Consultant – Impact Evaluation Including Baseline and End-line Studies at Grassroot Researchers Association (GRA)

Grassroots Researchers Association (GRA) is a nonprofit and non-political rights-based organization registered in 2016 with the Corporate Affairs Commission of Nigeria as a local content hub aimed at facilitating evidence- based grassroots initiatives and actions that promote development, justice and victims support in the communities. Our mission is to be an active grassroots mobilizer towards improving the total quality of human life and social justice in Nigeria. Our programmes are spread across Climate Change, Conflict, Security and Justice, Social Economic Development and Governance. For more information, visit: www.grassrootresearchers.org

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job Title: Consultant – Impact Evaluation Including Baseline and End-line Studies

Locations: Maiduguri – Borno, Yola – Adamawa and Damaturu – Yobe
Employment Type: Contract

Terms of Reference
Call for Consultants:

• Type of Service: Impact evaluation including baseline and endline studies
• Project Title: Nigerian youth, community peacebuilding, and resilience to crises and fragility
• Funded by: European Union
• Implemented by: Dr. Denis Mukwege Foundation,Grassroots Researchers Association, and Youth Initiative Against Terrorism (Project Partners)

Context

• The impacts of the Boko Haram insurgency in northeastern Nigeria have been particularly acute for youth, and have disproportionally affected women and girls. Borno, Adamawa and Yobe (BAY) States have been subjected to a violent conflict for more than a decade, which has led to large-scale displacements, disruption of basic services, food insecurity, malnutrition, and severe protection issues.
• Boko Haram focuses attacks on schools and other civilian targets and has forced hundreds of young men to join their forces, killing those who refuse. Its modus operandi includes gendered kidnapping and abductions with a view to using women and girls as a source of extortion.
• Armed state and non-state security forces have also committed sexual violence crimes in this ongoing conflict. Women and girls who have escaped or been released face marginalisation, discrimination and rejection by family and community members due to stigma, as well as fears that they may have been radicalised in captivity. Children who have been born of sexual violence are at even greater risk of rejection, abandonment and violence.
• Displaced populations living in IDP camps face a severe humanitarian crisis, with shortages of food, medical care and economic opportunity. Sexual exploitation within the camps is an ongoing danger, taking advantage of impunity and a context in which particularly young people are destitute and easy targets.
• Because of ongoing conflict in the region, many young people in the BAY States have been forced to leave their villages and are displaced. They often face crowded living situations, have irregular access to food, and experience high levels of unemployment. Circumstances such as these limit the opportunity of conflict-affected youth to influence decision-making on topics that directly affect their current and future well-being.

Background of the Project Partners
The Dr. Denis Mukwege Foundation(MF) is an international human rights organisation, based in The Netherlands, working together with survivors of conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV) from around the world. The Foundation supports survivors’ demands for a world where sexual violence as a weapon of war is no longer tolerated, and bears consequences for individual perpetrators and States. It works for a future where survivors receive the holistic care & the reparations they need to rebuild their lives.

Grassroots Researchers Association (GRA) is a non-profit organisation which facilitates community-led initiatives promoting gender equality and advancing the status of women and girls in northern Nigeria. GRA partners with local and international NGOs to support victim-led initiatives to prevent and respond to violence against women and girls, particularly survivors of CRSV, female genital mutilation/circumcision, as well as persons living with disability in North East Nigeria.

The Youth Initiative Against Terrorism(YIAT, formerly YOCAT) is a youth NGO that aims to weaken the appeal of Boko Haram in northern Nigeria through counter-radical peace education, skills training for vulnerable youth, and counselling services to victims of terrorism. Formed in 2010 as a volunteer-led network, the majority of their volunteers were themselves victims of terrorism.

Project Description

• With funding provided by EU, the Project will provide young people with an opportunity to overcome barriers to their effective participation in society, by creating the conditions where youth in the BAY States have greater access to policy-making at local and national levels and where they are strengthened to better demand accountability for conflict-related human rights violations, such as CRSV, and to participate meaningfully in local and national peace and reconciliation processes, such as platforms to advance the Women Peace and Security, or the Youth Peace and Security, agendas.
• The Project will give young people aged 18 to 29 from the BAY States the opportunity to organize themselves into clubs from which they can initiate and partake in meaningful advocacy and civic action. Through regular club meetings, and with support from Project Partners, youth participants will benefit from a structured opportunity to widen their pool of knowledge/skills, including on leadership, organizational development, communication, and advocacy. The clubs will set up their own governance and host meetings and trainings designed to help young people better understand their rights and address their challenges in an efficient and peaceful manner.
• Occasional regional meetings of some club members will facilitate peer-group networking and collaboration across and between different States. They will also allow youth activists in the BAY clubs to network; explore cross-State synergies and/or learning; and where coherent, build cross-State joint initiatives – all with a view to building momentum and sustainability for youth -led activism generated by the Project.
• The Project will tackle challenges around low prior knowledge and capacities, around a lack of synergy amongst CSOs and stakeholders working on these themes, and in addition around concerns for the safety of young activists to enable them to speak out without fear of stigma or reprisals.

