BASELINE, MID-TERM AND ENDLINE ASSESSMENT ON KNOWLEDGE, ATTITUDE, PRACTICES AND BEHAVIOURS RELATING TO PEER VIOLENCE AMONG CHILDREN

BASELINE, MID-TERM AND ENDLINE ASSESSMENT ON KNOWLEDGE, ATTITUDE, PRACTICES AND BEHAVIOURS RELATING TO PEER VIOLENCE AMONG CHILDREN IN TEN SCHOOLS IN BULGARIA, CROATIA, ROMANIA AND SERBIA

Terre des hommes is seeking the services of qualified researchers/evaluators to support with methodology development and data collection work at various stages during 2021-2022.

Tdh Hungary, together with four civil society partner organizations has launched a new, EU-funded project entitled: “REVIS: Responding to peer violence among children in schools and adjacent settings” (15 January 2021 – 14 January 2023). The project is implemented in four countries: Bulgaria (by SAPI), Croatia (by Brave Phone), Romania (by Tdh Romania) and Serbia (by the Center for Youth Integration), with project coordination work out of Hungary (by Tdh Hungary).

The overall goals of the project are to: • prevent, combat and respond to peer violence among children through transforming social and gender norms and behaviours (leading to violence); • and create space for children to challenge social and gender norms that lead to peer violence; and to become social influencers to develop their own solutions to the issue.

The project will work with ten schools in each four country and train a total of 8 trainers (two per country) and 80 facilitators (school teachers, 20 per country) in the target schools. The 80 trained facilitators will conduct participatory activities with children and young people (around 400 in each country) and awareness raising activities for other school professionals to help prevent, combat and respond to peer violence in and around schools and empower children in addressing the issue through their own solutions. Tdh Hungary and partners conducted a regional qualitative and participatory research in 2020 in the same four project countries (Bulgaria, Croatia, Romania and Serbia) and in other countries (Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo and Moldova). This research looked at 1) what social and gender norms contribute to what types of violence against children in schools; and 2) in what ways these norms contribute to violence against the children.

OBJECTIVES OF THE ASSESSMENTS AND DELIVERABLES

A. Baseline – endline assessment

The baseline-endline assessment will aim to measure the changes in knowledge, attitudes, practices and behaviours among (a sample) of the 1,600 children and the 80 facilitators (school teachers) engaged in the project.

Deliverables of the baseline phase under this contract: • Development of a baseline data collection methodology – same across the four countries • Methodology to include: justification of methodology, sampling design, data collection tool design, incl. testing and translation and training of other data collectors (if needed, depending on the type of method and tool proposed) • Conduct of baseline data collection in 3 stages (see schedule in Section 5 – Methodology) • Follow-on data entry, cleaning and analysis (as needed) • Presentation to the project team prior to the write-up of the full report • 4 national baseline reports (all in English, electronic format) – i.e. one-one for Bulgaria, Croatia, Romania and Serbia • 1 summary regional baseline report (in English, electronic format)

Deliverables of the endline phase under this contract: • Conduct of data collection in 1 stage (at project-end) (see schedule in Section 5 – Methodology) – using the same and already available methodology from the baseline phase • Follow-on data entry, cleaning and analysis (as needed) • Presentation to the project team prior to the write-up of the full report 4 • 4 national endline reports (in English, electronic format) – i.e. one-one for Bulgaria, Croatia, Romania and Serbia • 1 summary regional endline report (in English, electronic format)

