Evaluation Lead Consultant - Erbil/ Iraq

Founded in 1933, the International Rescue Committee is one of the most prominent international organizations working in relief, rehabilitation, protection, post-conflict development, resettlement services and advocacy for those uprooted or affected by violent conflict and oppression.

Working in coordination with the humanitarian community, the IRC currently addresses the needs of war-affected populations from several operational bases in the region and form part of an over-arching humanitarian response in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and Iraq and the region that seeks to assist refugees, IDPs and war-affected Syrians survive conflict and displacement.

Throughout its past and current experience in Iraq, the International Rescue Committee (IRC) has built solid expertise in protection including (Protection of law, Child protection, and prevention of and response to violence against women and girls), Education, and Economic recovery and development, serving mainly displaced populations in camp and non-camp settings as well as refugees and host communities. The IRC has also been instrumental in ensuring that children are protected and have access to safe formal and non-formal learning environments, which will reduce their exposure to risks including recruitment by armed groups, early marriage and environmental hazards, and give them an opportunity to learn and play, which is vital for overcoming extremely difficult experiences serving by that hundreds of internally displaced, host communities, and refugee children.

Purpose of the Evaluation:

The overall objective of the end of project evaluation is to measure the extent to which IRC has able to achieve the project anticipated targets and made any difference, and to generate knowledge and lessons learnt from the IRC OFDA funded project experience specific for Child protection/Education sector under the title of “Improving the Protection Environment for Vulnerable IDPs, Returnees, and Host Communities in Iraq”. This evaluation is being conducted as summative end of the project and will focus at the entire implementation period. The overall purpose of the Evaluation is to assess the processes and achievements made to effectively draw lessons that will inform the design and development of the future project through understanding what has and what has not worked in terms of effectiveness, relevance, efficiency, and sustainability, and utilize the findings as a guide for future planning.

SCOPE OF WORK

As part of a multi-sectorial project funded by USAID/OFDA, the IRC has worked directly with children and adolescents aged 0-17, their parents and community members, to prevent and respond to child protection risks at home, in schools, and in the wider community. The IRC Iraq has received a grant which allows it to conduct an external evaluation on its OFDA funded project for child protection/education sector. This evaluation aims to tap into IRC’s expertise in child protection and education to protect children affected by the Iraqi crisis (in terms of being associated with armed groups or armed forces and/or being used in any other way by armed groups), and assess how it can further tailor and develop programming which responds to children needs.

Under the supervision of the M&E Coordinator, the Evaluation Consultant will lead the implementation of the evaluation, overseeing the surveys and interviews with key Child protection and Education staff, lead focus group discussions with Children, youth, parents and teachers, translate and aggregate evaluation data for analysis and report writing.

The Evaluation Questions

The following key questions will guide the end of project evaluation:

Relevance:

• Was the program designed in a way to meet the needs of children, caregivers, teachers, and wider community considering gender equality? And was it implemented as designed?

Sustainability:

• What measures have been considered to ensure that the benefits of the project will continue beyond the life of the project?

Efficiency:

• Were the required resources (human, financial, and operational) in place and sufficient to implement the project activities and achieve the output targets on time?

Effectiveness:

• To what extent were the planned objectives and outcomes in the project documents achieved?

Coverage:

• Did the program reach the intended target group and considered gender equality among children, caregivers, teachers, and wider community?

KEY DELIVERABLES:

Timeline:

The evaluation will start once consultant is recruited and should be carried out during an anticipated period of one month. The consultant must be available from the 16^th of July 2019, and full time effort is expected of the consultant during the consultancy period is expected that the consultancy will be of a total of 30 days.

Methodology:

The consultant will be required to come up with a proposal on how he/she intends to conduct the evaluation. The proposal should further describe a timeline for the evaluation.

IRC proposes the use of both qualitative (key informant interviews, in depth interviews, focus group discussions, observations…) and quantitative (e.g. surveys…) research tools approaches in gathering information from a wide array of sources. These sources would include targeted beneficiaries, security staff, project coordinators, managers, monitoring & evaluation staff, programmes staff, local authorities, Directorate of Education, and other national and international organizations working in the child protection in the same area. The consultant might also have to review program policy documents including Human Resources and others and establish how they were applied. The IRC may provide staff who can support only in data collection.

