GLOBALLY RENFORCING THE CHILDREN’S RIGHTS COMPONENT IN EVALUATION PROJECTS

BRIEF PROJECT HISTORY: For many years now, the IBCR has worked in cooperation with Universalia, a Montreal firm specialised in evaluations. This partnership has taken various forms, including participation in the evaluation of the juvenile justice system in the Philippines and in the evaluation of the demobilisation, disarming and reintegration programme for veterans in the Democratic Republic of Congo. On April 20, 2015, the IBCR signed a memorandum of understanding to reinforce and reorganise this joint effort.

GOALS:

This alliance enables both organisations to optimise their efforts, improve the quality of their programmes and access new markets The joint effort is in line with the IBCR’s strategy to have a voice in national, regional and global networks and groups By carrying out bigger and better interventions, the IBCR will not only improve its impact with the children in the countries it works in, but will also increase its visibility and positioning as key player in this area for several years to come

The memorandum of understanding also aims to increase the synergy between both organisations . Universalia possesses an elaborate monitoring system that can quickly identify evaluation mandates throughout the world Normally, the IBCR would not have the capacity to carry out these mandates on its own (requirements pertaining to international evaluation experience, high costs, major integrated mandates, required multisectorial expertise, etc ) However, several of these mandates require specialists, in children’s rights and participation, humanitarian actions involving children, gender equality, etc This collaboration will allow the IBCR team’s expertise to be included in joint proposals

ACHIEVEMENTS:

Opportunities for discussions and reinforcement, including the IBCR’s participation in a specialised meeting on evaluation strategies, and Universalia’s support in producing a methodological note aimed at evaluating Angola’s justice system

In December 2015, Universalia sought out the IBCR’s expertise for a mandate regarding youth participation in a foundation’s evaluation process After some discussions and meetings, the IBCR provided guidance on Universalia’s scope of work and technical recommendations regarding ethics and child participation methods Other mutual capacity building initiatives will be undertaken by both organisations in 2016-2017

Our Committed Partners

“In March 2015, Universalia entered into a partnership with the International Bureau for Children’s Rights and this experience has been enriching in many ways We have shared our respective knowledge in several fields, including evaluation and children’s rights Thanks to this partnership, we have been able to bid on more calls for proposals and hope to continue doing so in the future, as the profiles of our IBCR colleagues are of very high quality On several occasions, Universalia has also played a part in building the evaluation capacities of the IBCR’s managers, and we are very happy that our training sessions have been helpful! Finally, as this is our first partnership with a non-profit organisation, our team has gained a better understanding of the fundamental role of this sector in development ”