ThaiNGO

Consultant to undertake Midterm Assessment for Promoting Rural Opportunities for Children’s Empowerment, Education and Development (PROCEED) Project

1. Background

The PROCEED project implemented by Save the Children (SC) in Thailand is funded by a private donor and aims to empower children, especially the most at-risk girls and boys from ethnic minorities including stateless children, and provide them with knowledge and skills on child rights, child protection, life skills and sexual reproductive health. The project’s duration is for 4 years from 2017-2020 in the 2 provinces of Chiang Rai and Mae Hong Son, and will reduce children’s’ risk of sex work, being abused or exploited and being affected by early pregnancy.

SC works with four implementing partners in Chiang Rai and Mae Hong Son: 1) ECPAT Foundation, 2) Highland People Education and Development Foundation, in Chiang Rai, 3) Legal Status Network Foundation, and 4) The Life Skills Development Foundation, in Mae Hong Son. In order to achieve the impact of the project effectively, to assess the project’s performance to use its result to improve the project is then a rational choice. 

At the core of the project approaches are the following components that provide both preventive and responding measures:

1. With the supports from Education Services Area Office (ESAO), schools in the targeted areas provide information and education on child rights and sexual, and reproductive health for children from grade 7 to grade 12.
2. Children are provided conducive environments created for all children to organize groups and clubs where they can discuss about their rights, issues of concerns, voice their views in the targeted schools and their communities.
3. ESAO and schools, in targeted areas, provide counselling/guidance services, adequate information and referral services to children from grade 7 to 12 who are at risk or affected by the identified risks, to appropriate services.
4. Stateless children, children from ethnic minorities and their families have accessed to quality and gender sensitive basic services.

The programme will reach its mid-point in June 2019 and SC will conduct an internal review and assessment in September to inform implementation during the second phase of the project. Save the Children in Thailand is thus seeking to recruit an independent consultant to lead and undertake the mid-term assessment. External support for the process is particularly important given the need to ensure quality deliverables and the possibility of including an external, independent and critical perspective to the conduct and outcomes of the review.

2. Purpose and scope of this consultancy:

Save the Children Thailand intends to conduct a mid-term assessment for PROCEED project to generate evidence, learning, and knowledge by specifically assessing project progress against its project objective, documenting good practices, lessons learn, and seeking recommendations, at the midpoint of the 4-year project. The assessment is intended to disclose the learning that has taken place in the targeted area and the local child protection-working group (implementing partners, local administrative organization, NGOs and government). The findings will inform course correction and adaptive actions for the remaining year of the project.

Moreover, it shall measure the following key questions:

Relevance and appropriateness

1. To what extent were project objectives, rational and approaches relevant to the needs and priorities of target beneficiaries and context of the areas?
2. To what extent are children, teachers and communities involved in child protection services delivered by PROCEED?

Effectiveness

3. To what extent has the project progressed towards its objectives/ key expected results and programme targets?

4. What do children, youth and partners involved in the project perceive to be the possible intended or unintended changes brought about by the project?

5.   How well is the coordination between Save the Children and local partners?

Sustainability

6. To what extent do key decision makers and stakeholders, e.g. project partners and local community, feel ownership of the project and how do they perceive the prospect for project sustainability?

Cross-cutting issues:

7. How gender-sensitive are the project activities implemented by Save the Children and partners?

The following two questions relating to constraints and lessons learned are integral to the review and should be answered in the light of the abovementioned mid-term assessment criteria:

8. What are (potential) constraints and challenges hindering project implementation and progress towards achievements of planned results?

9. What are major lessons learned, promising practices and recommendation that can help improve the quality of project implementation?

3. Design and methodology:

An independent consultant will be recruited to lead this midterm assessment. The following is the outline of a suggested process; however, it would be expected that this would be further refined by the consultant. The midterm assessment shall be undertaken based on the Save the Children International requirements and must be in line with Save the Children’s ethical guideline (Annex II).

Literature/ Desk review

                Review of project documents and background information

• Development and review of the survey/interview tools to be used for data collection;
• Development of sampling methodology to assess the progress of project

Field Work:

• Leading the administering of data collection, including training of numerators (if applicable);
• Conducting a series of interviews and focus group discussions with beneficiaries and stakeholders including children, parents, teacher, staff of implementing partners, SC staff, and government officials;

Data Processing, Analysis and Reporting:

• Discussion on preliminary findings with formulation of recommendations with SC staff;
• Draft Report and Final Report;
• Presentation on key findings;

4.Target area and group

The assessment targets children, schools, community, local government agencies as the main informants. The field working area will be taking place in Chiang Rai at Mae Fah Luang and Mae Jan District, and in Mae Hong Son province at Pang Ma Pa and Sob Meai/Mae Sa Riang District.

5.Timeframe

The consultant will be required to dedicate an estimated 23 days’ time to this consultancy work during August to September 2019 period, subject to the requirements and agreements with Save the Children.

6. Schedule and Deliverables

All materials, including all RAW data sets, collected in the undertaking of the consultancy process should be submitted along with the final report.

7. Management of the consultancy:

The consultant(s) will managed by Save the Children’s PROCEED Project Coordinator, with technical support from other staff, who will provide inputs throughout the midterm assessment process including on the proposed methodology and data collection tools, analysis and interpretation and recommendations. Furthermore, the project team will be able to provide support for logistics and arrangements for data collection and consultation with stakeholders in remote areas. Support requirements for tasks such as translation and data entry will be discussed with the successful applicant

8. Consultancy Fee

The consultant(s) is asked to propose the budget in Thai Baht and USD. The financial competitiveness of the fee will be considered in the selection process. Costs involved in the assessment, such as materials, travel, translation and applicable taxes, should be included in the proposed budget.

