TERMS OF REFERENCE FOR INSTITUTIONAL CONTRACT

Title of the assignment

Mapping of social service workforce and capacity gap analysis

Purpose

To assess the social service system and workforce competencies and capacities as it relates to child protection in Bangladesh

Location

Bangladesh-National

Estimated Duration

6 months and the estimated start date is 1st of September 2021.

Reporting to Technical Supervisor of this assignment

Child Protection Specialist, Child Protection Section, UNICEF Bangladesh

1. Background

Bangladesh is home to 160 million people and is world's seventh fastest growing economy with a rate of 8.3% real GDP annual growth in first quarter of 2019. Despite this inequality is rising because of the growth process itself. Inequality in the distribution of human capital is not only high but also increasing over time, which does not portend well for the prospects of achieving equitable growth in the future.

Young people aged 10 to 24 years is often used for identification of a group with special need for human capital development including greater access to education and health service. This goup is 56.6 million (Census 2011) which is 29.7%  of total population of the country with a projection to be increased by 10 million by 2020.  On the other hand, 5-14 years children are 24.88% of the total population. Male population in 5-14 years age group exceeds female population by 1,055,000 whereas in 15-24 years age group female population exceeds by 388,000. This is may be due to laws related to age bar on marriage and entry into labour force by obtaining counterfeiting age certificate.[1] Physical punishment and psychological aggression is common in the country. Overall, almost all children for whom survey data were collected (89%) experienced any violent discipline in the month prior to the survey. These data are alarming and indicate an urgent need to protect the physical and emotional rights of children in Bangladesh. Marriage before 18 years is the reality for many young girls, with a national child marriage rate of 51.4%.

About 10 million children below 5 years do not exist officially due to their birth being not registered officially. Approximately 6.8% of children among total child population are into child labor. Additionally, children with disabilities are among the most marginalized groups and facing daily discrimination in the form of negative attitudes, and lack of adequate policies and legislation. They are barred from realizing their rights to health, education, and even survival. Children with disabilities are often likely to be among the poorest members of the population and are less likely to attend school, access medical services, or have their voices heard in society.

Children also represent the largest group of people affected by climate change and are the generation that will deal with the future impact. When people’s livelihoods are disrupted, whether through flooding or extreme weather events, it is children who are most exposed to negative coping mechanisms, family separation, and strain on their mental health and psychosocial well-being; however, these impacts are less visible. Save the Children estimates that in the next ten years around 175 million children globally will be hit by climate-related disasters annually.[2] Further, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and its socio-economic consequences on children in adversity has increased child protection and psychosocial risksduring the crisis and will continue to in the immediate aftermath and subsequent recurring lockdowns. This further places a huge strain on the social service workforce. These men and women need to be equipped with capacity and tools to be able to support children and families in natural disasters and pandemics like COVID-19. Placement of adequate number of social service workforce for preparedness and response to disasters and pandemics is vital to ensure the rights and protection of children in the country.

Ministry of Social Welfare is the nodal Ministry in the country for Child Protection and implementation of the Children Act 2013 which has laid the groundwork for a Child Protection System in the country. Despite this, there is alack of adequade probation and social service workforce, dedicated for Child Protection under Ministry of Social Welfare, as well as lack of financial allocation for the implementation of the Children Act 2013.

The current ratio of total social service workforce per 100,000 child (0-17 years) population is 6.07 and they don’t have any responsibility mentioned for children, nothing on protection of children nor even prevention of violence against children and anything for family strengthening in their official roles and responsibilities. One third of the positions for social service workforce are also vacant for long. The lack of adequate staff, supervision and monitoring is a key constraint to ensure adequate capacities at all levels which is critical to strengthening child protection systems. UNICEF has been working with the Ministry of Social Welfare and Department of Social Services through Child Sensitive Social Protection in Bangladesh Project, Phase-II for strengthening child protection social service workforce and implementation of Children Act 2013. To be able to understand the current status of the social service workforce, different types and quantities of child protection services entrusted by the Children Act 2013 on them, quality of services, workload, skills and capacity gap, UNICEF is going to support MoSW and DSS to conduct mapping of the social service workforce and a capacity assessment, within the scope of European Union funded Project “Fostering Rights and Empowerment Among Most Marginalized Adolescents and Children with Disabilities in Bangladesh”.

The purpose of this evidence generation activity is to assist in an understanding of how the workforce can be well planned, developed and supported to provide the highest quality child protection services to children and families according to the Children Act, CRC and relevant national and international standards, protocols, strategies and action plan. .

