Terms of Reference for Evaluation

School Based Disaster Risk Reduction (SBDRR) Project

March 2015-February2017

Type of survey / End-of-project evaluation
Number of evaluators / One or team------
Expected start/end dates, number of work days / March
Data collecting in the field from 3rd/4th of March, final report by 3nd week of April, total working day would be 17-20 days.------
Commissioner / Bangladesh Red Crescent Society (BDRCS), International Federation of Red Cross & Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) and Hong Kong Red Cross (HKRC)
Deadline for receiving applications / ------

1. Description of project/program to be evaluated

1.1.Background and objectives of project/program

Bangladesh is one of the most disaster prone countries in the world. Every year millions of people are affected by disasters. The increase in frequency and magnitude of disasters in Bangladesh over recent years has demonstrated the need to reduce the underlying risk factors. The main causes of the increased impact of disasters are poor national governance, unplanned development, rapid and unplanned urbanization, and the density of population. Bangladesh is affected by floods, cyclones, river bank erosion, drought, tornadoes, landslides, and earthquakes. When any hazard strikes, children are predominantly the most vulnerable population group - especially those who are attending school. Damage to large numbers of school buildings including extensive casualty of school children has been a bitter truth during disasters in developing countries. Such loss results from the geographical location and proneness to disaster on one hand, and on the other hand, the low level of disaster awareness and preparedness of the country. Many children and teachers die simply because they do not know well what they should do to protect themselves. In the Bangladesh context, school infrastructures are most vulnerable during disasters due to poor construction and lack of proper maintenance. On top of this, due to rapid urbanization and over population in urban areas, schools are being constructed in an unplanned way to accommodate students in the education system. Consequently, vulnerability is ever increasing in the education sector and safety of the students is becoming more questionable. Considering all these factors, school safety has become an issue of major priority to make schools safer for the wellbeing of the next generation.

Learning about disaster risk in school plays an important role in their ability to save their own lives and in protecting members of their families as well as communities in times of any disaster. Additionally, children often transfer knowledge to their families as well as their neighbors. Realizing the importance of disaster preparedness in vulnerable schools especially at urban areas and continuing school safety project, BDRCS started the implementation of School Based Disaster Risk Reduction (SBDRR) project from March 2015 with financial support from Hong Kong Red Cross Societychannelled through the International Federation, Bangladesh country office.

Project Goal:

Reduce the number of deaths and injuries caused by disasters by building safer, more resilient schools and enhancing the disaster preparedness for response capacity of BDRCS.

Objectives of the project:

  • To Improve disaster preparedness and response capacity of school
  • To Enhance disaster response and preparedness for response capacity of BDRCS

1.2Project/program management

  • The prject is implemented by BDRCS with support of IFRC and HKRC. Oversight of the project including technical support, monitoring and evaluation was provided by IFRC.

1.3 Scope and reach of project/program

This final evaluation is a summative evaluation to assess relevance, effectiveness and, to some extent, impact, and will be conducted externally at the completion of implementation of activities in the schools and unit. The geographical coverage of the final evaluation will include national headquarters of the BDRCS , IFRC in Dhaka,GazipurRC unit and 10 project schools.

BDRCS staff, volunteers, IFRC progarmme team, Hong Kong Red Cross (HKRC), School management committee,school teacher, school student,Education office, Local authorities of relevant department and other stakeholders of the project are included in the scope of evaluation.

2. Evaluation Overview

2.1Purpose of evaluation

The main objective of the evaluation is to assess the program performances and to provide inputs for new strategic directions or implementation design of the school level disaster risk reduction program in Bangladesh aligning the BDRCS strategic plan.

2.2 Previous evaluation activities

A baseline survey was conducted in June-July 2015 to identify the knowledge, attitudes and behaviors on disaster preparedness among school teachers and students.

2.3Specific objective of evaluation

  1. Assess/mesure performance and impact in relation to the results and indicators identified in the project proposals.
  2. Harvest recommendations, based on best practices and lessons learned, for strengthening program strategies, management and implementation for future school safety/ school level disaster risk reduction programme in Bnagladesh.

