This contract is to document and assess the service approach and impact of the transformed services for children in Kharkiv Oblast Baby Home #1, comparing the situation in the baby home prior to the use of early intervention practices and then the changes that occurred since it has used early intervention practices (2009 – to present).
Specific objectives of the summative assessment are as follows:
Document lessons learned and good practices in the services developed within transformation of the baby home’s traditional services;Assess and analyse the bottlenecks and barriers, including policies, practices and other structural barriers; Analyse the effect that transformed services have on keeping children with families and preventing separation (“institutionalization”) and the effect on child’s overall development and family’s capacity to respond to child’s special needs;Demonstrate, based on evidence, whether or not a nation-wide scale up of the service approach is possible and whether a scale up will effectively lead to closing of equity gaps in the area of early intervention (i.e. enhance the access of these particularly vulnerable young children to protection, education, and other services necessary for their survival growth and development); Develop strategic, policy and implementation recommendations of how to strengthen the on-going services, informing policy development and framework of national scale-up of the service.Key Users:
The primary users for this assessment will be the Kharkiv Oblast Baby Home #1, UNICEF, the Ministries of Health and Social Policy, other baby home directors, early intervention service providers, and other local organizations involved in the development of policies and provision of services related to children with disabilities and families.
Findings will be used by UNICEF to better understand the potential role of transformation of baby homes within advocacy for enhancement and expansion of the early intervention services approach . At the same time, documentation and assessment of the baby home’s transformed services will provide an evidence basis for advocacy with Ministry of Health specialists and baby home directors/staff to transform baby home residential care to community-based services for children with their families.
Scope of Work:
The assessment should analyse the baby home’s transformed service(s) in terms of methodology and process and identify the lessons learned specifically of “what worked” and “what did not work” from 2009 to present. Among other questions, it will examine how and why the service(s) have been successful in strengthening families to take care of their children with disabilities, preventing separation/ institutionalisation.
The assessment should result in the transfer of knowledge of what types of services, through which method or approach is most effective in addressing needs of children with disabilities and their families to enable them to live in a family environment.
Overall, the model should be documented and assessed for its innovation, evidence of impact on children with disabilities and their families, standards, set of services or approaches to be used in developing national policy, and costing of services.
The documentation and assessment will consider:
Profile of children and families using the services;Accessibility: Means that families/children are referred/ heard about services;The rationale of the service interventions;The methodology used to develop the Baby Home’s transformed services;Steps in service delivery;Coordination/ partnerships across service agencies/ sectors (authorities) and functioning of referral mechanisms;Client cost of each service;Result of services on children’s well-being against the baseline indicator: Status of children’s health/development:
% children who demonstrate improved positive social-emotional skills (including social relationships);% children who demonstrate improved acquisition and use of knowledge and skills (including early language/ communication);% children who demonstrate improved use of appropriate behaviour to meet their needs;% of children who were in the baby home and returned to families;# children/families receiving out-patient services;Satisfaction rate among families-service beneficiaries (client satisfaction);% of families who feel empowered/ express their ability to continue development care for their child by their own Health and social workers who participated in the Baby Home have positive attitude towards rehabilitation of children, recognise the family as the best environment for children with disabilities and do not stigmatise families with children with disabilities;Lessons learned: what works, what and where are the remaining challenges to make the services work (looking at policies, service delivery, inter-sectoral coordination, etc.).Time Period to be assessed: 2008– 2014:
Early intervention practices were incorporated in the baby home responses in 2009. The assessment will review the services and impact on children in the baby homes prior to the incorporation of these services and then the effect of the services, which transformed the baby home’s responses.
Approach for consultancy:
The international consultant will lead this documentation and assessment process, and will ultimately be responsible for achievement of the report and final deliverables. The team will consist of three experts: the international consultant (as lead expert); an expert from Ukraine’s Ministry of Health; and an expert from an established early intervention service provider in Ukraine.
Agreement with the two national experts will be managed by UNICEF, but it is expected that the international consultant will have significant communication and consultation with these colleagues in the process of doing this work.
The assessment of the transformed services should be the result of review through consultations with concerned stakeholders, staff, decision-makers, beneficiaries and others.
