Final Evaluation of the Second Chance Education and Vocational Learning (SCE) Programme

Consultant

Overview

Conduct final evaluation of the SCE Programme to assess relevance, effectiveness, sustainability, and impact.

You have:

• Master's Degree in Education, Gender Studies, Social Sciences or related field is required.
• Minimum 10 years of relevant experience in international development work, preferably in humanitarian settings, with substantial experience in monitoring and evaluation.
• Experience with women's empowerment and gender equality is essential.
• Strong communication skills with a focus on writing evaluation reports.
• Fluency in English is mandatory, French, Spanish or Hindi language skills are an asset.

Contract

This is a International Consultant contract. More about International Consultant contracts.

Background

UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security.

Aligned with the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, UN Women’s Second Chance Education and Vocational Learning (SCE) Programme is a solution for women who have missed out on education. This project aims to develop context specific, affordable and scalable learning, entrepreneurship and employment pathways for empowering the most disadvantaged young and adult women. It offers young and adult women, their families, local communities and societies the benefits of access to educational services which are tailored not only to their needs as learners, but also to their future as earners.

The SCE Programme is delivered through two modalities: UN Women Empowerment Hubs with both face-to-face training and access to the second modality - an online SCE learning portal through blended and independent learning opportunities. In its first phase (July 2018 – June 2022), the Programme is being piloted in Australia, Cameroon, Chile, India, Jordan, and Mexico.

The SCE programme is now in its fourth year of the innovative pilot Phase I, including a 12-month cost extension due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on programme implementation, ending 30 June 2022. To date (September 2021 data), the total number of women enrolled was 72,894 out of the target 67,000). The number of graduates has reached 28,031 women with 15,846[1] starting to earn an income, mostly through self-employment/entrepreneurship.

UN Women is currently planning the design of a five-year Phase II of the SCE programme to transition the successful components of the programme to sustainable scale by integration into institutional and policy frameworks in the initial pilot countries, mobilizing resources for scale up by other stakeholders including by governments, as well as continuing to expand the use of the model geographically through new UN Women Country Offices adopting it into their wider women’s economic empowerment programs in both humanitarian and development contexts. UN Women continues to engage potential new partners (traditional and non-traditional). With the final evaluation of SCE Phase I in the first quarter of 2022, the consolidated evidence-base of the SCE global model will provide potential new donors the necessary justification to invest in Phase II.

This document presents the key elements of the Terms of Reference for the final evaluation of the 4-year piloting phase of the SCE Programme, to guide candidates for the International Lead Consultant to prepare proposals for consideration.

[1] If including 10,000 nurses upskilled for COVID-19 emergency response, the number of graduates is 25,846.

Duties and Responsibilities

1. Purpose

UN Women is interested in conducting a utility-focused final evaluation of the SCE pilot programme (July 2018 – June 2022). The purpose of the evaluation will be to assess 1) the relevance of the SCE programme design and set objectives in meeting the needs of beneficiaries, 2) whether the programme is effective in achieving its objectives, 3) how well resources have been used, 4) whether the results of the programme is sustainable and scalable, and 5) how the COVID-19[1] pandemic has impacted the programme implementation, measures taken to contribute to the pandemic response and to adapt the programme, and lessons drawn for similar challenges in the future[2]. In particular, the evaluation should provide practical recommendations for how the SCE model should be standardised to support scaling and sustainability of successful programme outcomes in existing countries and new countries looking to adopt the model.

2. Stakeholders

Based on consultations with the SCE Global Programme Manager, and SCE Country Project Managers, the main stakeholder groups for this review are women participating in the SCE Programme, Implementing Partners/NGOs, Government partners, donors and private sector stakeholders.

3. Programme Theory of Change

Despite the scale of the global education challenge faced by marginalised women, young women and girls, there is not yet a proven approach to enabling successful second chance education at scale and leaving no one behind. UN Women has therefore developed a Second Chance Education and Vocational Learning (SCE) Programme (2018-2022) with context specific, affordable and scalable learning and employment pathways for empowering the world’s most disadvantaged young and adult women. The Programme support women with three pathways out of exclusion: 1) re-entry into formal education, 2) vocational education that provides them with a pathway to employment, and 3) entrepreneurship training and skills that support them to start their own business. The overall design of the Programme includes four outcome areas:

• OUTCOME 1: More marginalized women and young women access and benefit from high quality educational content, material and learning pathways.
• OUTCOME 2: More marginalized women and young women benefit from increased employment, livelihood and entrepreneurial opportunities.
• OUTCOME 3: Fewer marginalized women and young women are disadvantaged and denied education opportunities due to harmful and discriminatory social norms.
• OUTCOME 4: More marginalized women and young women have improved access to education and employment pathways through enhanced multi-sectoral policy and financing frameworks that enabling scaling of successful SCE solutions.

