Background of the program
The Saving lives now and in future project is funded by the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs through Oxfam IBIS and has been running from 1st January 2019 to 31st December 2021. This country program is part of a global Inclusive Peacebuilding program implemented in a total of 8 countries from 2018 to 2021: Burkina Faso, Colombia, Ghana, Niger, Mali, South Sudan, Uganda, and Yemen. In Uganda it is being implemented by Oxfam in collaboration with 12 local partner organizations that include; Youth Social Advocacy Team (YSAT), Community Empowerment for Creative Innovation (CECI), Action for People in Need Organization (APINO), I Can South Sudan, South Sudanese Refugees Association (SSURA), Save Humanity Africa (SHA), Youth Empowerment to Act (YETA), Support Trust For Africa Development (STAD), Community Empowerment for Peace and Development (CEPAD), Lugbara Kari, Uganda Christian Lawyers Fraternity (UCLF) and Dynamic Action for Peace and Rehabilitation (DA4PR).
Objectives of the Evaluation
The overall objective of the global program is to promote sustainable peacebuilding and prevention of violent conflict with a focus on strengthening the participation of women and youth in conflict transformation and peace processes. In Uganda, the program is being implemented in the West Nile region and works towards the following objectives:
- Increase the awareness and understanding of existing and potential tensions and conflict between host and refugee communities and between refugee populations, as well as of cross-border security dynamics.
- Provide recommendations for and support the design and implementation of conflict-sensitive interventions and programming in the refugee response.
- Promote exchange and dialogue between political, development, and humanitarian actors, refugees, and host communities about preventing, mitigating, and addressing conflict related to the refugee response.
- Encourage and promote support for and development of peace-building, reconciliation, and mediation initiatives to address conflict dynamics.
End-Term Evaluation of the program
The end-term evaluation of the global program is planned to be finalized by February 2022. To contribute to the global evaluation, the Uganda evaluation should be carried out between November - December 2021. The global evaluation is being led by a team of two independent consultants, who also led the participatory design of the evaluation. The national consultant based in Uganda will receive support from the global evaluation consultant throughout the process, including a briefing on the terms of reference and training on one of the data collection tools.
Evaluation questions
The following evaluation questions will guide the evaluation. A full evaluation matrix including an overview of the data sources to be used for each evaluation question will be provided to the selected consultant following contract signing.
- Do program participants perceive a contribution by the program to a reduction of conflict or increased peaceful coexistence? What does this look like?
- What are the other changes (including unexpected changes) in the lives of target communities to which the program has contributed?
- Which program strategies or external factors were most effective in reducing conflict or increasing peaceful coexistence in target communities?
- Has the participation of women and youth in peacebuilding been strengthened by the program and how?
- Has the set-up of the program and ways of working enabled or obstructed the achievement of results?
- What are examples of results achieved by the program's support to networks and alliances on peace?
Methodology of the Evaluation
As far as possible the evaluation implementation in Uganda will follow the centralized evaluation design as described below. Adaptations will be made where necessary in consultation with the global evaluation consultant, depending on the specific needs and characteristics of the country program.
- Desk review
The first phase of desk research will focus on reviewing existing program documentation, including program reports, research reports, monitoring data, and progress reports. Subsequently, the consultant will establish an overview of the program and partner staff and other key stakeholders who should be interviewed as part of the evaluation. Actors will be selected according to a sampling strategy that will be provided by the global consultant, to gain contrasting views on the program and its effects. Key documents related to the program and conflict context will also be reviewed.
- Interviews with CO and partner staff
In-depth semi-structured interviews will be conducted with Oxfam and partner staff involved in the program implementation, as identified during the desk research phase, as well as a select number of other key stakeholders who can provide information about the program. The in-depth interviews will aim to expand the understanding of the strategies that the program implemented, the views and opinions of staff and partners about implementation challenges and successes, key results, how results (if any) came about (the influencing actors and factors), the sustainability of initiatives and any unexpected and/or negative effects, to answer the evaluation questions. The global consultants will design an interview guide for the KII’s, which can be adapted by the national consultant to ensure its relevance for the Uganda context.
Interviews will be conducted either online or in-person (depending on feasibility and prevailing COVID-19 precautions) by the consultant. A total of 50 - 60 interviews are expected to be carried out.
The interview notes will be analyzed by the national consultant in line with the relevant evaluation questions, aiming to gain a full picture of each program based on the different points of view of stakeholders.
Following some initial interviews in-country, the consultant will propose a case for the case study (see below). The selection will be made in consultation with the country office staff, partners, and the global consultant.
- Story-based inquiry
The evaluation will collect stories from program participants in intervention communities about their experiences as part of the program using Sprockler. Sprockler is a methodology and an online platform that allows for collecting, processing, analyzing, and visualizing data. It is specially designed to evaluate complex contexts. It enables users to collect and combine quantitative and qualitative data and presents this in an accessible manner, making it easy to learn about what is happening and make decisions for the future. In regular Sprockler inquiries, respondents are asked to tell a story about an experience (storytelling) and then give meaning to this experience themselves by answering a few questions about the story. Between 50-60 stories will be collected to examine any differences and discover patterns.