2.4Main audience of evaluation

The main audiences for the evaluation include field project/program team, Gazipur RC Unit, NHQ, BDRCS, HKRC and IFRC

2.5Coverage of evaluation

The evaluation will cover the current phase of implementation of all activities and the results of the activites under SBDRR project (March 2015-February 2017) inGazipur district.

3. Evaluation criteria

The evaluation criteria present below:

  • Outcomes
  • Relevance
  • Coverage and tergating
  • Coordination
  • Satisfaction
  • Replicability
  • Lessons Learned
  • Effectiveness

4. Scope of work and evaluationdesign

4.1 Scope of work

A single or a team of external/national consultants preferably with knowledge and experience of working with the RC/RC Movement and adequate knowledge and experience in Disaster Risk Reduction focused on School based disaster risk reduction programme will undertake the following:

  1. The individual or team is assigned the (desk) review the project proposal, documents related to the project and relevant secondary information
  2. The consultant/team is to hold discussions with project personnel to understand the parameters of the project, as well as its activities
  3. The consultant/team will interact with key DM people at BDRCS and IFRC
  4. The consultant/team will undertake a thorough analysis of the evaluation findings using relevant tools and development theories, prepare and share the first draft
  5. The consultant/team will incorporate additional comments fromthe project team including PMER senction of BDRCS and IFRC and then the draftreport will be finalized.
  6. The draft report will be presented during a sharing meeting with BDRCS /IFRC for the finalization of the report.

The consultant will be responsible for the following:

  1. Develop evaluation methodology and work plan
  2. Provide a one-day training to survey data collectors
  3. Ensure the data collection according to the agreed methodology of the survey and supervise the data collection process
  4. Data quality check
  5. Data-entry and data management (data interface)
  6. Data analysis
  7. Report writing in English
  8. Presentation to BDRCS, IFRC and HKRC

The consultant will not be responsible for the following:

  1. Coordinating with target schools, education department and other stakeholders to plan for the data collection
  2. Organizing logistics for the training for data collectors
  3. Transportation costs to and from data collection sites
  4. Accommodation cost if required
  5. Translating the final evaluation report into Bengali

4.2 Methodologies

The detail methodology will be developed by the evaluator/team. To complete the evaluation in a standard manner itrequires desk review , literature reiview, probabilistics sample surveys of selected groups and for field data collection interview with different stakeholders.

4.3 Reporting relationship

The consultant will report to Director, DRM and theEvaluation Management Team (EMT) (BDRCS, IFRC & HKRC)

4.4 International standardsPresentation of evidence

Standard survey and survey methodologies and good practices utilized in the international humanitarian community should be applied. In particular, all findings and conclusions should be based on evidence which is presented in the evaluation report. For sample surveys, detailed information should be presented on the sample design (including sample size calculation, stratification, clustering, allocation, selection, departures from equal selection probability and weighting), the respondent selection methodology, nonresponse rates, and coefficient of variation, design effect and intra-class correlation for all variables. For case studies, the criteria and processes for selecting those cases should be presented.

4.5 Ethical Guidelines

It is expected that the evaluation will adhere to ethical guidelines. A summary of these guidelines is provided below.

  1. Informed Consent: All participants are expected to provide informed consent following standard and pre-agreed upon consent protocols.
  2. Systematic Inquiry: Evaluators conduct systematic, data-based inquiries.
  3. Competence: Evaluators provide competent performance to stakeholders.
  4. Integrity/Honesty: Evaluators display honesty and integrity in their own behavior, and attempt to ensure the honesty and integrity of the entire survey process.
  5. Respect for People: Evaluators respect the security, dignity and self-worth of respondents, program participants, clients, and other survey stakeholders. It is expected that the evaluator will obtain the informed consent of participants to ensure that they can decide in a conscious, deliberate way whether they want to participate.
  6. Responsibilities for General and Public Welfare: Evaluators articulate and take into account the diversity of general and public interests and values that may be related to the evaluation.

4.6 Future use of data

All collected data will be the sole property of BDRCSand IFRC and consequently confidential. The consultant/team may not use the data for their own research purposes, nor license the data to be used by others, without the written consent ofBDRCS and IFRC.