1. Purpose, Objectives and Expected Results

The overall purpose of the study is to assess the social service system and workforce competencies and capacities as it relates to child protection in Bangladesh.

The specific objectives of this study include:

1. To identify the size, scope and structure of the social service workforce, including client-to-social worker ratio (considering sex and ability of both), education/qualification and skills assessment, and social worker demographics (age, sex, background, ethnicity, years of service, etc.);
2. To assess the current structure of the social service workforce and system against relevant policies and legislation, documenting the historial evolution of the country’s workforce;
3. To document the available in-service support to all levels of the social service workforce, including social worker professionalization mechanisms, uptake rates, and a recommended capacity building plan;
4. To review and assess the available development, courses and training available (pre-service and in-service) (including those for university degree, professional training curriculum, etc.) against the necessary skills and knowledge required for job effectiveness (actual job descriptions and daily tasks);
5. To assess the capacity of the social service workforce to support children and families during emergencies, such as COVID-19 or other natural disasters, including the emerging needs of social workers, their level of satisfaction, and quality of social work support provided in natural disaster-prone and climate change-affected districts;
6. To map the available social services and referral pathways of the social service system, assessing the quality of service provision and identify gaps in provision (including locations) or quality of services;
7. To identify challenges and opportunities in practice for providing gender-transformative and inclusive child protection services to children and families;
8. To test and adapt data collection (tools and methods) for continuous bi-annual monitoring of the government and non-government social service workforce.

The expected results of this study include findings and recommendations that can directly influence  how the social service workforce can be effectively planned, developed, and supported within the government structure and inform policy advocacy and the development of programmes and strategies for strengthening the workforce.

1. Description of Assignment

Workforce mapping is based on the premise that when the right number of workers are in the right

positions and locations and have the right skills/training, people will be able to access more effective and

appropriate levels of care and support. UNICEF and Global Social Service Workforce Alliance developed a toolkit for social service workforce mapping which serves as a step-by-step, how-to guide for a national

workforce mapping process and packages tips, key considerations, sample tools, terms of reference and

other guidance. This will be the starting point for the development of data collection tools in this study.

The process of analyzing the social service workforce is not meant to be a one-off exercise, but should build the baseline information and create a standardized process for future, regular analyses every two to three years  in order to update workforce strengthening programmes and strategies in the context of a continually changing landscape of workforce and child protection issues.

The tool kit is a globally relevant toolkit, but will need to contextualized for Bangladesh, taking into consideration the political, social, cultural, economic and labor contexts along with legal and regulatory laws, ordinances and policies related to national social welfare, protection, health, justice,  education, natural disaster/climate change and COVID-19 emergencies .

Scope

The scope of the study is nationwide, including hard-to-reach, urban (CC), and enclave areas. Services provided in Cox’s Bazar to Rohingya refugees is out of scope. Any current or planned social service for 2022 and beyond should be considered. A diverse array of social service workforce champions, leaders, managers, probation services, and frontline workers should be included. The “social service workforce” specifically includes social workers, probation officers, and Upazilla Social Service Officers (USSO)-Urban Community Development Officers (UCDO). Adolescents (10-19 years) and parents/caregivers/guardians will also be included for perception of quality service provisions and recommendations.

In harmony with global indicators outlined in the Social Service Workforce Strengthening Results Matrix,

national-level assessments of the current social service workforce aim to provide at a minimum (further details on data needed to achieve specific objectives):

• A basic overview of the context for child protection social workforce structure and planning, including:
  • Definition of the Social Service Workforce in Bangladesh with listing of core social service workforce, key allied professionals and para-professionals or community level volunteers working in child protection 
  • Roles and responsibilities of child protection social services workforce at central, rural and urban setting including institutional setting according to the Children Act and beyond (considering act that address specific vulnerabilities: human trafficking, disabilities and protection, etc.)
  • Working conditions of child protection social services workforce
  • Relevant policies and regulations related to the child protection social service workforce, including statutory frameworks and the administrative structure of services
  • Financial and other resources currently dedicated to hiring, employing and training of the child protection social service workers and probation services
  • Number of social service workers responsible for child protection per 100,000 children, according to type (governmental and non-governmental) and vacancy rates where available, and caseload
  • Deployment and accessibility of CPSSW, the areas of highest need and vulnerability that is, natural disaster and climate change prone districts including COVID-19 social workforce deployments
  • Management, coordination and professional supervision of SSW on different levels  
  • Certification, registration and/or licensing requirements and practices
• A basic overview of the context for workforce development and training (pre-service), including:
  • Availability of different levels of education, training, and field placements/practice learning
  • Contents and effectiveness of current training and education provided by private institutions, NGOs and government institutions, universities and colleges
  • Existence of mechanism for skills audit and ethical protocols
  • Workers’ perceptions of the availability and accessibility of pre-service and in-service  professional development opportunities

