Assessment, Monitoring, and Strategic Planning for UNICEF Timor Leste’s Child Friendly Schools Initiative

AIR conducted a baseline assessment of the 30 UNICEF Child Friendly Schools (CFS) that would be the primary focus of UNICEF Timor Leste’s holistic intervention in 2009 to more carefully and comprehensively document lessons learned and best practices that may be relevant and informative for all schools in Timor Leste.

Given this was the beginning of the Government of Timor Leste (GoTL)-UNICEF’s 2009-2013 Basic Education Country Program, a framework for action was articulated to guide UNICEF and MECYS collaboration over the next five years of significant change in the educational system. An important step in realizing both of these ends was careful program monitoring and evaluation. AIR’s evaluation team

1. conducted a retrospective review of CFS in Timor Leste; 
2. developed a baseline assessment and monitoring strategy that demonstrates impact of CFS in targeted focus schools; and 
3. framed a national, five-year strategy for engagement with CFS in Timor Leste, including plans for how UNICEF may best use formative monitoring data in scaling up the Initiative.

This evaluation was ultimately used to guide UNICEF Timor Leste in the effective, efficient, and sustainable implementation of CFS programming on a national scale.