Rutgers is the leading Dutch center of expertise on sexuality. We are active in The Netherlands and internationally in about 20 countries. Together with other civil society organisations, professionals in the field and experts by experience, we advocate for positive change on issues that matter and have a major impact on people's health and lives. We work to improve sexual and reproductive health and rights, access to sexuality education and information, access to contraception and safe abortions, and on the prevention of sexual violence. We do this in a variety of ways. Rutgers connects research, practice and advocacy. We are there for everyone, with an extra focus on young people. We speak out against injustice and for important human values, especially when they are under pressure or under-reported. 

We are looking for a:  

Rutgers, ABAAD - Resource Centre for Gender Equality, Equimundo (Formerly Promundo-US), and Sonke Gender Justice, together the #GenerationG partnership, are looking for an evaluator for the purpose of conducting an end-term evaluation of Generation G according to the terms of reference set out herein.  

Programme Locations:

• Indonesia (DKI Jakarta, Bandung, Palu);  

• Jordan (Amman, Al Ghor, Irbid, Karak);  

• Lebanon (Beirut, Akkar, Beqaa, Baalbeck-Hermel, Mount Lebanon, North Lebanon, Nabatieh, South Lebanon);  

• Morocco (Marrakech, Fkih Bensalah, Ouarzazate, Larache);  

• Rwanda (Kigali city, Karongi district);  

• South Africa (Gauteng, KwaZulu Natal, Eastern Cape, Western Cape);  

• Uganda (Kampala, Namutumba district, Iganga, Adjumani, Kapchorwa, Kween, Bukwo) 

Total programme budget:    €25.065.800,- 

Application Deadline: 25 August 2024 

Timeline: 16 September 2024 – 31 December 2025  

Evaluation Budget: €140.000,- 

The Generation G partnership strives towards the creation of gender-just and violence-free societies with and for young people in their full diversity. The partnership raises public support, advocates for improved policies and laws, and strengthens civil society to contribute to achieving gender justice. It thrives on the diversity, strength and collaboration of experts, evidence-based and evaluated approaches, cross-country learning, and global advocacy.

Programme activities are running in seven countries in the Global South: Indonesia, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Rwanda, South Africa and Uganda, and will conclude at the end of calendar year 2025. As the end-term date of the programme approaches, the organisations and institutions involved in the programme are eager to investigate the results of their work, and document lessons about the successes and challenges of the programme to inform our future programming and the lobby and advocacy field as a whole.  

Programme background

The Generation G partnership raises public support, advocates for improved policies and laws, and strengthens civil society as a means to contribute to gender justice. More specifically, this partnership engages an innovative gender-transformative strategy that equips youth leaders and civil society organisations to address the root causes of gender inequality and power imbalances. Engaging (young) men in promoting gender justice is a key component of this strategy.  

The key approach of the programme is a gender-transformative approach. A gender-transformative approach  focuses on the following elements: a) investing in amplifying young feminist voices; b) strengthening the role of young men as allies in gender equality; c) promoting human rights and youth agency; d) analysing and addressing harmful norms and unequal power relations; e) embracing sexual and gender diversity. 

Next to a gender-transformative approach, this partnership has fully embraced the principles of inclusiveness, meaningful and inclusive youth participation, do no harm and accountability. As young people are our key actors and key impact group, they are actively included in decision-making processes, as well as the design and implementation of key strategies. The diversity in these principles refer to the fact that, although the partnership recognises the need to amplify voices of women and the need to actively engage men, we live in a world where youth have intersecting identities that influence their position in society and access to rights and power. As such, an intersectional feminist approach to gender justice is strongly embedded in the Generation G programme. 

Gender-transformative lobbying and advocacy happens at the individual, community, institutional and policy levels. The different levels of gender-transformative lobbying and advocacy are embedded in three mutually reinforcing long-term outcomes (LTOs), described below:  

• LTO 1 aims at increasing and mobilising public support for gender justice and rejecting gender-based violence. This LTO also feeds into the other two LTOs as mobilised individuals can become part of organised civil society or might use their voice or voting power to pressure decision makers towards more gender-transformative policies and legislation. 