The Theory of Change underpinning the four outcome areas are as follows: It is anticipated that if increased access to high quality content is provided with an emphasis on learning outcome and retention; and if links to the labour market are established to increase the value of education and learning for women; and if positive social norms support second chance education and vocational learning for women; and if supportive multi-sectoral policy and financing frameworks for second chance education and vocational learning for marginalised women are promoted; then women will be empowered to determine their future; because the structural barriers that women face in equally accessing quality education, learning and decent work opportunities will have been addressed through long-term systematic change.

4. Approach and Criteria

The overall approach of this evaluation is utility-focused and needs to adhere to principles of gender equality, including the voices of marginalized women participating in the SCE Programme. The key guiding questions are organized under five main criteria: relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, sustainability, and impact.

The questions categorized under “relevance” will assess the relevance of the SCE Country Plans and identified learning and earning pathways against the identified labour market opportunities and aspirations of women participating in the programme. “Effectiveness” will examine to what extent did the programme has reached its planned objectives and outcomes “Efficiency” will look at how the country programme designs are meeting the demand from women and the efficiency of implementation. Research questions that refer to “sustainability” examine whether and how the benefits generated will continue at the end of the programme, for a reasonably long period of time. Sustainability may refer to the financial or technical capacity of partner organizations to continue the initiative, national ownership, and adaptive, operational, or management capacities of national partners. In addition to reviewing the SCE programme at country level, a key priority of the review should be to consider the holistic global effort of the programme including the role of the global SCE team such as its engagement of governments to prioritize education and employment opportunities for disadvantaged women in their national efforts and policies. In this regard, a SROI analysis is of interest to assess the impact of the programme during the pilot phase, but also its potential impact at scale, especially of the policy influence of the programme.

5. Questions and Focus

The following section summarizes some of the key questions, categorized under the appropriate research criteria. The following questions should be considered for the research design at both global and country levels and further refined during the Inception phase of the evaluation:

Relevance

• Is the suite of learning and earning pathways for SCE relevant, have any been identified as more relevant (by participants based on their aspirations, programme or country and if so what are the characteristics/learning)?Which pathways are most relevant for scale?

• What Programme activities designed to increase awareness and changing social norms have been most successful to allow women to access the Programme and employment opportunities and what are the specific attributes/characteristics?

• How does the Programme objectives and strategies fit (complement and/or amplify) with the overall UN Women strategic priorities at global and regional level?

Effectiveness

• To what extent has the SCE programme reached its planned objectives and desired outcomes?
• What was not achieved in full and why or did not deliver the anticipated outcomes?
• What improvements need to be made to the Programme M&E framework to support a Phase II scaling of the programme in current and new countries?

Efficiency

• What is the evidence of the demand for the Programme from the target groups and what is considered the most material bottlenecks in this regard?

• What is the strength of partnerships leveraged for the programme in each country?

• Are the SCE knowledge products being developed sufficient for the planned scale up phase of the Programme?

Sustainability

• What are the emerging trends, issues, and areas of consolidation for the global SCE model that should be considered for the scale-up design of the programme?
• Are there specific pathways from learning to earning that if scaled, could deliver accelerated and amplified quality outcomes?
• What is the evidence of how the established partnerships, especially ownership by government and local partners, will ensure sustainability of the Programme beyond the pilot phase?
• What is the status and continued strategy of fundraising for scaling the programme?

Impact

• What is the Social Return on Investment (SROI) of the program in each programme country during the pilot phase?
• What is the potential impact/ SROI of the programme in each country, and globally, if scaled?

