide a clear articulation of what students are able to know and do across the 9 components of SEE Learning. SEE Learning also contains proficiency measures that further designate what students can know and be able to do, specific to the SEE Learning Enduring Capabilities, according to proficiency levels. These rubrics provide a feedback tool for both educators and students to identify how they can grow in their embodiment of SEE Learning Enduring Capabilities.
• SEE Learning has been translated to 27 languages.

• SEE Learning is both a curriculum and a framework. SEE Learning has been integrated into the existing curriculum, behavioral strategies, and other school initiatives.
• As a research-based curriculum, SEE Learning can serve as a standalone curriculum that fosters competencies related to systems thinking, ethical discernment, compassion for self and others, resilience, and awareness.
• The SEE Learning pedagogical model guides implementation in schools ranging from preschool through secondary school.
• SEE Learning provides a playbook of activities and practices that help to extend SEE Learning beyond the lesson experience. These activities and practices support SEE Learning implementation on a whole-school basis.
• SEE Learning® (Social, Emotional, and Ethical Learning) is a comprehensive curriculum and framework for students from ages 3–19 developed at Emory University that advances the field of social and emotional learning by incorporating the science of compassion. SEE Learning provides students and educators worldwide with an evidence-based program that cultivates compassionate and ethical individuals, schools, and communities.
• The SEE Learning curriculum is further supported by:
  • An annual facilitator course that prepares administrators, counselors, and teachers to implement SEE Learning in their school by certifying them as SEE Learning trainers and workshop providers.
  • Certified facilitators with training and workshop resources to support fidelity and large-scale implementation.
  • Training that supports school implementation related to special topics such as restorative practices, special education, etc.
  • An asynchronous online educator preparation course called SEE 101. On the basis of this 3-hour course, educators gain access to the curriculum.
  • School implementation guides for preschool (SEE Learning Play), early elementary, late elementary, middle school, high school, and the curriculum integration model.
  • Adult social emotional learning training and professional development through the adult version of SEE Learning called CBCT® (Cognitively-based Compassion Training). CBCT is the most research-based adult compassion training program available and provides educators and administrators with the depth of knowledge needed to effectively embody the enduring capabilities contained within SEE Learning.

Implementation Monitoring Tools

• Teacher Feedback Diaries
• Observer Feedback Diaries
• Implementation checklist

Outcome and Impact Tracking Tools

• Empathic Concern
• Perspective Taking
• Intrinsic Prosocial Motivation
• Academic Goal Setting
• Classroom Supportiveness
• Well-being
• Self-Compassion

Curriculum-Based Tools

• Learning Objectives
• Curriculum-based rubrics

• Center for Contemplative Science and Compassion-Based Ethics at Emory University. (2017). SEE Learning: A Framework for Implementation. https://seelearning.emory.edu/en/about
• Center for Contemplative Science and Compassion-Based Ethics at Emory University. (2019). The SEE Learning Companion: Social, Emotional, and Ethical Learning. Retrieved from: https://strapi-cms.seelearning.emory.edu/uploads/SEE_Companion_March2019_v1_2ef4afe129_151dc146b7.pdf
• Center for Contemplative Science and Compassion-Based Ethics website: http://www.compassion.emory.edu/about.html
• Frazier T, Roeser RW, Schonert-Reichl KA, Negi LT (2025) Evaluating the feasibility and preliminary impact of the Social, Emotional, and Ethical (SEE) Learning program: A compassion-based social and emotional learning program for elementary school children. PLoS One 20(8): e0328519. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0328519
• Frazier, T., Rosenstein, S., Elkoin, O. et al. Voices of teachers: a qualitative analysis of the feasibility and qualitative perceptions of impact of SEE Learning on the well-being of Ukrainian classrooms before and during war. Confl Health 19, 47 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1186/s13031-025-00688-8
• Romano, G. V. S., Bazán, P. R., Sato, J. R., da Cruz, N. V. C. J., Pacifico, E. D. S., Lacerda, S. S., ... & Kozasa, E. H. (2025). Mental health outcomes following a four week online training on social emotional and ethical learning for public school teachers. Scientific Reports, 15(1), 9179. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-91967-0
• SEE Learning website: https://seelearning.emory.edu/