• An overview of the context for workforce support (in-service), including:
  • Workers’ perceptions of challenges and opportunities, supervision and career paths
  • Presence, role, size and effectiveness of professional associations
  • Workers’ salaries and their equivalent to other professionals, and other incentives
  • The image and recognition of SSW by the society and local communities 
• Recommendations should consider ways:
  • To strengthen the service workforce for incorporation into national strategic frameworks or action plans (including a capacity building plan with costing)
  • To continuously monitor social workforce status and national needs (for government and non-governmental organisations)  
  • To develop a competency based framework for the various levels of the social service workforce related to working with children and families – a workforce down to the village level
  • To develop Child Protection Social Work expertise specifically for developing Child Protection Social Work course for graduate and post graduate level
  • To develop a social work accreditation mechanism.

Methodology

The contracted agency will review the Social Service Workforce mapping toolkits developed by UNICEF and Global Social Service Workforce Alliance and contextualize them according to the national context and need for this study. The agency will propose a detailed methodology for achieving the purpose and specific objectives, including any sampling (for any primary data collection), data collection tools, data analysis tools, quality assurance and expected limitations. These will be ultimately approved in collaboration with UNICEF through the submission and approval of the inception report, which will be further validated by DSS before implementation. The methodology is expected to be largely, if not entirely qualitative, and should include remote methods as much as possible, with face-to-face observation or data collection only recommended where virtual options will not be sufficient. Institutions/individuals that must be included in this study include:

1. Professionals under Department of Social Services (Social Workers, Probation Officers, Upazilla Social Service Officer, Urban Community Development Officers, Staffs working in institutions for children under the department)
2. Professionals from nongovernmental organizations (BRAC, Save the Children, World Vision, Plan International, BLAST, ASK, Aparajeyo Bangladesh, Bangladesh National Women Lawyers’ Association etc.) who are working with children, youth and their families to ensure child protection and well-beingGovernment and nongovernment community level volunteers and parasocial workers working with children, youth and their families to ensure child protection and well-being.  

A process will be undertaken to engage a national leadership group (NLG) by DSS and other key government stakeholders for national ownership, participation of experts in child protection social service workforce development and provide overall technical guidance and oversee in developing the full scope of the mapping. The NLG will also be engaged in the discussion on preliminary findings and recommendations for strengthening and advocating for the social service workforce.

The contracted agency will deploy a team in Bangladesh including a Team Lead, for data collection. The agency will analyse data, present information from this process to NLG and produce a final report. Below are a list of the key tasks.

Key Tasks

• Gather existing background documents, reports and literature relevant to the child protection and social service workforce mapping; analyze and provide written overview of the documents and other data, especially as available in the local language
• Support DSS with any necessary meeting preparation in advance of NLG meetings
• Assist in organizing NLG meetings and preparation of NLG meeting notes
• Finalize the data collections tools in consultations with NLG members, reflecting their feedback and translating tools as needed into local language
• Submit application to Institutional Review Board for ethics approval (if handling any personally identifiable information or collecting data from vulnerable groups)
• Oversee pilot testing of data collection tools and finalization of the tools
• Carry out data collection, travel to interview social service workers/officials where electronic survey methods are unavailable and coordinate with NLG
• Carry out data cleaning and create any data analysis tools/databases, as necessary
• Prepare presentation of key preliminary findings, creating reader-friendly data visualizations to present to NLG for review and feedback
• Take action to filling in data gaps identified after the initial data analysis and NLG review

Ethical and other considerations

This study will be held to the highest standards employed by UNICEF. This means, the agency will abide by the following:

• UNICEF Procedure for Ethical Standards in Research, Evaluation, Data Collection and Analysis
• UNICEF Strategic Guidance Note on Institutionalizing Ethical Practice for UNICEF Research
• The agency is expected to explain ethical considerations for the study, specifically spelling out how these above guidelines will be followed/met including training of all data collectors and supervisors in terms of guidance on ethics and communication skills.
• Special focus should include ethical considerations/ strategies to prevent or avoid COVID-19 infection and spread. 
• Ethical clearance letter should be attached in the annexure of the final report.
• Any sensitive issues or ethical concerns arising during implementation should be raised with UNICEF right away. 
• The final report should include a section that describes the exact way ethical considerations were identified and addressed as part of design, implementation, and analysis/writing.
• All data collected through this study as well as reports and dissemination materials are the intellectual properties of UNICEF and shall not be used for purposes other than those approved by the registered Institutional Review Board during the ethical clearance. 
• Additionally, the study should be human rights-based (including child rights) and gender sensitive. All applicable data will be disaggregated by sex, age, and ability level.