6. Scope

The evaluation will focus on the activities of the Programme between July 2018 until current time and the outcomes achieved to date against the SCE objectives. The geographic scope of the evaluation will include the pilot countries Australia, Cameroon, Chile, India, Jordan, and Mexico. The review will include field visits to 3 countries (possibly Chile, Cameroon, India) and 3 (Mexico, Jordan, Australia) more can be covered through desk review and phone/virtual interviews with programme partners and stakeholders with support from national consultants. The evaluation proposal would need to include an alternative methodology should field visits not be possible due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

7. Methodology and Data Collection

The evaluation will use a mixed method approach, triangulating both quantitative and qualitative data. The following methods are suggested for answering the research questions:

Desk Review of Documents

It is recommended that the evaluation should begin with an in-depth context analysis of the Programme from a desk review of documents that can also answer questions of relevance. The following documents are suggested for review: SCE Project Document/ donor agreement, SCE Country Plans, SCE M&E framework, SCE Communications Strategy, SCE Risk Register, SCE budgets, SCE quarterly and annual reports, SCE e-portal, and SCE needs assessment global and country reports.

Key Informant Interviews

Key informants are individuals who are knowledgeable or experienced in a specific area or aspect of the Programme. For the purposes of this review the key informants will range from SCE team members, UN Women management and experts, country office staff, implementing partners, government and other partners, donors, and women participating in the Programme.

The research team will conduct semi-structured/ individual or group interviews, in person or over teleconference where possible. This methodology will be useful for triangulating information and interviewing a broad range of stakeholders.

Focus Group Discussions (FDGs)

Focus group discussions can gather in-depth qualitative information from groups of women participating in the Programme. The discussion will be facilitated and guided by a list of topics/questions developed by the research team. The team will also identify focus groups based on the areas of inquiry. For example, the evaluating team, in consultation with the SCE global and country managers, will explore possibilities of triangulating the data collected through interviews, documentation review and FDGs.

SROI analysis

The evaluation should include a social return on investment (SROI) analysis, with a methodology that would be practical to conduct during the timeframe of the evaluation. The analysis should include a cost-benefit analysis, quantifying both the economic and social value created for key programme stakeholders (e.g. programme beneficiaries, their family and communities, the government etc) during the pilot phase, as well as providing an estimate of potential future impact of the program if scaled, especially through policy integration. This analysis will help support UN Women in making decisions on which components of the programme to scale, and to provide a strong business case for new funding partners to join in scale up of the programme.

8. Expected Product of the Project Evaluation and Timeframe

The proposed time frame for the evaluation is from February – May 2022, contingent upon approval of the budget and recruitment of the evaluation team. The expected products of the evaluation include an inception report; a report with analysis of the findings; and a knowledge product which summarizes the findings and makes recommendations on planning, managing, monitoring and assessing the SCE Programme. The final reporting of the findings could be an audio-visual product that can be shared with country offices and other key stakeholders.

The following table indicates the proposed timeline and milestones:

Activities

Product

Indicative Milestones

Submission of Inception Report by lead consultant, with detailed work plan, evaluation methodology and SROI analysis methodology

Inception report (will include the complete research design including the scope, review approach, methodology, indicators, interview protocols, timeline, budget and any other relevant factors.)

25 March 2022

Data collection: Context analysis, Focus groups, interviews conducted

Presentation of preliminary findings

Feedback and consultation with SCE team

10 April 2022

Analysis of data and presentation of draft evaluation report with ppt/ visuals

Draft report and ppt

22 April 2022

Receive comments and finalize the report & ppt

Final Report

6 May 2022

Presentation of final report and knowledge product

Final Presentation

31 May 2022

9. Evaluation Team

The evaluation is to be conducted by the International Lead Consultant and a national consultant in each of the six programme countries. In addition, the lead consultant should include in the evaluation proposal an additional international consultant to support on the SROI analysis. Each consultant will be contracted directly by UN Women.

10. Management of the Evaluation

The lead international consultant will be supervised by the Global SCE programme manager. The UN Women SCE global unit in Geneva, in consultation with the SCE Country Project Managers, will be responsible for management of this review. The SCE Global Programme Manager at UN Women in Geneva is the focal point for the research team and will ensure that key stakeholders participate in the review and that the overall approach remains utility-focused and inclusive. The SCE Global Programme Manager will facilitate the process to the extent possible, by providing contact information, documentation for desk review, reviewing draft report and providing feedback to the researcher.

[1] This document will refer to the global pandemic as COVID-19 (and variants) related. The Omicron variant is of no particular consequence for the implementation of the Joint Programme at field level. It may, however, influence field mission opportunities.