• LTO 2 focuses on strengthening gender-transformative and youth-inclusive policymaking and legislation. This LTO feeds into the other two LTOs as decision makers directly influence the availability of civic space and have a strong influence on the general public through discourse, legislation and policies. 

• LTO3 envisions a strong, inclusive and resilient civil society that is able to fight for gender justice. This LTO also feeds into the other two LTOs as a strong civil society is able to advocate for gender-transformative laws and policies and is able to foster and stimulate public support. 

Our strategic objective is to create societies that are gender just and violence free, with and for young people in their full diversity. By saying gender just, we imply systemic change at the level of root causes of discrimination, sexism and harmful norms that impede full access to rights for young people on the mere basis of their gender. By violence free, we imply our ambition to actively contribute to a decrease in gender-based violence in the countries where this programme is active. 

Objectives

The end-term evaluation of the Generation G programme has two-fold objectives: programmatic focused and collaboration focused. Detailed objectives are: 

1. Evaluating the effectiveness of the programme: evaluate the results (including unexpected or unintended results) of the programme, which changes occurred, how changes happened and the contribution of the programme to these changes: 

   • To assess and validate the country programme progress towards the achievement of the 5-year targets at output and outcome level; 

   • To assess the country programme strategies regarding: 

     • sustainability (what is the likelihood that the programme results will be sustainable, in terms of systems, institutions, policies, financing) and institutionalization (e.g. on GTA and MIYP); 

     • operationalisation of programme principles (do we live up to our own principles?); 

     • capacity strengthening (Is the programme sufficiently sensitive and responsive to capacity strengthening needs? Is the country capacity strengthening plan effective and likely to lead to sustained capacity improvements in the long-term?) 

   • A mapping of funding in relation to budgets vs. expenditures at activity, thematic and geographical level, as well as an evaluation of financial resource management (e.g. appropriateness of budget planning, whether grant allocation has been appropriate, whether there were any bottlenecks in the system of financial disbursement between consortium, national lead partner and coalition partners; 

   • Additional country specific evaluation and/or learning objectives.  

2. Evaluating the partnership collaboration focusing on: coherence, localisation/leading from the South, partnership with the Ministry and the Embassies, lessons learned and good practices. 

3. Evaluating the relevance and validity of the theory of change: evaluate the programmes’ theory of change including assessing the validity of the assumptions underlying the TOC in the different country contexts by providing evidence of which mechanisms of change worked, which did not, and why.  

More details on the end-term requirements as set out by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the IOB can be found in Annex 2. 

The partnership calls for an external, independent party to address these objectives clearly and comprehensively in all seven countries where Generation G has been implemented. Results from the end-term evaluation needs to provide insights for future programmes. Further details about the programme, methods and approach, selection process, and the timeline for the assignment are presented below.  

Methods and approach

Paradigm for the evaluation. For the Generation G end-term evaluation the realist evaluation approach (See for example: https://www.intrac.org/wpcms/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Realist-evaluation.pdf ) – which is endorsed by the IOB – will be used. The realist evaluation focuses on understanding what works, for whom and under what circumstances, and will  be informed by the programme’s theory of change and context at country and global levels. The realist evaluation provides a structure for exploring the context and programme mechanisms that enables a programme to work. It is particularly useful for understanding complex interventions and how context influences programmes. A realist evaluation works by going back to the theory of change, mapping how we assume the programme works (i.e. who is doing what and what outcomes do we assume these interventions have), then gathering data to understand if these assumptions are in fact true, and how context has an influence. Moreover, this approach offers a deeper understanding of the success factors and challenges which facilitate or inhibit the attainment of sustainable impact within and across all levels of the programme. Data will be collected around these assumptions. All realist evaluation components aim to look into the ‘black box’ of initiatives in order to understand which particular components, modules, or messages seem to be driving the most positive results, or what factors are holding back successes.  

Testing of assumptions (theory to inform the evaluation). During the inception phase of the end-term evaluation, each country coalition together with the global consultants and their respective national consultants and youth researchers, will develop their country specific set of assumptions that they want to test and evaluate in order to make the evaluation of their programme as contextualized, focused and useful as possible. Each country set will be derived from the following documents:  

1. the literature review on the assumptions of the global theory of change assumptions that was conducted in June, 2023;  

2. a detailed set of assumptions developed by the planning, monitoring, evaluation, and learning (PMEL) technical working group;  

3. the recommendations of the (country) mid-term reviews (if applicable).  