The Sprockler inquiry will be conducted with program participants by enumerators, under the management of the consultant. The enumerators will be independent and identified by the consultant.
The global evaluation consultant will design the Sprockler inquiry and provide this to the national consultant. The consultant will be expected to attend a training session on using the Sprockler software and will be provided with training materials to train the enumerators on the Sprockler approach. A preliminary analysis of the data will be provided to the consultant by the global evaluation consultant and the consultant will be expected to review and provide feedback and insights on this analysis.
- Case study on women and youth participation in peacebuilding
Drawing together information from the desk review, the Sprockler inquiry, interviews with CO and partner staff, and any other key stakeholders, the consultant will develop a case study that profiles one aspect of the program's strategy to involve women and youth in peacebuilding processes. The case study will briefly describe the programs’ objectives and the stakeholders involved, before zooming in on one specific strategy implemented by the program to increase women and youth participation, including the activities carried out, the nature of the results, the success of the strategy in terms of contributing to the long-term objectives of the program as perceived by different stakeholders, the actors and factors that contributed to or hindered results being achieved, the challenges encountered and any unexpected effects.
The case study should be approximately 3-4 pages long and will form the response to evaluation question 4.
The selection of the case for the case study will be made by the consultant following initial interviews in-country. The selection will be made in consultation with the country office staff, partners, and the global consultant.
Expected outputs/deliverables
- Transcripts of KIIs (to send to global consultant)
- 50-60 responses from community members entered into Sprockler; if applicable translated from the local language into English
- Evaluation report, including 3-4 page case study
- PowerPoint presentation for reflection session and facilitation of the session
Scope of work and timeframe
Below is a summary of the deliverables for this assignment as well as the deadline for their delivery:
Attend briefing session for national consultants (facilitated by the global consultant): Half a day.
Attend training on Sprockler (facilitated by the global consultant): Half a day.
Conducting interviews with Oxfam staff and partners: (approx. 12 interviews)
- Planning and coordination: 1 day
- Conducting the interview and transcribing: half-day per interview
- Total number of days for all interviews: 7 days
Recruiting external interviewers for community interviews & training them in story collection and use of Sprockler: 3 days.
Data collection plan for 50-60 community interviews based on the sampling approach, including details of which interviewers will collect data in which location on which dates to ensure data collection is completed according to the plan, on time, and within budget. Translate Sprockler inquiry into the local language, if needed: 1 day
Support to and monitoring of interviewers during data collection: 5 days
Analysis of Oxfam and partner interview data: 3 days
Additional analysis of Sprockler community interview data: 1 day
Production of draft country evaluation report: 3 days
Facilitate reflection session (approx. 2 hours) on country findings with the participation of Oxfam and partner staff in-country and potentially Oxfam IBIS staff and global consultants: 1 day
Participation of national consultant in reflection session on global findings (facilitated by a global consultant): ½ day
Production of the final country evaluation report, including integrating comments from Oxfam staff, partners, and global consultants (comments will be provided in a consolidated document): 1,5 days
The total estimated number of days for this work is 28 working days (additional days for translation and data entry as needed).
Qualifications and experience of the consultant/team
The consultant is expected to meet the following requirements:
- Master’s degree or Bachelor’s degree with extensive work experience in a relevant topic
- At least 7 years of relevant professional experience
- At least 3 years of experience in conducting evaluations of peacebuilding programs
- Thematic expertise (peacebuilding, fragile contexts, women and youth participation, gender)
- Experience in qualitative and quantitative research methodologies, including in-depth interviews, analysis of interview data
- Experience hiring and training data collectors in in-depth interviewing and surveys
- Strong analytical skills and proficiency in writing in English
- Good knowledge of Arabic
- Excellent facilitation and coordination skills
- A network of enumerators in-country is considered an asset.
- Knowledge of the program intervention regions is considered an asset
- The ability to travel to the field to train and supervise enumerators and carry out interviews
Proposal Evaluation Criteria
- The experience and competence of the consultant concerning the Terms of Reference
- The availability to carry out the assignment in the proposed timeframe
- The budget for the assignment
Submission and deadline
- Interested and eligible candidates should submit:
- A CV (maximum 3 pages)
- A cover letter highlighting their relevant experience for this assignment and indicating how the candidate meets the requirements
- Up to two examples of their work on a previous similar assignment (evaluation or research reports)
- Two references
- A budget for the assignment, including the estimated number of days and daily rate (in EUR).
Submit complete applications by email with the title “Application Inclusive Peacebuilding Evaluation” to ugandalogistics@oxfam.org by 16th November 2021 by 5:00 pm