4. Deliverables: The following deliverables for this ToR include:

No.

Deliverable

Deadline

1

Inception report including methodology, and all mapping and data collection tools

--Ethical approval and finalized (translated) data collections tools and workplan

3 weeks after signing contract

2 months after signing contract

2

Draft study report

4 months months after signing contract

3

Final study report

5.5 months after signing contract

5. Reporting requirements

The reports should be submitted to UNICEF. These  will be accepted only after the Department of Social Services and Child Sensitive Social Protection in Bangladesh (CSPB) project-phase II approves and NLG reviews and provides feedback as well. The agency will have to maintain close liaisoning with the National Project Director (NPD) of CSPB project and the Director General (DG) of Department of Social Services for field missions to access information with service providers and NLG for the committee members’ technical guidance.

Child Protection Specialist of UNICEF Child Protection Section will be the main focal person for maintaining the coordination between UNICEF and DSS or CSPB Project. All deliverables have to be submitted to UNICEF focal person who will facilitate approval and acceptance of deliverables from DSS and CSPB project. UNICEF will facilitate approval of the reports within three weeks of submission of each draft report.

Examples of content to be incorporated in the final mapping report:

• Table of contents, list of annexes/figures/tables, etc.
• List of Acronyms
• Executive Summary (2 – 5 pages)
• Introduction & Background
• Study Purpose and Objectives
• Methodology, including ethical considerations and limitations
• Findings
• Conclusion and Recommendations
• Annex (including data collection tools, IRB approval letter, etc.)

6. Payment Schedule: Payment will be arranged in accordance with the following schedule:

• 30% of total fee upon submission and approval of the inception report;
• 20% of total fee upon completion of data collection and data analysis;
• 20% of total fee upon submission and approval of draft report (achieving all specific objectives);
• 30% of total fee upon submission and approval of final report, including policy brief (10 pages), accompanying powerpoint presentation, and all raw and analyzed data and finalized tools.

7. Qualification requirement of the company/institution/organization

Qualification of the agency: 

• International firm with experience in conducting social science research, including large scale quantitative social/economic surveys as well as rigorous qualitative research, including high quality data collection tool design;
• Experience on capacity assessments and developing capacity building plans, including the costing thereof;
• Technical understanding of social service systems with the focus on social welfare, child protection, community development and social protection/ social assistance;
• Extensive experience and expertise in mapping workforce, policy and legal analysis
• Extensive knowledge and experience with qualitative and  quantitative  data analysis, and demonstrated competency in analysis using relevant software;
• Strong report writing skills in English;
• Familiarity with UN systems and procedures, management and monitoring tools is desirable;
• Experience developing policy recommendations, policy briefs, and accompanying data visualizations;
• Prior work experience in Bangladesh/South Asia on similar mapping/survey.

7a. Qualification requirement of the team (optional)

Professional requirements of the individual(s) and/or team(s) for the assignment including required experience, skills and qualifications are required as given below:

• Team members with postgraduate (preferably PhD) degrees in social science, social work, child development, anthropology, sociology, law, finance and other relevant disciplines
• At least one team member with legal and policy analysis expertise in the area of  human rights, child rights, and rights and protection of children with disabilities
• At least one team member with 8+ years working experience in the area of social service workforce strengthening programme management
• At least one team members with 5+ years in monitoring, evaluation, and research (quantitative and qualitative) of programmes related to child protection system strenghtening

8. General conditions: procedures and logistics

Policies both parties should be aware of:

i.   The institutional Contractor will be responsible for all support required to complete the assignment including accommodation, meals, transportation, and tools of trade (including computers).

ii.   Office space will be provided by UNICEF for use during the evaluation and UNICEF premises will be available for the meetings and consultations.

iii.  The institutional Contractor company will not be entitled to the use of UNICEF transportation;

iv.   No contract related activities may commence unless the contract is signed and received by both parties.

vi.   Institutions or their staff will not have supervisory responsibilities or authority on UNICEF budget; and,

Policy both parties should be aware of:

• Members of the contracting company are not entitled to payment of overtime.  All remuneration must be within the contract agreement.
• No contract may commence unless the contract is signed by both UNICEF and the Contractor.
• No member of the contracting company may travel prior to contract signature.
• Members of the Institutional contractor company will not have supervisory responsibilities or authority on UNICEF budget.

No additional payment request beyond the approved budget will be authorized by UNICEF.