Call for Proposals: Research Partnership to Strengthen South Africa’s Evaluation System, Deadline: 30 September 2016

The South African Monitoring and Evaluation Association, the Centre for Learning, Evaluation and Results and the Centre for Research on Evaluation Science and Technology, has launched a call for proposals for its Research Partnership process. The purpose of the process is to facilitate the implementation of research projects that will contribute to strengthening South Africa’s evaluation system and improving the institutional relationships and partnerships that underlie it.

Funding Information

The Research Partnership seeks to make around 4 grants of up to R40000 each to contribute to the costs of research projects in the fields of inquiry.

Areas of Inquiry

Research proposals into the following areas are invited:

• The current state of South Africa’s evaluation system: Research in this area should provide insight into the status of the evaluation system in various possible areas, for example academia, research or SAMEA itself. Research here should build on the existing work being done on the CREST/ CLEAR AA database for which a substantial amount of scoping has already been done. Researchers interested in this area of work should inquire for further information.
• Evaluation utilization: Research in this area should provide insight into the extent to which evaluations actually lead to improvements in interventions and how. The focus could be on the state or civil society.
• Profiling evaluators and the commissioners of evaluations: Again, research in this area should build on research already under way and should provide a constructive, descriptive understanding of who does evaluations in South Africa and who commissions them. The findings from the research should help identify how to strengthen SA’s evaluation system.
• Reviewing the evaluation architecture in SA, with specific reference to ethics, standards and competencies: Research in this area could take the form of ethnographic or case studies in which the issues are highlighted and reflected upon or could explore the theoretical and policy dimensions.
• Identifying examples of good practice in evaluation communities of practice (or professional learning communities): Research in this area could entail exploring strategies undertaken in other VOPES (especially in the global south) but other approaches can be motivated for.

Eligibility Criteria

Researchers who live and work in Africa are invited to submit research proposals.

How to Apply

Research proposals should be submitted via email, with “Research Proposal” as the subject line.

Eligible Countries

Algeria, Angola, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cabo Verde, Cameroon, Central African Republic,Chad, Comoros, Congo, Republic of the Congo, Democratic Republic of the, Cote d’Ivorie, Djibouti, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia,Libya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria,Rwanda, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Africa, South Sudan, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe.

For more information, please visit Call for Proposals.