Aridity may plague their surroundings, but their enduring resilience tells their stories beyond the scorched borders. Their cultures still weave in values and life skills albeit the domineering digital disruptions. They are open to talk and open to learn. This is a highlight of ALiVE’s community dialogues aimed at promoting life skills and values in Isiolo, Kenya. In the heart of Isiolo County resides the heat of the sun. It shines too bright and too hot as to crack the ground! Therefore, a large indigenous tree shade makes for a conference hall in mid-March. Even so, nothing is certain with regards to the weather patterns. We arrive at Kambi ya Juu Integrated School with the rain that disrupts an otherwise grounded meeting with community members (parents and education leaders). We all run to one of the classrooms and camp there until the rain subsides, just enough to let us hear our voices, under the yelling iron sheet roofs. When we settle down, one truth sinks in: modern realities present unique challenges in nurturing and promoting life skills and values, even in this conservative community. “Mobile phones have taken over family conversations. Nowadays, everyone hibernates to their devices in the evening to catch up with the rest of the world, while losing out on family dialogues that we grew up enjoying and learning life through,” laments a mother. “Through the same phones, young people are exposed to evil. Alcohol and substance abuse are coated in appealing content, and this misleads our children. You don’t know who is talking to your child anymore, or what they are watching or reading. Besides, the children themselves do not feel free to share their lives with adults. How then do you nurture values?” asks a father. Such unsettling realities justify the relevance of the Action for Life Skills and Values in East Africa, (ALiVE) initiative. ALiVE’s core business is to support education systems and communities, to enable children and adolescents to acquire core competencies (generic skills/life skills and values) that help them navigate life through school and beyond. ALiVE Regional Summit 2025 In March 2025, ALiVE held its second regional summit in Isiolo, Kenya. It brought together key system actors in education from Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania mainland, and Zanzibar. The summit sought to unpack ALiVE’s theory of change to make meaning of the connection between national-level change and school or community-level changes that directly impact children. The overall message was that life skills and values drive success and help individuals and societies coexist and progress meaningfully. Skills like problem solving, collaboration, digital literacy, and the values like responsibility, respect, and love, are very important for our children. They drive success. Therefore, we support public education systems so that they can deliver on both the academic curriculum and nurture life skills for a more holistic learner development. Dr. John Mugo ALiVE Principal Investigator The summit also gathered government officials from across East Africa. “We live in a society where integrity has cracks. So how do we build values such as accountability in our children? We must not only teach them but also model them so that our children can copy them along. At the end of the day the character of our children impacts all of us. You will not enjoy riding your car with a child who has lost their values and comes to steal your phone. You will not enjoy your home when somebody breaks in and robs you of your property because they have lost their minds to drugs. It is therefore our collective responsibility to shape our children’s character. I want to thank the collaborative efforts through ALiVE initiative, because of the changes we are seeing so far.” said Dr. Grace Baguma, the Deputy Executive Director of the National Curriculum Development Council in Uganda. ALiVE Principal Investigator Dr. John Mugo speaks during one of the community dialogues in Isiolo. The weeklong regional summit was the climax of the celebration of the key milestones which ALiVE has achieved in its 5 years of operation, including: stronger relationships with system agencies; the finalization of frameworks, tools and materials for embedding life skills and values in education curricula, teacher training and assessment; and the training support to 818 system actors to institutionalize these competences. The notable achievements also include significant knowledge sharing and policy influence at national and global events; leadership development through a distributed leadership model and staff transitions, gender programming, the institutionalization of RELI Africa, and securing more funding. Collaborating to promote core competencies across East Africa ALiVE’s collaborative approach positions it to work with both government and non-governmental organizations. This is aimed to support education systems in East Africa, to embed as well as assess core-competencies within their respective education curricula. “Our approach is to work with government institutions because there are various institutions that oversee the CBC implementation. We do not believe in blame games, but we take the approach of cocreating and collaborating with government agencies to ease the implementation of CBC. For instance, we are working with teacher educators, to develop content that integrates life skills and values. This will enable the trained teachers to embrace core-competencies and be able to nurture and assess them once they are deployed,” noted Dr. Mugo. ALiVE thrives in co-creation to build ownership and foster learning, in the journey of core-competencies (also known as life skills and values). We appreciate the fact that skills cannot be assessed the same way as academic work is tested. That is why ALiVE develops tools and build capacities of teachers, trainers, parents and community leaders, so that they can sustainably nurture as well as support the assessment of life skills and values. Khadija Shariff ALiVE Co-PI, Assessment Shift ALiVE exists to generate and share evidence that would enhance the implementation of competency-based education across East Africa. “The evidence and data that ALiVE co-creates and shares forms part of the critical pillar needed to support a shift towards a competency-based curriculum that delivers value-based education,” said Dr.

