Back External Consultancy firm to provide regular third-party monitoring for Questscope (QS) Protection Project in Syria- Year 7

TERMS OF REFERENCE (TOR) FOR THE

EXTERNAL THIRD-PARTY MONITORING AND VERIFICATION**

THE PROTECTION PROJECT IN SYRIA-YEAR 7

Terms of Reference: External Consultancy firm to provide regular third-party monitoring for Questscope (QS) Protection Project in Syria- Year 7.

Job Title: Independent consultancy firm to provide Third Party Monitoring

Location: Syria (Aleppo, Daraa, Hama, Homs, Rural Damascus, Deir ez Zor, and Hassakeh Governorates)

Provisional Time Frame: 3 months (2 rounds)

Starting Date: Anticipated on Thursday June 18th , 2020

Application Deadline: Tuesday June 9th , 2020 @ 12:00 PM Amman time**

PROJECT SUMMARY

Questscope (QS) and its partner, Syrian Society for Social Development (SSSD), will provide protection services in Aleppo, Daraa, Hama, Homs, Rural Damascus, Deir ez Zor and Al-Hasakeh. SSSD will mainstream protection in all its services and will carry out a holistic set of protection interventions in eight community centers (CCs) and reach other vulnerable communities through 10 mobile units that will address child protection (CP), prevention and response to gender-based violence (GBV) with integrated provision of psychosocial support (PSS).

OVERALL OBJECTIVE

QS will hire an external consultancy firm to provide ongoing third-party monitoring for the protection project activities led by SSSD inside Syria within seven governorates. The purpose of this assignment is to increase verification quality for Questscope Syrian partner and to increase the response time for corrective and supportive actions through the provision of valuable information from the ground to QS project management, team members, and donor.

METHODOLOGY

The TPM tools and methodology will be designed in partnership with QS and SSSD at the beginning of the consultancy contract. The TPM should adopt a mixed methods approach, integrating quantitative and qualitative methods to achieve the desired objectives.

The minimum types of monitoring for this assignment will include:

• Beneficiary verification, feedback, and satisfaction for accountability to affected populations

• Direct observation and on-site verification on the implementation of project activities

• Service delivery verification

• Safety and situational analysis of population and operational environment.

Anticipated limitations include any restrictions by the Syrian government to collect data from the field. QS will work closely with SSSD and the consultancy firm to overcome these limitations.

SCOPE OF WORK

The TPM will cover the below scope:

· Geographical focus – concentrating on verification at different project locations

· Quality focus- concentrating on the quality of services provided

· Partner focus – Field staff knowledge and behavior.

MAIN TASKS

· Conduct inception meeting for the assignment in preparation for an inception report.

· Gathering and reviewing of all necessary project documents such as project proposal, monitoring and evaluation plan, work plan, performance reports among others.

· Development of TPM inception report with appropriate methodology, quantitative and qualitative survey tools, data collection workplan, roles and responsibilities of the team members. All of this should be prepared in consultation with QS.

· Training of the data collection teams and enumerators on the agreed tools and methodologies.

· Data collection, cleaning, validation, entry, and analysis.

· Develop and submit a draft TPM survey report for each round of data collection to QS.

· A monthly update is required from the TPM Consultancy firm on the status of the field data collection and any obstacles or challenges they may face.

· Incorporate feedback and finalize the report and submit to QS.

KEY DELIVERABLES

The TPM consultancy firm will provide the following deliverables:

· An overall workplan for the contracted period with an inception report and details of types of monitoring, methodology, coordination, tools, data protection protocols.

· Develop data tools to be reviewed by QS staff.

· Database of all information collected in the field, whether through mobile data collection or on paper-based forms. Reports for each site visited should be rapidly retrievable by the TPM.

· Draft Report: Prepare and present a draft report to QS for review, comments, and discussions.

· Final report for each round of data collection covering:

• Title page

• Table of Contents

• Abbreviations/acronyms page

• Executive Summary

• Section one: TPM approach and rational

• Section two: Data and analysis such as: beneficiary verification and feedback, direct observation and on-site verification on the implementation of program, service delivery verification, post-distribution monitoring (and situational analyses of population and environment) and consolidating information from all sites visited and aggregating those reports by the geographical area.

• Section Three: Findings and observations

• Section Four: Specific conclusions and actionable recommendations.

· Conduct a debriefing presentation on TPM findings, observations, and recommendations to QS staff.

· Full sets of photos collected including details of the dates, locations, and the project sites visited

· All above deliverables should be submitted in English.

· Soft copies of the report, and the cleaned data sets (qualitative and quantitative) should be submitted together with the final report. QS has sole ownership of all final data and any findings shall only be shared or reproduced with the permission of QS.

DURATION OF THE ASSIGNMENT

The TPM consultancy firm contract is expected to start on June 18th, 2020 until September 18th, 2020. The consultancy firm must ensure that the whole process including preparation, development of the TPM tools, reviewing the tools, actual field work, data analysis, dissemination of the key findings and reviewing of the final report can be completed within this time frame.

ORGANIZATIONAL REQUIREMENTS

The following criteria should be met by applicants:

· Have expertise and experience in research, monitoring and evaluation in humanitarian emergency response contexts, preferably related to the Syria crisis;

· Capacity to carry out monitoring activities, assessment, field data collection, and reporting of protection interventions;

· Capacity to manage all the logistical arrangements for field staff and actual field work;

· Have excellent written and spoken English and Arabic;

· Availability of qualified male and female field monitors who are native Arabic speaker, with knowledge of the culture, practices, and the security situations in the areas of the assessment;

· Ability to work in government-controlled areas of Syria.

SELECTION CRITERIA

· An application letter addressing the selection criteria including how the candidate’s previous experience matches the TPM objectives;

· Proposed methodology and workplan with expected schedule;

· Financial proposal providing cost and fees, enumerators’ payments, etc., to carry out this work. Please include all costs, including taxes, as additional costs will not be considered.

· Suitability statement including CVs of lead team members with details of qualifications and experience;

· Reference Contacts of three organizations that have recently contracted you to carry out similar assignments.

Applications that are not including all the above information will not be considered. Only short-listed candidates will be contacted. Please note that proposed cost will affect the final selection.