9. Qualifications

• At least master’s degree in education, research, social sciences or other related field
• Expertise in qualitative and quantitative research methods
• Strong qualitative and qualitative data analysis skills
• Expertise in issues related to child protection is an asset
• Experience working with non-profit organizations and familiarity with development work
• Experience in conducing evaluation in multicultural, multilingual and sensitive context will be an asset
• Thai/English language proficiency
• Ability to work within strict deadlines

10. Submissions for the consultancy

The submission must address the terms of reference and include:

The resume of the lead candidate and team (if any)

• A cover letter explaining the interest and suitability
• Assessment plan and budget proposal including research methodology and timeline (5 pages maximum)
• A detailed budget in USD and THB as specify in the consultant fee section

Annex I: PROCEED Log Frame

Annex II: Save the Children’s ethical guideline

Before undertaking any monitoring and evaluation activity with children or adults an ethical assessment should be undertaken by the Country Office. Where appropriate, approval for an activity should be obtained from all relevant ethical or institutional review boards in-country prior to the commencement of the activity.
As per the minimum standards, at each of these stages the responsible individual or office must:

• Make sure the information gathering activity is necessary and justified:
  • Make sure that the purpose of the activity is clearly defined
  • Use the minimum sample size required to get statistically significant or valid results
  • Consider carefully the ethics of using a comparison or control group
• Adopt informed consent and voluntary participation procedures:
  • Participants must give their informed consent (either written or verbal) to participate. When children are involved consent must also be granted from an appropriate adult. Consent forms should be field tested before use. Save the Children’s Practice Standards for child participation can give more guidance. 
  • Ensure that participants are well informed on the purpose of the activity and how the results will be disseminated
  • Make sure that individuals are informed that their participation is voluntary and that they have a choice to opt out
  • Confirm that participants understand the limits of the activity, in terms of benefits, and the next steps
  • Consider very carefully the use of incentives for participation and try not to use incentives where possible
• Adopt appropriate confidentiality procedures, sensitive to children’s needs
  • Ensure that all persons involved in the activity, including data gatherers, data input staff, translators etc have received training on the confidentiality procedures and signed an appropriate confidentiality agreement
  • Confidentiality may need to be breached to provide immediate protection to a child. Children and adults must be made aware of the confidentiality procedures before being asked to provide any information.
• Ensure that the costs to children of participating in activity do not outweigh the benefits, and ensure their safety at all times:
  • Adhere to Save the Children’s Child Safeguarding Policy
  • Adhere to Save the Children’s Practice Standards for Child Participation
  • Ensure that participation is in the children’s best interests and does them no harm
  • Ensure that information gathering with children is appropriate to their age and stage of development
  • Anticipate adverse consequences and develop appropriate responses
  • Be cautious and protective and undertake ethical checks as you proceed with any activity
  • Be sensitive and flexible; if situations change you must be prepared to stop or change an activity if ethical issues cannot be resolved
• Be consultative
  • Determine whether local permission from community stakeholders or authorities is needed to proceed and adhere to any locally established institutional policies or guidelines for conducting research.   
  • Information about the activity must be provided to all stakeholders
  • Prepare local communities and explain the purpose and aims of the activity
• Be sensible and prepared
  • Researchers have a responsibility to be mindful of cultural, religious, gender, and other significant differences within the research population in the planning, conduct, and reporting of the study findings
  • Ensure that those gathering information from children and/or vulnerable communities are adequately trained and ready to follow up or refer children who might need special attention as a result of research/investigation in sensitive themes.
• Respect the dignity and autonomy of those participating in the activity
  • Ensure children and/or vulnerable communities are not simply used as a means to achieve research objectives 
  • Know that study participants have a right to remain anonymous.
• Be accountable
  • Adhere to the International Accountability Charter
  • Make sure that a complaints and feedback mechanism is in place for children and adults participating in the activity
  • Ensure accuracy of information during analysis, interpretation and reporting.  And remain open to the findings of any study and do not allow vested interests to interfere
  • Make sure that proper acknowledgement is given at all stages, as appropriate.

Ethical issues

Every data gathering exercise involving children and vulnerable communities is theme or context specific therefore you must review all ethical considerations before undertaking a new activity.

Whenever we conduct research on people, the well-being of research participants must be our top priority. The research question is always of secondary importance. This means that if a choice must be made between doing harm to a participant and doing harm to the research, it is the research that is sacrificed.

In some cases you may decide that you cannot proceed with a monitoring and evaluation activity because of ethical issues.  In this case you may need to re-design the activity or cancel it altogether if an ethical solution cannot be found.

Annex III: Evaluation report quality score tool

The role holder is required to carry out the duties in accordance with SCI Health and Safety policies and procedures.

Interested candidates should submit all required documents and details of at least 3 referees to: hr.thailand@savethechildren.org

Please indicate in the subject as “Consultant to undertake Midterm Assessment for PROCEED Project_(Name of candidate)”

Only shortlisted candidates will be notified.

“We need to keep children safe so our selection process, which includes rigorous background checks, reflects our commitment to the protection of children from abuse”