[2] Criticality of gender specific programming, gender inequality at a global scale during a global crisis.

Competencies

Corporate Competencies: • Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability • Highest standards of integrity, discretion and loyalty • Accountability • Creative Problem Solving • Effective Communication • Inclusive Collaboration • Stakeholder Engagement

Functional Competencies: • Demonstrated grasp and understanding of gender issues, in general, and preferably in the UN system. • Excellent knowledge of principles and methods of evaluation, particularly in the context of international development. • Strong analytical skills, including ability to rapidly analyze and integrate diverse information with a discerning sense for quality of data. • Excellent writing skills. • Ability to work with multidisciplinary and multicultural teams. • Creativity, innovation, and initiative. • Result oriented. • Ability of facilitation.

Required Skills and Experience

Skills and Experience of the consultant

• University Degree: Master's Degree Education, Gender Studies, Social Sciences or related field
• Minimum 10 years of relevant experience in the area of international development work, preferably also in humanitarian setting, with substantial experience in monitoring and evaluation conducting evaluations and scale up methodology
• Experience with women’s empowerment and gender equality
• Strong communication skills, in particular writing of evaluation reports
• Experience in the SCE pilot (Australia, Cameroon, Chile, India, Jordan, Mexico) countries an asset
• Fluency in English mandatory, with French, Spanish, and Hindi language skills an asset

Mode of Contract Execution

This consultancy will be home based with travels.

Scope of Price Proposal and Schedule of Payments

Payments shall be made to the consultant against the submitted deliverables and fully completed and duly authorized Certification of Payment Form.

Deliverables****Details

% of Payment1. Upon submission of Inception report

Inception report (will include the complete research design including the scope, review approach, methodology, indicators, interview protocols, timeline, budget and any other relevant factors.)

20%

2. Upon submission of draft report with ppt/ visuals

Presentation of preliminary findings

Feedback and consultation with SCE team

30%

3. Final report and ppt

Final report and ppt and presentation of report and knowledge product

50% Total

Travel

The consultant will be responsible for all the travel arrangements including visa and insurance for three missions (possible countries Chile, Cameroon, and India).

A travel lump sum will be paid upon signature of the contract.

Submission of Proposal

The International Lead Consultant should submit an evaluation proposal outlining a proposed methodology based on the above elements. The methodology should build on the SCE mid-term review (report available: https://gate.unwomen.org/Evaluation/Details?evaluationId=11474). A methodological framework will be fully developed by the Lead Consultant and presented in the Evaluation Inception Report (first deliverable), including an evaluation matrix that will consider and refine as needed the initial evaluation questions outlined above. The proposal should outline the approach to developing the Inception Report (first deliverable), including how a sampling frame (area and population represented, rationale for selection, mechanism of selection, limitations of the sample) will be developed, including how it will address the diversity of stakeholders in the intervention.

Submission package should include:

• Updated CV for the lead consultant and proposed additional consultants
• Technical proposal
• Financial proposal: the financial proposal shall specify a lump sum amount breaking down the professional fee for each deliverable and travel related cost
• Three written references
• Sample of evaluation reports conducted by Lead consultant conducted previously

Recommended Application

The following documents should be submitted:

1. Personal CV and P11 (All applications must provide the completed UN Women Personal History form (P-11) which can be downloaded from http://www.unwomen.org/about-us/employment), indicating all past experience from similar projects, as well as the contact details (email and telephone number) of the Candidate and at least three (3) professional references;
2. Brief description of why the individual considers him/herself as the most suitable for the assignment, and a methodology, if applicable, on how they will approach and complete the assignment. A methodology is recommended for intellectual services, but may be omitted for support services [Note: this is optional for support services];

IMPORTANT

Kindly note that the system will only allow one attachment. Applications without the completed UN Women P-11 form will be treated as incomplete and will not be considered for further assessment. Please combine all your documents into one (1) single PDF document as the system only allows to upload maximum one document.

In July 2010, the United Nations General Assembly created UN Women, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women. The creation of UN Women came about as part of the UN reform agenda, bringing together resources and mandates for greater impact. It merges and builds on the important work of four previously distinct parts of the UN system (DAW, OSAGI, INSTRAW and UNIFEM), which focused exclusively on gender equality and women's empowerment.

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Added 4 years ago - Updated 1 year ago - Source: jobs.undp.org