GAGE’s conceptual framework takes a holistic approach to understanding what works to support girls’ and boys’ development and empowerment both now, while they are teenagers, and in the future, when they are adults. We pay particular attention to the ways in which gender norms shape young people’s day-to-day experiences and expose them to different risks and opportunities. Our conceptual framework focuses on:

• Adolescent capabilities: looking at young people’s individual and collective well-being in terms of six broad domains: education and learning, bodily integrity (including freedom from sexual and gender-based violence, and child marriage), physical and reproductive health and nutrition, psychosocial well-being, voice and agency, and economic empowerment.
• Change strategies: exploring how to maximise programme impacts for adolescents by simultaneously intervening at individual, family, community, service and systems levels.
• Contexts: investigating the ways in which adolescents’ local, national and international environments shape their lives and development trajectories.