The assumptions developed by the PMEL technical working group  is based on the literature review as well as from professional experience from programme staff.  The assumptions as developed during the programme proposal of the Generation G theory of change can be found in annex 1. The mid-term review was conducted in 2023 and recommendations were validated and incorporated into country plans for 2024.  

Data collection methods. A range of data collection methods can be included in a realist evaluation. For this end-term evaluation interviews, focus group discussions, outcome harvesting, and observations will be used, with scope for further methods to be included as needed. It is envisaged that the realist evaluation will contribute to future programme development by providing insights on what works in what contexts as well as the ‘transferability’ of different programme elements. Triangulation techniques need to be systematically applied throughout the analysis process and validated across the various data collection methods.  

Evaluation rigour. The end-term evaluation will look at programme implementation and results at both country and global (advocacy) level, as well as at processes (partnership, collaboration, governance, power balance) at in-country level, at consortium level and the interlinkage between those levels. As mentioned under section 3, the end-term evaluation needs to adhere to the requirements from the Ministry and the IOB which include – amongst others –, achievements and validation of the output and outcome indicators that are linked to the strengthening civil society and thematic result framework basket indicators, crosscutting themes (gender, youth, climate), and sustainability. Partnership collaboration needs to focus on: coherence, and localization/leading from the South. The partnership has a solid M&E framework in place which contains – amongst others – progress data on GTA and MIYP capacity strengthening activities; all available data needs to be validated by the consultants. 

Evaluation principles. Joint learning is a key component of the end-term evaluation. Through participatory reflection, validation, and linking and learning meetings during the evaluation period, the end-term evaluation will contribute to strengthening the evidence of the Generation G programme. It is expected that the end-term evaluation will also provide input for internal reflection and stimulate innovation for future programme development and implementation.   

With regards to the principles of gender transformative approaches, inclusiveness, meaningful and inclusive youth participation and accountability, the end-term review needs to include young feminist voices, young people in all their diversity as well as excluded and marginalised groups throughout the process. Preferably we select a feminist oriented consultancy agency that has a strong network of local feminist youth researchers. It is expected that the principle of co-ownership is fully embedded in the proposal methodology. With the selected consultants, the Generation G partnership must ensure that their different voices are included in the end-term evaluation design, including inclusive and accessible language. 

Process, deliverables, and illustrative timeline  

The end-term evaluation process will be a fluid collaboration between the successful applicant and various parties within the Generation G partnership, all working with unified goals. The timeline of the end-term evaluation is designed so as not to be rushed, and instead to offer enough time for the necessary data collection and review to prepare a thorough, thoughtful, and useful answer on all objectives. The final process will be designed and revised over the term of the assignment by all participating parties. The Generation G partnership will be eager to hold initial meetings with the selected applicant as soon as possible in the timeline, to clarify any questions related to the assignment, and to provide necessary background documentation, data, and other materials as needed.

For reasons of ownership and context specificity, the successful consultants will work with local consultants or local research teams and youth researchers in the respective programme countries. These will be selected jointly and in agreement with the Generation G team in each country.  

In addition, an in-person meeting to develop country specific end-term evaluation plans will be held from 2-6 December 2024 in Rabat, Morocco. Attendees will include: 

• Representatives from partners of each country coalition (Indonesia, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Rwanda, South Africa, Uganda) 

• Consortium members (Rutgers, ABAAD, Equimundo, Sonke) 

• Global consultants (to be hired) 

• National consultants (to be hired) 

• Youth researchers (to be hired) 

The successful consultants are expected to develop a methodology for this workshop and take responsibility for facilitating the process, in close collaboration with the programme’s PMEL staff. The meeting will be paid in full for by Rutgers (additional to the evaluation budget).  

The Generation G partnership is required to establish a reference group consisting of internal members of the partnership and external stakeholders. The reference group will need to review and approve the following: 

• Terms of reference for hiring the global consultants; 

• Selected global consultant(s) to be contracted as evaluator; 

• Inception report by the evaluator; 

• Evaluation tools; 

• End evaluation report by the evaluator. 