The impact (overall objective) of the Project is that:

• Nigerian youth, and in particular survivors of the conflict in north eastern Nigeria, participate in a meaningful and structured way, at local and national levels, in conflict prevention, the protection of civilians, peacebuilding, mediation & conflict resolution efforts, actively promoting the rights of the most vulnerable in society, therefore supporting the attainment of SDG 16 on promoting just, peaceful and inclusive societies.

The outcome (specific objective) of the Project is that:

• Conflict-affected Nigerian youth in the BAY States have strengthened capacities and increased opportunities to shape and influence policy and practice around governance, security and peacebuilding.

The intermediate outcomes of the Project are that conflict-affected Nigerian youth in the BAY States:

• Have strengthened networks, capacities, and skills to effectively advocate for changes in policies, laws, and programmes affecting them;
• Have opportunities to participate in organised and sustained dialogues with State and national authorities, service providers, and the wider civil society ecosystem to share information and good practice, and to influence policy and practice around governance, security, and peacebuilding; and
• Have improved recognition of their human rights, and are supported to more safely take a leading role in community reconciliation and conflict prevention.

Request for Proposals (RFP)

• It is in this context that the Dr. Denis Mukwege Foundation will recruit a team of consultants or a consulting firm whose members have proven expertise in the field of monitoring and evaluation of development, peacebuilding, and/or justice projects.Ideally, the incumbents will also have experience engaging directly with youth and other vulnerable groups, such as survivors of sexual violence.
• The chosen incumbent will assist the Mukwege Foundation team in conducting the impact evaluation for the Project, including baseline and endline studies at the start and close of the Project respectively.
• The baseline study will serve to update the Project’s M&E framework with initial data on indicators and to the extent possible address the below listed research questions. The endline study will utilise as much as possible the same methodology as with the baseline in order to ensure the comparability of the findings. In addition to preparing a baseline report (2021), the consultant will prepare a final report at the end of the assignment (2023) which presents the findings of the baseline and endline studies and discusses changes related to the Project over time – corresponding to the Project’s M&E framework and the below research questions.
• Responses to this RFP should include a technical and financial proposal, be a maximum of 5 pages excluding CVs for the consultants and be accompanied by a cover letter (also excluded from the 5-page count). Teams of consultants or firms that bring together relevant expertise related to this assignment and are able to ensure effective data-collection in the 3 BAY States (see geographic and linguistic selection criteria at Part IX herein) are encouraged to apply.
• It is anticipated that interviews will occur in the week of August 16, 2021. An updated M&E framework and an inception report will be due by latest September 13, 2021, with baseline data collection to occur from September 16, 2021.
• The baseline final report should be submitted at latest by November 1, 2021, and the endline and impact evaluation report must be submitted in the first or second quarter of 2023.
• Only financial offers of up to13,100 Euros, inclusive of VAT and all relevant taxes, will be accepted.

Methodological Guidelines and other Practical Information

• The youth clubs will be divided into the following themes: Democratic Governance, Peacebuilding, and Transitional Justice, comprising 30 participants each. In other words, 90 participants across Borno, Adamawa, and Yobe States will focus on the same thematic, with a total of 270 youth club participants for the entire Project.
• The consultant(s) or firm(s) applying can propose any methodology or work-plan so long as it responds to the requirements for the assignments and it is sound, cost-effective, and Covid-resilient, while ensuring active participation of youth club members and other relevant stakeholders by theme and location.
• All costs (including air travel between Yobe, Borno, and Adamawa States for data collection) must come within the total 13,100 Euros available for the consultancy.
• It can be arranged that 3 thematic clubs in one State meet over the course of a single week in September 2021so that the consultant(s) or firm can collect data from youth participants during club meetings. The chosen incumbent must make their own arrangements to collect data fromotherstakeholdersidentified in the project documents as relevant to the site (State) and the thematic area. Local partners GRA and YIAT (with offices across Yobe, Borno, and Adamawa)can assist the consultant(s) by facilitating contact with key respondents in the BAY States.
• It will be important to have clear findings by thematic area as well as by site (State), as part of both the baseline and endline evaluations. In view of this and other considerations related to contextual and geographical disparities, and cost-efficiency, the Mukwege Foundation recommends the following or similar division of roles within consulting teams: a data collection leader based in one of the 3 BAY States and a research coordinator based anywhere in Nigeria.

