TERM OF REFERENCE BACKGROUND Over 40% of the Romanian population is at risk of poverty, with children particularly affected (49%). Due to low coverage and adequacy of social benefits and services, poverty is not reduced significantly, nor is social inclusion strengthened. Based on good practice at international, national and local levels, UNICEF and its partners will test the integrated social services model at community level in 45 communities in a single county - Bacau, as an innovative approach to ensure increased access to services for children and families and to reduce the risk of social exclusion. The model brings together education, social protection and health services under the leadership of local authorities, with coordinated technical and methodological support from the county authorities Based on the collected evidence, it is expected that the model will influence public policies at national, county and local level, while actively contribute to the social inclusion of vulnerable children and their families. The current pilot is based on previous UNICEF experiences in education and child protection and will be tested for a period of 3 years (2015-2017). The current project will use some of the tools developed in previous UNICEF interventions including the on-line application named AURORA which responds to several systems’ bottleneck related to monitoring and evaluation such as: i) introducing a methodology for complete diagnostic of vulnerabilities of children and families by community professionals based on a grid of indicators to be applied unitary for all children and across all communities; ii) availability and transparency of real-time data about children and their families at – – community level for social protection and health sectors; iii) increasing effectiveness of monitoring and timeliness of feedback and supervision; iv) supporting evidence-based policy development using various statistics and reports which can be generated. JUSTIFICATION The AURORA methodology was tested since 2014 and is currently implemented through two components: a mobile software application and an on-line platform that have been used in 32 rural communities from the NE regions, allowing for the collection, aggregation and analysis of reliable and accurate data in relation to the situation of children’ and their families at ‘invisible various levels of access (community, county and national level). The diagnostic of vulnerabilities is a very important step because it represents the base on the individual plan of intervention is decided, including the community services to be provided.
TERM OF REFERENCE BACKGROUND Over 40% of the Romanian population is at risk of poverty, with children particularly affected (49%). Due to low coverage and adequacy of social benefits and services, poverty is not reduced significantly, nor is social inclusion strengthened. Based on good practice at international, national and local levels, UNICEF and its partners will test the integrated social services model at community level in 45 communities in a single county - Bacau, as an innovative approach to ensure increased access to services for children and families and to reduce the risk of social exclusion. The model brings together education, social protection and health services under the leadership of local authorities, with coordinated technical and methodological support from the county authorities Based on the collected evidence, it is expected that the model will influence public policies at national, county and local level, while actively contribute to the social inclusion of vulnerable children and their families. The current pilot is based on previous UNICEF experiences in education and child protection and will be tested for a period of 3 years (2015-2017). The current project will use some of the tools developed in previous UNICEF interventions including the on-line application named AURORA which responds to several systems’ bottleneck related to monitoring and evaluation such as: i) introducing a methodology for complete diagnostic of vulnerabilities of children and families by community professionals based on a grid of indicators to be applied unitary for all children and across all communities; ii) availability and transparency of – real-time – data about children and their families at community level for social protection and health sectors; iii) increasing effectiveness of monitoring and timeliness of feedback and supervision; iv) supporting evidence-based policy development using various statistics and reports which can be generated. JUSTIFICATION The AURORA methodology was tested since 2014 and is currently implemented through two components: a mobile software application and an on-line platform that have been used in 32 rural communities from the NE regions, allowing for the collection, aggregation and analysis of reliable and accurate data in relation to the situation of ‘invisible children’ and their families at various levels of access (community, county and national level). The diagnostic of vulnerabilities is a very important step because it represents the base on the individual plan of intervention is decided, including the community services to be provided.
RFP_ROMA_2015_004BIS-IT-application.docx