Gender Considerations:

The consultant should include gender considerations in the evaluation not only at the sampling level of interviewees and reporting on the reach of different gender, but also at the level of examining gender issues within activities and recommendations. The following questions are proposed by IRC to be answered through the evaluation:

1.Has the project integrated gender considerations into its activities?

2.Has the project developed any measures to enhance women and girls participation in the project?

Ethics/protection:

The evaluator is requested to include a section on research ethical considerations in the inception report which elaborates on protection issues and other ethical concerns. A child protection briefing by IRC staff is part of the assignment.

The evaluation will provide quantitative and qualitative data through the following methods:

1.Desk and program data review including tools, assessments, case management guidelines, etc.

2.Design and translate the data collection tools which include quantitative and qualitative methods.

3.Interviews with IRC staff in Erbil, and Mosul including managers, social workers, and prevention officers.

4.Focus group discussions with Parents, Teachers, and student taking into consideration gender balance.

5.Translate and aggregate data collected so it is ready for analysis.

6.Data cleaning and Analysis for both qualitative and quantitative data collected from interviews and survey.

Expected Deliverables:

1-Inception report which will outline the key scope of the work and intended work plan of the analysis, and evaluation questions. The inception report should detail the consultant’s understanding of what is being evaluated and why to show how each evaluation question will be answered through: proposed methods; proposed sources of data; and data collection procedures. It should also include the timeline and deliverables of the evaluation. The inception report will be shared after 5 days of the consultancy and discussed and agreed upon with all stakeholders.

2-A Draft Evaluation Report in English which will be shared within 10 days with the steering committee and who will be providing their comments in 5 days. The programme unit and key stakeholders in the evaluation should review the draft evaluation report to ensure that the evaluation meets the required quality criteria.

3-A Final Evaluation Report in English within 10 days from receiving the comments on the draft report which should not exceed 25 pages including:

-Title page

-Table of contents

-Executive summary

-List of acronyms and abbreviations

-Description of the project including any major changes occurring since the design

-Description of the evaluation methodology

-Main findings based on the objectives highlighted in the proposal and supported with charts and numbers.

-Best practices and lessons learnt.

-Recommendation on the use of the evaluation results for program changes and decision making.

4-A power point presentation in English to key IRC stakeholders, including methodology, main findings, recommendations, best practices and lessons learnt.

Treatment of information:

All data and information received for the purpose of this assignment are to be treated confidentially and are only to be used in connection with the execution of these terms of reference. All intellectual property rights arising from the execution of these terms of reference are assigned to the IRC. The contents of written material obtained and used in this assignment may not be disclosed to any third parties.

Management:

The implementation of the evaluation will be supervised by the M&E team and project staff. The consultant will supervise the implementation of the field work and quality data management as well as report writing and dissemination. If the consultant has his/her own team of enumerators, their costs should be specified and covered from the overall evaluation envelop mentioned in the title. Logistics, administration, finance and HR support could be provided by IRC from the field offices if necessary.

• Minimum 5 years of experience in evaluation and/or research of humanitarian programs, preferably related to Child protection and/or Education.

• This will require high level of experience with qualitative and quantitative research methods including surveys, Focus Group discussions, and interviews.

• Experience in USAID/OFDA mandate, Evaluation policy, procedures, and programme management

• Fluent in English and Arabic, written and oral.

• Good understanding and experience in selecting and applying methods for gender sensitive evaluation.
• Excellent data analysis skills and ability to articulate the linkage between findings, analysis, and program recommendations
• Proven experience and track record of timely and high quality completion of assignments

• High level of organization and time management, as well as an ability to learn quickly and produce high quality work under tight deadlines.
• Good analytical and critical thinking skills.
• Ability to work independently and as part of a team.

• Flexible attitude towards receiving feedback.

• Able to travel to Mosul and Sinjar-Iraq.