Intended users and audience of the final product. Considerations of the ultimate users/uses of the evaluation should inform all evaluation decisions. We anticipate that the key audiences and end users of the report include:  

• Members and partners of the partnership. The findings will be used by consortium members and in the programme countries to steer and adapt, and to identify successful strategies and lessons learned. Insights from the end-term evaluation will provide insights into which approaches need to be started, continued, revised or stopped for which target groups. 

• Programme participants and stakeholders in each country. Engaging directly with this audience ensures downward accountability and for learning, inspiration and motivation. 

• The international field of gender-based violence programming, including international knowledge platforms for gender-based violence prevention and male involvement. This will contribute to global learning and innovation concerning best practices, scalable interventions, and lessons learned. 

• Furthermore, the evaluation report will be shared with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands (the primary donor of the programme) and the Dutch development sector in particular.  

Expected deliverables and illustrative timeline 

• Recruitment of the global consultants (recruitment period: 22 July  – 25 August, 2024; interviews - will be held from 2 – 13 September, 2024) 

• Recruitment of the national consultants and youth researchers together with representatives from the country coalitions (interviews will be held from 23 September – 4 October, 2024); 

• End-term evaluation planning workshop; develop a methodology for and (co-)facilitation of the end-term evaluation workshop with country representatives, and the national consultants and youth researchers (2 – 6 December, 2024; Rabat, Morocco). The workshop will be paid in full (flights, hotel, transportation, food (excluding diner) by Rutgers. The programme will be developed jointly with representatives from the partnership; 

• Inception report (expected timeline: 9 December, 2024 – 18 January, 2025); 

• Development of the global and country specific tools (expected timeline: 10 – 21 February, 2025; tool development can also go partially in parallel with the writing of the inception report); 

• Conduct and facilitate the data collection at global and national level (estimated period: March – August, 2025) 

• Methodology for and (co-)facilitation of a validation process with the country coalitions and the global partnership (estimated period: Q3 2025); 

• Final report. This report needs to include concise country specific reports as well (estimated deadline for approving the end-term evaluation report by the reference group is 12 December, 2025).

In addition, regular updates on the process, for example on the country studies, are required. The applicant needs to adhere to the IOB evaluation quality criteria and should address the communication process and collaboration between the different parties in their proposal. 

The succesful applicant

The partnership, through its lead agency Rutgers, wants to contract one (lead) organisation, responsible for the deliverables and the process implemented. We also welcome applications that reflect a collaboration of multiple organisations for this assignment; research institutes and/or independent researchers/consultants can collaborate in order to conduct the end-term evaluation. It is likely impossible for a single independent evaluator to accomplish this assignment, given the scope of travel and data collection required within the timeline.  

It is required that the lead consultant works with local research teams (national consultants and youth researchers). These research teams must have knowledge of the context of the countries, and are able to do interviews in the local language, and should have been jointly selected with the respective Generation G country coalitions. 

The successful application will identify key personnel within the evaluation team who meet desired criteria such as the following:  

• Master’s degree or higher in social sciences or related fields such as public health science, political science.  

• Advanced skills in the realist evaluation approach, as well as quantitative and qualitative research methodologies;  

• Proven track record in the evaluation of advocacy programmes, gender justice, meaningful and inclusive youth participation gender-transformative lobbying and advocacy, youth-inclusive policymaking and legislation, particularly in long-term assignments such as this one, that have been implemented in multiple countries;  

• At least five years’ experience in the development sector;  

• Knowledge of human rights, gender justice, gender-transformative lobbying and advocacy, intersectionality, youth agency, youth-inclusive policymaking and legislation and collaborative programming, including approaches to engage men and boys;  

• Proven experience in working with the realist evaluation approach; 

• Proven experience in working with qualitative and quantitative data collection and analysis for evaluations;  

• Network with research institutions and/or independent consultants in the South; 

• Ability to work independently, take initiative and respond appropriately to constructive feedback; and 

• Experience in sharing and discussing review findings with clients, in-country partners and beneficiaries, and within an international research network. 