Key Objectives of the Assignment
The assignment has the following key objectives:

• Provide quality baseline and endline data (quantitative and qualitative) – including findings that are site-specific (per State) and thematic-specific (Democratic Governance, Peacebuilding, and Transitional Justice) – to respond to the indicators in the Project’s logical framework / M&E framework;
• Conduct an impact evaluation for the Project, setting these out in a final evaluation report;
• Provide recommendations to Project stakeholders in order to strengthen the Project’s impact and effectiveness.

Research Questions
Relevance:

• How well does the Project correspond to existing realities in the targeted communities? Is the Project able to respond to context changes in a timely manner?
• How does the Project regularly integrate beneficiary/participant feedback into design and implementation processes?

Efficiency:

• Are the objectives of the program clear? Are the indicators attainable and measurable?
• How does the Foundation coordinate with implementing partners in order to support the management and implementation of the Project?
• How has the Project design and organization of activities contributed to the Project’s efficiency?
• Were resources, human, financial and otherwise used in an efficient manner to deliver Project outcomes?

Effectiveness:

• Is the organisation of the Project (and activities) optimal?
• To what degree has the Project achieved its objectives/outcomes?
• What internal or external factors may have had an influence on the Project’s achievement of its indicators?

Impact:

• What are the most significant changes expected by the direct and indirect beneficiaries of the program? To what extent has the Project contributed to these most significant changes?
• What are some concrete examples of successful youth-led initiatives under this Project? How has this success been measured and/or viewed by Project participants?
• Were there unplanned results or changes which may have occurred in the implementation context, related to the Project?
• What internal and external factors may have contributed to or limited the Project’s impact?

Coherence:

• How has the Project coordinated with other similar initiatives (internally and externally) in order to mitigate risks of duplication of efforts and promote synergies?

Deliverables
The incumbent(s) are responsible for providing the following deliverables according to a calendar to be developed in coordination with the MF team:

• An M&E framework updated with (site and thematic specific) baseline and endline data on planned results and indicators;
• An inception report, including a proposed methodological guide, updated calendar and draft data collection tools (questionnaires, interview guides etc as applicable);
• A baseline study report following a template to be validated in advance with the MF team;
• Cleaned data collected during the course of the assignment;
• An internal final evaluation report including baseline and endline findings and analysing processes and results of the Project (to include an executive summary, methodology and limitations, comparison and analysis of findings, conclusions and recommendations).
• A summary final report for external audiences including the Project donor.
• 2 virtual workshops for Project staff presenting findings at baseline and endline.

Selection Criteria
We encourage applications from a team of consultants or a consulting firm whose members have the following attributes:

• Experience in the monitoring and evaluation of development, peacebuilding, and/or justice Projects, including in conducting complex impact evaluations;
• Experience in utilising participatory and inclusive methods of data collection;
• Proven familiarity with the contextual realities of North East Nigeria;
• Expertise in engaging with and conducting interviews with youth and other vulnerable groups, such as survivors of sexual violence will be an asset;
• Fluency in English (reading, speaking and writing);
• Team members must be based in Nigeria;
• Data-collection leads(see Part V) must speak Hausa;
• Data-collection leads based in one of the 3 BAY States (thereby ensuring context specificity and efficiency in inter-State travel costs) will be considered an asset;
• The ability of data-collection leads to speak other local languages will be considered an asset.

Deadline: 2nd August, 2021 (11.59pm Abuja, Nigeria Ttime).

Method of Application
Interested and qualified candidates must submit their Proposals in English via email to “Brynn Campbell” via: campbell@mukwegefoundation.org including “Nigeria Youth M&E Consultant” in the subject line.

Application Instruction
Please provide the following:

• Cover Letter
• Technical and financial proposal (max. 5 pages)
• CVs of the consultants expected to be involved in key aspects of the data collection and study conceptualization and reporting.

The technical and financial proposal should cover the following:

• Understanding of the objectives of the evaluation;
• Particulars of the proposed methodology;
• A well-informed approach to the participation of vulnerable persons in the study;
• Approaches to ethics, “Do no harm” and gender sensitivity;
• A proposed timeline for completing the assignment;
• A proposed division of roles and responsibilities among the team;
• An indicative financial proposal including daily rates and any other expenses.

For any question related to this study, please contact “Nicole Charalambous” at: nicole@mukwegefoundation.org. We encourage serious applicants to send in any questions for clarification, if any, by Thursday, July 29, 2021 (by noon, Abuja, Nigeria time).

Note

• All participating consultants will be asked to comply with the safeguarding policies of the Dr. Denis Mukwege Foundation, including its code of conduct and integrity policy.
• This document has been produced with the financial assistance of the European Union. The contents of this document are the sole responsibility of the Dr. Denis Mukwege Foundation, Grassroots Researchers Association, and Youth Initiative Against Terrorism and can under no circumstances be regarded as reflecting the position of the European Union.