Specifically, the international consultant will undertake the following tasks in cooperation with the national experts:
Develop within two weeks after signing of the contract a work plan for the documentation and assessment process in consultation with UNICEF colleagues and two national experts that defines the planned activities/ assessment design; methodology and data collection instruments and timeline for accomplishing various components of the assignment. In response to the terms of reference, consultants should provide a brief description of how they would conduct the work: planned activities; methodology & instruments to be used; and timeframe envisioned for this work.
In collaboration with national experts, analyse results/findings from desk review analysis of relevant documents and statistics of the work of the Baby Home. As the materials will only be in Ukrainian or Russian, this work would be conducted in collaboration with the national experts. The national experts would conduct an initial review of documents, but their “findings” would be analysed with the international consultant to provide a framework for planning the in-country assessment mission.
Conduct in-country assessment mission to Kharkiv Oblast Specialised Baby Home #1 with the objective to:
Gather specific observational and other data, including through key informant interviews, site visits, review of available statistical, Baby Home or other site specific or/and other data sources;Conduct meetings with relevant national, sub-national and local counterparts;Facilitate in-depth interviews and/or focus groups with beneficiaries of existing services;Debrief UNICEF Ukraine Child Protection Specialist and Social Services Officer on initial findings.Prepare report assessing services and their approaches; assessing results of the services (impact on children’s well-being, contribution to preventing a child’s family separation/ abandonment); and recommending steps to enhance the existing service(s).
Develop PowerPoint presentation that highlights the key findings and the recommendations for future actions:
Draft presentation presented to UNICEF and Baby Home colleagues (possibly via Skype); Final presentation finalised subsequent to feedback provided to the drafted for delivery to key stakeholders (colleagues from Ministry of Health, regional health departments, baby home directors, NGO colleagues, etc.)Limitations: It is recognized that the transformation of the baby home provides critical services but there are still further opportunities for enhancement. Early intervention practices continue to be integrated and advanced in Baby Home #1. The current documentation and assessment will not review these further steps but assess the existing services with their current impact on children and their families.
Deliverables:
Guided by the UNICEF Ukraine Country Office, the International Consultant will complete the following key deliverables under the contract:
Deliverables- Timeframe - Consultancy Timeframe
Finalised work plan and development of instruments/tools and methodology for project documentation/assessment 2 days;Analysis of desk review conducted by national consultant to be integrated into the plan for the in-country assessment 2 days;First draft of analytical report based on data collection and in-country assessment, with lessons learned and recommendations 12 days;Finalised report & development of powerpoint presentation (providing initial draft for consultation with UNICEF staff and then finalization of the powerpoint) 4 days.All materials developed will be reviewed by the programme communications consultant and a team of peer review experts, comprising UNICEF staff, MOH colleagues, early intervention service providers, and other disability NGO colleagues such as the National Assembly of People with Disabilities. Feedback from this peer review will be given at one time. The international consultant will be expected to review all feedback with UNICEF staff to determine what feedback must be included. The consultant then revises and consults with UNICEF staff on the final version. All deliverables are considered completed and final once documents have been approved by UNICEF.
Proposed format for the report should include, though not be limited to:
Executive Summary;Introduction;Methodology;Key Findings and Analysis.Description of services and referral mechanisms:
Steps in the transformation to these services: What were the strategies/ approaches used to establish these services?
Description of any obstacles or challenges that had to be overcome and how these challenges were addressed or remain as outstanding;What has worked and why? What could work better?Impact of new services on child’s/family’s well-being;Assessment on “scalability” of the service practices – i.e. to what extent can these interventions/ strategies be used in other regions of Ukraine by other baby homes or other agencies.Cost estimates:
Lessons Learned;Conclusions & Recommendations: Conclusions should summarize the major issues, strategies and results. If appropriate to give concise recommendations for action clearly specifying who should carry out the recommendation.The report should not exceed 25-30 pages and be not less than 15 pages.
Performance indicators for evaluation of results:
Evaluation of results will be based on the following indicators:
Technical and professional competence will be measured by quality of work, including quality of progress and final reports to UNICEF, quality of conclusions/ recommendations developed, as well as feedback from peer review;Such indicators as work relations, responsibility and communication will be also considered during evaluation of the consultant’s work.
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