The successful application should identify one lead researcher of the research team to be the primary contact person for the end-term evaluation focal point and the reference group. In addition to the above, this person should:  

• Have proven experience in layered and complex evaluations; 

• Have strong communication skills; 

• Have a strong methodological background in multi-country evaluations;  

• Have proven experience in using a mixed methodology approach.  

The consultancy team should not comprise current or former staff (minimum of 5 years) of any of the members or partners of the consortium (including volunteers and board members), in order to protect the independence of the evaluation.  

Annex 1: Detailed outline and assumptions per long-term outcome (LTO) 

LTO 1: A growing number of young men and women are mobilised to promote gender justice and prevent GBV on and offline 

LTO 1 assumptions: 

1. Awareness and knowledge about harmful norms and power dynamics lead to action against gender inequality and GBV. 

1. When young people, communities and media act simultaneously, it enhances the promotion of gender justice and the prevention of GBV (on and offline). 

To achieve this long-term outcome, we identified one key precondition: people are aware of harmful norms and power dynamics and equipped to act on gender inequality and GBV. This is advanced by the following pathways of change: 

• Communities participate in dialogues and programmes on GBV, gender norms and men’s role in promoting gender justice on and offline. Since community programmes need to be organised, fostered and fed, CSOs need to have the capacity to stimulate these processes.  

• CSOs are able to directly campaign towards the public. 

• Media makers (traditional and new) effectively address gender justice and GBV on and offline. 

• Since media makers need to be informed and committed, CSOs need to be able to reach out, offer support and provide correct information. 

Key interventions include: 

• Media and community outreach and mobilisation on care division, GBV, and civic space for women through community-based dialogues and programming, on and offline outreach activities, working with media on gender-transformative messaging, nudging and influencing. 

• Skill-building for CSOs and media makers on media and gender-transformative campaigning through training and mutual learning. 

LTO 2: Decision-makers increasingly adopt, adapt, implement and are accountable for gender-transformative and youth-inclusive policies and laws 

LTO 2 assumptions: 

1. Lobbying and advocacy are most effective when happening at multiple levels simultaneously 

1. Policies and laws are more likely to become youth-inclusive if youth are meaningfully included in these processes. 

We will focus on decision-makers at the local, district and national level within their countries. Implementation includes budgeting and staffing. In order to achieve LTO2, we have identified one key precondition: decision-makers have political will and capacity to promote gender-transformative policies and laws related to GBV, care division and civic space for women. 

This is advanced by four pathways of change: 

• Key leaders influence decision-makers to promote gender-transformative laws and policies. For us, key leaders are people with influence and audience, including religious leaders, social media influencers, celebrities, political leaders, civil society leaders and business leaders. In order for key leaders to wield their influence, civil society movements need the capacity to effectively engage them. 

• CSOs directly advocate towards decision-makers. 

• National and intergovernmental organisations, treaty bodies and accountability mechanisms (e.g. national human rights institutions, Ombuds organisations, UN agencies, the African Union, CEDAW and UPR) positively influence decision-makers. To effectively use these spaces, CSOs need capacity to exercise influence in them. 

• Feminist youth advocates and allies inform and engage decision-makers to promote gender-transformative and youth-inclusive policies and laws. Civil society needs to be able to support and facilitate these advocates in this process, for example through training, brokering, mentoring and joint advocacy. 

• By capacity we mean awareness, knowledge, skills, understanding, space, financial resources and connections. 

Key interventions include: 

• Concerted advocacy at the local, district, national, regional, international level that is youth-inclusive and gender-transformative. This requires simultaneous campaigns, technical assistance for governments, and facilitating access to political spaces for youth advocates. 

• Skill-building for CSOs and key leaders on policy and law monitoring, reporting and gender-transformative lobbying and advocacy. 

LTO 3: Civil society for gender justice is increasingly resilient, effective, gender-transformative and youth-inclusive 

LTO 3 assumptions: 

1. Civil society is more efficient if it is strong, unified and inclusive. 

1. Civic space can be safeguarded and expanded if resilient and diverse civil society actors work 

LTO3 directly contributes to the preservation and, where possible, expansion of civic space. This LTO is advanced by two pathways of change: 

• CSOs jointly embrace gender-transformative approaches and youth participation. To do so, CSOs need to be willing and able to collaborate for gender justice. Moreover, young feminists and excluded groups need to be able to voice their needs. 

