Why?
In 2015, NRC Education began a strategic review of its programming with young people. This Jordan Youth Programme evaluation is seen as a key additional component of the wider NRC learning youth agenda. The programme in Jordan has been regarded as a high quality, relevant and innovative programme. Distinctly in NRC, the Youth programme in Jordan has been a stand-alone platform with a dedicated management structure, independent from the Education Core Competency.
How?
The evaluation considered 47 documents, used a semi-structured interview guide and convened 23 focus group discussions and 9 individual interviews with Syrian camp residents, as well as 25 key informant interviews. These included feedback from youth participants, youth who had dropped out from the programme, graduates of the programme and non-participant youth as well as teachers, community members and parents.
Interesting for you:
See the steps of the Theory of Change: On p.26 the evaluation provides a novel way to review the steps in a programme’s theory of change and to verify how assumptions play out in reality
Youth guiding principles: On p.36 the section presents staff and NRC partner responses when asked about what principles from the Jordan programme NRC should take to its youth work in other countries
Potential synergies: On p.38 the evaluation explores the potential for synergies between Youth programme and other NRC Core Competencies or thematics, demonstrating that working with youth is a natural candidate for more cross-Competencies work
The difficult to measure impacts of education: The evaluation identified the social and emotional changes in the lives of youth. On p.44 you’ll find an annex of “Stories of Change”. These can be useful for report writing, articles and presentations.
Overall conclusions:
- The NRC Youth Programme in Jordan is nimble and ever-adapting like the youth it aims to serve
- The Country Office decision to keep Youth separate from Education has allowed the Programme to focus on a wider range of youth issues than youth-serving organisations normally do: not just education and training, but making friends, improving your standing in the community, finding your way in the world
- The Programme also manages to embody much more than the sum of its parts: Technical Vocational Education and Training, Education, Life Skills – functions that often stay in their silos and ossify – to include those elusive “soft” effects that NGOs often claim to achieve, but often do not
- The advocacy and coordination functions in particular have been exemplary, owing in part to the tenacity of a few staff
- There is work to be done to break down (especially the gendered) barriers to participation, and the high dropout rate is worrying
- To the extent the experience from this programme can be made known outside Jordan, the refugee youth empowerment field will be better for it