B. Mid-term assessment In addition to the baseline-endline, the project will also carry out a mid-term assessment to: • discover interim changes in knowledge, attitudes, practices and behaviours that will provide a quick snapshot of how the project is performing and impacting children and the facilitators; • explore further nuance regarding knowledge, attitudes, practices and behaviours held by the children and facilitators, which can inform the project approach in the remaining months of the project. The 80 facilitators (school teachers) engaged in the project will conduct participatory sessions with children. One of the sessions will be used for the mid-term assessment. Selected facilitators will conduct a focus group discussion with a sample of the children in their country (in a balanced group of different age, gender and diversity background) using a focus group discussion guide. The 8 trainers of trainers engaged in the project will also conduct a focus group discussion with a sample of the 80 facilitators, using a focus group discussion guide. Deliverables of the mid-term assessment under this contract: • Development of a Focus Group Discussion guide for children and for facilitators – with justification for the methodology and questions based on the objectives of the assessment (see above). • Short guidance section for the facilitators and trainers who will use these guides with the children and the facilitators, respectively (including child-friendly techniques, how to lead the discussion, take notes effectively etc.). No mid-term data collection and leading of the focus group discussion will be required from the selected contractors

METHODOLOGY AND SAMPLING APPROACH

The applicants are invited to propose their specific methodology for the baseline – endline assessment. As the mid-term assessment will use an already decided qualitative method (Focus Groups), it is recommended that the baseline – endline assessment will be complementary and focus on the use of a quantitative method. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic situation, and the limited visibility of how it may still affect (in-person) project activities with children and professionals in schools from now up to Jan 2023, any methodology that is proposed should be feasible in a remote and/or online data collection setting as well. As mentioned above, the methodology and questions need to take into account the projects’ mandatory indicators (see Section 3 – Objectives) and complement the earlier regional research (see Section 2 – Background).

The technical offer should outline: • the proposed data collection method for the baseline – endline assessment (incl. justification why this is the most suitable, and any potential limitations and issues with degree of accuracy) • the proposed sampling approach (if quantitative method) OR selection criteria for consultations (if qualitative method) • a preliminary draft/outline of the data collection tool (e.g. survey/questionnaire/discussion structure) with main questions • work plan for the assignment – including the various phases (such as tool development, testing, data collection, data processing, presentation and report-writing etc.) Two of the ten target schools in each country have already participated in the regional qualitative research (mentioned above), with varying numbers of children consulted. The sample proposed by the applicant can already include the same children in addition to new children (provided they will still be available/in the school in the endline phase). Contacts can be facilitated by Tdh as needed. Tdh is committed to ensuring diversity and inclusion in all its projects. Therefore, the sampled groups should be reflective of the overall age, gender, ability and other diversity ratio among the broader group of children. All data collected will need to be disaggregated by: age / gender / ability / country / school / type of respondent (children or facilitators), as per the donor contract.

Required expertise and skills: • Demonstrated experience in social research techniques including developing baseline/endline data collection methods and tools, and Focus Group Discussion guides. • Demonstrated experience in conducting data collection using quantitative and qualitative approaches. • Strong understanding of ethical and other considerations when it comes to involving children in data collection exercises. • Demonstrated understanding of the themes of violence against children and the impact of social and gender norms (further experience in the sub-theme of peer violence is an asset). • Strong understanding of diversity and inclusion considerations in research design and conduct. • Strong writing skills and ability to convey technical and complex information in a structured, logical, clear and concise manner for different audiences. • Full written and oral proficiency in English. Knowledge of the local languages (Bulgarian, SerboCroat and Romanian) is preferable to ease communication with the school children and teachers/facilitators from whom the data will be collected (and who are not necessarily Englishspeakers). Translation resources (if needed) will need to be arranged and covered by the contractor(s). • Experience in working in the project countries – Bulgaria, Croatia, Romania and Serbia – is a significant asset. • Strong computer proficiency in producing quality written reports with compelling visual representation of the findings. • Official registration as an individual consultant or as an organization, company, think-thank, academia entity etc. with social research (or similar) being under the registered scope of activities. • Master’s degree (or higher) in social sciences, public policy, law, research and evaluation, management, economics or other related field(s) from an accredited university

The full details of the assignment and requirements are described below in the Terms of Reference via below link:https://childhub.org/en/child-protection-vacancies-jobs-positions/baseli…