CASEL framework for social-emotional learning
CASEL (the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning) defines social-emotional learning around five core competencies that schools build across grades. It is a framework, not a curriculum or a set of grade-by-grade standards. The five competencies have been stable since the early 2000s, and a 2020 update added a Transformative SEL focus on equity and student identity. As of 2026, 27 states have K-12 SEL standards, most of them built on the CASEL 5.
- PreK-12 SEL
- CASEL 5
- Updated 2020
- CASEL
Identifying emotions, recognizing strengths, and understanding how feelings affect behavior.
Regulating emotions and behaviors and working toward personal and academic goals.
Understanding the perspectives of others and recognizing social norms.
Communicating, cooperating, resolving conflicts, and seeking help when needed.
Making constructive choices about personal behavior and social interactions.
The CASEL framework is built on two parts: the five competencies and the four settings where the competencies grow.
CASEL's argument is that the five competencies cannot grow in one setting alone. A school that runs an SEL curriculum in homeroom but ignores SEL in math class, in the cafeteria, and at home will not see durable change. The four-setting model is meant to make that visible. The 2020 Transformative SEL update adds an equity lens. It asks schools to look at how identity, power, and student agency interact with each competency, and to plan SEL alongside academic instruction rather than as a separate block.
- The CASEL 5 (5)
-
- Self-awareness
- Self-management
- Social awareness
- Relationship skills
- Responsible decision-making
- Four settings
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- Classrooms
- Schools
- Families and caregivers
- Communities
CASEL is a curriculum.
No. CASEL is a framework. It names the competencies and the conditions under which they grow. It does not provide lesson plans or a daily program. Districts pair the CASEL framework with a chosen SEL curriculum or build instruction around the competencies themselves.
SEL is the same as character education.
They overlap but are not the same. Character education usually names virtues (respect, integrity, perseverance) and asks students to embody them. CASEL focuses on observable competencies (managing your attention, taking a peer's perspective, deciding what to do next) that develop with practice.
SEL replaces academic instruction.
No. CASEL is explicit that SEL is meant to support academic learning. The framework is named the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning for that reason. Schools that integrate SEL into content classes (not just an SEL block) see the strongest effects.
CASEL is the same in every state SEL standard.
State SEL standards usually adapt CASEL rather than copying it. Some states expand a competency into multiple grade-level indicators. Others rename the competencies. The CASEL 5 is the reference. State standards are the law in any given state.
- CASEL 5
- The five core competencies of social-emotional learning.
- Self-awareness
- One of the CASEL 5. Recognizing one's own emotions, values, and strengths.
- Self-management
- One of the CASEL 5. Regulating emotions and behavior and working toward goals.
- Social awareness
- One of the CASEL 5. Understanding the perspectives of others.
- Relationship skills
- One of the CASEL 5. Communicating, cooperating, and resolving conflict.
- Responsible decision-making
- One of the CASEL 5. Making constructive, ethical choices about behavior and interactions.
- The four settings
- Classrooms, schools, families and caregivers, and communities. The places where the CASEL 5 grow.
- Transformative SEL
- The 2020 framing that ties SEL to equity, identity, and student agency.
- CASEL Wheel
- The visual that shows the CASEL 5 inside the four settings.
- CASEL Program Review
- CASEL's evaluation of SEL curricula against the framework. Results are published in CASEL's CASEL Guide.
Does CASEL recommend a specific SEL curriculum?
No. CASEL maintains a CASEL Guide that reviews SEL curricula against the framework, but it does not prescribe a single program. Districts choose curricula based on their grade range, their goals, and the CASEL Guide ratings.
Is CASEL used outside the United States?
Yes, but informally. CASEL is a U.S. nonprofit, and the framework is most widely used in U.S. schools. Some international schools and country-level frameworks reference the CASEL 5 as a starting point.
How is CASEL different from PBIS or trauma-informed practice?
PBIS (Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports) is a behavioral tiered-support system. Trauma-informed practice is an instructional posture grounded in trauma research. CASEL is a competency framework. The three are complementary. Many schools use all three at once.
Has the CASEL framework changed over time?
The five competencies have been stable since 2003. The four-setting visualization came in around 2017. The 2020 Transformative SEL update added the equity and student-agency framing without changing the competencies themselves.
Which states have adopted free-standing SEL standards?
As of 2026, 27 states have free-standing K-12 SEL standards. Examples include Illinois, Pennsylvania, Kansas, and West Virginia. Some states (Massachusetts, New York) have SEL competencies embedded in other policy documents rather than as a separate standard.
- 1
1994: CASEL founded
A group of researchers and educators, including Daniel Goleman, Eileen Rockefeller Growald, and Mark Greenberg, found CASEL at Yale to bring rigor to what was then a scattered field of programs.
- 2
1997: First CASEL publication
CASEL publishes Promoting Social and Emotional Learning: Guidelines for Educators, the first practitioner-facing articulation of SEL.
- 3
2003: The CASEL 5 named
CASEL identifies five core competencies. The list has been stable since.
- 4
2011: First meta-analysis
Durlak and colleagues publish a meta-analysis of 213 SEL programs in Child Development. The paper shows an average 11 percentile-point gain in academic achievement for students in school-based SEL programs. CASEL cites this paper widely.
- 5
2017: The four settings formalized
CASEL formalizes the four-setting model (classrooms, schools, families and caregivers, communities) in the CASEL Wheel visual.
- 6
2020: Transformative SEL
CASEL releases the Transformative SEL framing, which ties the competencies to identity, agency, and equity. The five competencies stay the same.
CASEL has been the most influential SEL framework in U.S. K-12 education for nearly three decades. The five competencies were not invented in 2003 from scratch. They were synthesized from existing developmental psychology research and from a generation of school-based programs. CASEL's contribution was naming a shared set of outcomes and giving schools a vocabulary they could use across grade levels.
The 2020 Transformative SEL update did not change the framework so much as it expanded the conversation. Many educators had been asking what self-management means for a student who is over-policed at school, or what responsible decision-making means under a system the student did not design. The transformative framing asks schools to address those questions explicitly. The five competencies still do the work in the classroom. The transformative lens reframes how the work gets planned and evaluated.
- Publisher
- CASEL, the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning.
- First released
- 1997 (the first CASEL framework publication). The CASEL 5 competencies were named in 2003.
- Current version
- 2020 update, introducing the Transformative SEL framing. The five competencies themselves have been stable since 2003.
- Subjects covered
- Social-emotional learning, not academic content. Designed to sit alongside academic standards.
- Grade range
- PreK-12, with separate competencies for adults (educators and caregivers).
- Adoption
- 27 states have adopted free-standing K-12 SEL standards. Most are built on the CASEL 5. Many more districts use CASEL without state-level adoption.
- Legal status
- Voluntary framework. Not a content standard. Not a federal mandate.
- Companion frameworks
- CASEL Schoolguide and CASEL Districtwide Resource Center (implementation supports). CASEL Program Reviews evaluate SEL curricula against the framework.
- License
- CASEL owns the framework. Free to reference with attribution.