• CSOs are able to monitor and mitigate risks related to backlash, harassment, conflict and opposition in on and offline civic space. This precondition feeds directly into the resilience of civil society. Therefore, civil society needs to have the capacity to assess what kinds of risks exist and which risk-mitigation measures are appropriate. 

Key interventions include: 

• Tailor-made organisational capacity strengthening focused on, for example, financial resilience(including post-programme resilience) and management, leadership and planning, monitoring, evaluation and learning (PMEL). 

• Coalition-building through joint programme design, value clarification, and brokering connections. 

• Skill-building on holistic safety and security, including monitoring opposition and attacks on gender. 

• Capacity strengthening on human rights, youth inclusion and GTA. 

Annex 2: End-term evaluation requirements as set by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and IOB / Available reports / Additional notes 

The guidance note of MoFA states the following on the end-term evaluation: 

You are required to conduct an external independent end evaluation for the period of 2021-2025 taking the following into account: 

• The evaluation for each strategic partnership program must adhere to the updated IOB quality criteria; 

• Focus of the evaluation will be twofold, both programmatic and partnership collaboration as described above (added below); 

• Programmatic focusing on: Theory of Change, , achievements to date on the output and outcome indicators that are linked to the Strengthening Civil Society and thematic Result Framework basket indicators, unintended/unexpected effects, reaching the most marginalised groups, crosscutting themes (gender, youth, climate), challenges, lessons learned and good practises, sustainability; 

• Partnership collaboration focusing on: coherence, localisation/leading from the south, partnership with the Ministry and the Embassies, lessons learned and good practices. 

• You are required to establish a reference group consisting of internal and external members of the consortia; the Ministry of Foreign Affairs focal point is required to be among the reference group members. The reference group will need to review and approve the following: Terms of Reference; Selected consultant(s) to be contracted as evaluator; Inception report by the evaluator; End evaluation report by the evaluator. 

IOB Criteria: The end-term evaluation must adhere to the updated IOB quality criteria (2022): https://english.iob-evaluatie.nl/publications/guidelines/2022/04/22/evaluation-quality-criteria. The IOB recommends that at least 23 of the 26 evaluation criteria are scored as ‘adequate’ or ‘good’. In addition, there are 13 knock-out criteria. If an evaluation scores ‘inadequate’ on one of these 13 criteria, the evaluation as a whole will be regarded as inadequate. The knock-out criteria are: 2, 4, 5, 10, 11, 13, 14, 15, 17, 20, 21, 22 and 23.  

Public available Generation G reports 

Baseline study: https://aidstream.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/documents/1--GenG-baseline-report-revised-Feb-2022-20220407010401.pdf 

Mid-term review – Executive summary: https://aidstream.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/documents/Executive-Summary-GenG-MTR-%28IATI%29-compressed-20231108101147.pdf 

Additional notes 

Note 1. This call for proposals has been distributed among the professional networks of the consortium, through our websites and social media, and also through several email listservs of evaluation and violence prevention personnel.  

Note 2. Rutgers is no contracting authority within the meaning of the ‘Aanbestedingswet 2012’ (the Dutch Public Procurement Act). This tender procedure is a voluntary and private tender procedure. The Aanbestedingswet 2012 as well as the principles of procurement law are explicitly not applicable.  

Applicants are hereby advised that Rutgers is not committed to any course of action as a result of its issuance of this Terms of Reference and/or its receipt of a proposal from the applicant or other forms in response to it. Rutgers reserves all rights and liberties regarding the tender procedure, including:  

• the right to terminate the tender procedure at any moment in time;  

• the right to reject any proposal;  

• the right to engage negotiations with one or more parties (also third-parties) regarding the contract or a part thereof;  

• the right to award the contract or a part thereof;  

• the right to award the contract to one or more parties;  

• the right to make any decision subject to conditions;  

• the right not to award the contract;  

• the right to depart from or modify the proposed framework and/or any other procedure in relation to the Terms of Reference.