I was just two months into my internship when the second ALiVE regional summit came calling. I was eager to meet the regional teams whom I had only known but through emails. I wanted to understand life skills and values deeper. I desired to interact with policy players and sieve into the ALiVE team’s wisdom into systems shift. My many miles journey began with a mess, but I missed nothing in the end. My name is Janet Musyoka. The dream Journey Roosters crowing, skies rumbling, and me, bright-eyed and ready to conquer the Action for Life Skills and Values in East Africa (ALiVE) Summit in Isiolo. I thought I had it all figured out. I got a call from my team leader, cool as ever, saying, “We’ll pick you up at Makutano junction, please be there in time.” A golden chance! I thought to myself, “This is my moment to shine. I would be early, waiting with a smile, to be picked,” I promised. Then, the storm hit hard! It started raining. The kind of rain that does not fall, it pounds! The drenched Mwea roads know no matatu.  When it rains even motorbikes disappear. It took forever, but I finally flagged one down. The rider looked at me like I had just asked for directions to Mordor, nonetheless we set off. Eventually, I roved into Makutano junction; muddy, sweaty, and not at all the punctual hero I had envisioned. My team was already there, giving me that look of concern and probably thinking, “Did she wrestle a camel on her way here?” I learned patience and respect as the team leader calmly allowed me to board. I noted with a ton of remorse that some of the passengers in the bus had begun their journeys at midnight only to come and camp at Makutano, waiting for the late intern! I should have called to state my state. I should have communicated clearly without offering uncertain hope of my arrival time. Problem-solving 101, score zero! I should have arranged to be picked up on the second trip. Despite the chaos, the ditches, the rain, and the drain, the ALiVE Summit was worth it. Arrival at Isiolo Just when our journey had left us weary, the natural world stepped in to rejuvenate our spirits. The summit was hosted at a hotel in the middle of the Buffalo Springs National Reserve and the sight of the wildlife quickly erased any traces of exhaustion. As our team gathered to witness the stunning sights: a cheetah gracefully patrolling its domain, gazelles bouncing across the plains, towering giraffes nibbling at treetops, and playful waterbucks frolicking in the distance—their tired faces lit up with wonder. It was nature’s own energy boost, a wild reminder of the beauty that exists even when life’s journey gets murky.   Then Came the Summit! From the moment I set foot in the conference hall on the morning of March 11,2025, I knew this summit was going to be more than just another professional gathering. It felt like a movement. The Action for Life Skills and Values in East Africa (ALiVE) had organized its second regional summit in Isiolo, Kenya. The summit brought together a dynamic group of civil society organizations (ALiVE partners), researchers, policymakers, and community advocates from Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, and Zanzibar. The discussions were focused on the pressing issues in translating systems change to impact on children and communities. The summit also celebrated the five-year milestones of the ALiVE initiative.   The present powerhouse of minds unpacked ALiVE’s theory of change and explored how national-level shifts trickle down to real impact in schools and homes. Dr. John Mugo, ALiVE Principal Investigator and the Executive Director of Zizi Afrique Foundation, made the introductory remarks. He stated a four-point purpose of the summit: take stock, align, bond and celebrate. Isiolo County’s Deputy Governor who officially opened the summit, welcomed participants to Isiolo and challenged us to ensure that education addresses the needs of local and pastoralist economies.  He also lobbied for deeper collaboration between ALiVE and other agencies, “ALiVE will be alive not to leave anyone behind. If you’re alive, you should be in ALiVE,” he said.   With the vibe set, we had dived into group reflections, celebrating the gains and pains through ALiVE’s half a decade of operation. Dr. Mary Goretti Nakabugo, ALiVE Co-Principal investigator and the Executive Director at Uwezo Uganda, grounded us in ALiVE’s systems change model. She likened it to a four-legged stool – held up by curriculum, assessment, teacher training, and parental involvement. “Take one leg out and the stool gets wobbly!” She noted. The power panel praised milestones and poked gaps while presenting possible partnership areas around life skills and values (also known as core-competencies in Kenya and generic skills in Uganda). “For a long time, we only valued basic research. We are not taking serious research on practice,” noted Prof. Jackline Nyere of Kenyatta University. ALiVE embraces a collaborative approach in working with government and other education stakeholders.  “Collaboration with government implies aligning to the mandate of the targeted institutions. It is useful for non-state actors to align their planning with the national government budgetary cycle,” emphasized Dr. Purity Ngina, the CEO, National Gender and Equality Commission. A community dialogue session in which ALiVE engaged parents on nurturing life skills and values Day two of the summit opened in the field. We visited Elsa Primary School located just a few kilometres outside Isiolo town. After the warm performances, the learners settled down in class while we spoke with the parents.  “We appreciate the support from ALiVE and other stakeholders who contribute to real change, not just in the learning outcomes but in our learners’ attitudes,” observed a teacher. The values lessons flow between school and home. “We teach our children responsibility at home; like washing their own uniforms and helping in the kitchen garden. It’s our way of supporting what they learn in school,” said a parent. It was a powerful reminder that while assessments matter,