5 Expected activities and Deliverables

5.1 Expectedactivities

Activities / Number of days / Expected timeline
  1. Data collection
/ 7 days / 3rdweek of March
  1. Training for data collectors
/ 1 / 4th week of March
  1. Data management, analysis and report writing, draft sharing
/ 8 / 4thweek of March
  1. Revise, finalize and submit evaluation report
/ 1 / By 3rd week of April
Total expected work days: / 17days

5.2 Deliverables

Deliverables / Expected deadline
  1. Training of data collectors
/ 3rd/4th st week of April
  1. Data collected and entered into database
/ 1st week of April
  1. Draft report
/ 15th April,2017
  1. Presentation
/ 18th April
  1. Final report
/ By 20April 2017

5Obligations of key participants in the evaluation

6.1 Obligations of the Consultant(s)

  1. Inform the evaluation manager in a timely fashion of progress made and of any problems encountered.
  2. Implement the activities as expected, and if modifications are necessary, bring to the attention of the evaluation Manager before enacting any changes.
  3. Report on a timely basis.

6.2 Obligations of the evaluation Manager

  1. Make sure that the consultant(s) is/are provided with the specified human resources and logistics support, and answer any day-to-day enquiries.
  2. Facilitate the work of the consultant(s) with beneficiaries and other local stakeholders.
  3. Monitor and supervise the daily work of the consultant(s) and flag any concerns.
  4. Receive and signoff on deliverables and authorize payment

6.3 Obligations of the NHQ Technical Team

  1. Review and approve the proposed methodology.
  2. Provide technical oversight in the review of all deliverables.
  3. Provide timely comments on the draft report.
  4. Receive and signoff on deliverables and authorize payment

7 Required qualifications

1.Demonstrated experience in leading evaluation of disaster preparedness, DRR-related humanitarian projects/programs and school safety programmes

2.Demonstrated experience in quantatitive and quantitative data collection and statistical analysis

3.Demonstrated experience in training enumerators

4.Candidate with Red Cross/Red Crescent experience preferred

5.Excellent report-writing and communication skills which need to meet the required standard

6.Professional work experience in country or region preferred

7.Fluency in relevant languages (e.g. English and Bengali) required

8 Application and selection details

8.1 Application materials

The proposal should include the following four items. Please note that any proposal which does not contain all four items will be rejected.

  1. One-pageSummary of experience
  2. Detailed CVs of all professionals who will work on the evaluation. If there is more than one consultant on the proposed evaluation team, please attach a table describing the level of effort (in number of days) of each team member in each of the evaluation activities.
  3. Professional references: please provide two or three references from your previous clients.
  4. Daily rate: please mention the proposed daily rate for each consultant in BDT.
  5. Short examplefrom previous evaluation report that is relevant to this work (5-7 pages).

The Summary of experience should be no more than one page and should include the following:

  1. Experience in leading project/program evaluations
  2. number of evaluations led (with dates, locations and names of organizations)
  3. number of evaluations served as team member
  1. Experience in quantitative methods
  2. numbers of years of experience
  3. tools/methods used in the past
  1. Experience in DRR and/or school safetyprojects/programs
  2. number of years of experience
  3. titles of positions held
  4. countries worked in
  5. organizations worked for
  1. Professional experience in Bangladesh
  2. number of years of experience
  3. organizations worked for
  1. Language proficiency
  2. clearly state language proficiency in English and Bengali

8.2 Application procedures

Please email complete applications nd copy /

8.3Deadline for applications

13 March 2017

9 Annexes

Annex 1: SBDRR Project Logframe

Report in English. The structure and content of the report should meet the requirements of the IFRC/BDRCS PMER Policy. The length of the Report should not exceed 40 pages in total (excluding the annexes).The report should contain the following:

  • Executive summary
  • Rationale and purpose of the evaluation
  • Analysis and findings (both quantitative and qualitative aspect and the evaluation criteria)
  • Methodology (the detail will got to the annex)
  • Graphs, visual presentation of the findings,- (as relevant to support narrative )
  • Recommendations(with clear linkage to the findings)
  • Conclusions
  • Relevant annexes- (As relevant)
  • List of interviewees, etc.

End of TOR

Evaluation ToR-SBDRR Project

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