RFP – Independent Mid Term Evaluation of the AIMS-IDRC/DFID Program

1.0 INTRODUCTION

The African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS), was established in 2003 in Cape Town, South Africa. It is an innovative post-graduate centre for education, research and public engagement, providing advanced, broadly applicable mathematical skills to talented students from all over Africa. AIMS offers a number of educational programs highlighted by its one-year Master’s in Mathematical Sciences. The Master’s program trains hundreds of talented women and men African scholars each year, and prepares them for leadership careers in academia, government and industry. Research is also an integral part of the AIMS work. Since its launch, AIMS has won global recognition as a centre of excellence for postgraduate education and research. Building on its success, AIMS launched the Next Einstein Initiative (NEI) in 2008 to build a critical mass of scientific and technical talent in Africa, capable of driving progress across the continent.

AIMS-NEI key objectives are to:
Promote mathematics and science in Africa;
Recruit and train talented women and men students and teachers in mathematical sciences; and
Build capacity for African initiatives in education, research and technology.
In July 2010, the Government of Canada contributed CA$20 million to the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS). The grant, to be administered by the International Development Research Center (IDRC), is to support the AIMS centre in South Africa; and establish three new centres in Senegal, Ghana and Cameroon by December 20151. In November 2012, the UK Department for International Development (DFID) entered into a match funding arrangement with IDRC, contributing a sum of approximately £18,160,000, to complement and build on Canada’s contribution to AIMS-NEI2. The DFID funds were geared towards the establishment and initial operating costs of two additional AIMS centres in Tanzania and Benin; provide consolidation funding for the centres in South Africa, Senegal, Ghana and Cameroon; and contribute to the enhancement of the AIMS curriculum and learning environment in order to facilitate career opportunities within relevant sectors and industries in Africa. As part of the agreement, IDRC provided a further contribution of CA $2 million to build the research capacity of the AIMS network. To facilitate efficient management and oversight of the Program, IDRC is responsible for managing DFID’s contribution.

The goal of the AIMS-IDRC-DFID Program is to provide advanced training in applied mathematics to top African students enabling them to pursue high quality post graduate studies and eventually contribute as future leaders to the further economic, political and educational advancement of the African continent.

The specific objectives of the program are to:
support existing AIMS Centres;
establish new AIMS Centres;
update and implement a monitoring and evaluation plan;
support and strengthen AIMS-NEI’s Secretariat;
develop a common set of administrative and operating procedures across the AIMS network;
form a unified learning network with an appropriate balance between a central approach and local variation;
enhance post graduate opportunities for AIMS centre graduates, including complementing AIMS-NEI’s curriculum with employability, entrepreneurship and business skills modules; and
improve the financial stability (sustainability) of AIMS-NEI.
In keeping with the terms of the grant agreement, AIMS, in collaboration with IDRC and DFID, has commissioned a Mid-term evaluation (MTE) of the Program.

The MTE is important and timely as it is an opportunity for AIMS to clarify and assess the initiatives under this Program, as well as highlight areas of programmatic strength and opportunities for change, especially now that the organization is growing and working to advance its theory of change (ToC).

The MTE will serve learning and accountability purposes for AIMS-NEI, IDRC and DFID who will be the primary users of the evaluation. Essentially, it will seek to identify: progress against objectives, what is going well, highlight early results, what are the challenges, what can be improved, and what are the key recommendations to ensure progress towards the objectives of the Program.

2.0 EVALUATION OBJECTIVES & SCOPE

The MTE will be guided by general OECD-DAC criteria and will have the following objectives:
Determine the progress towards achieving the Program’s objectives and intended outcomes specific to:
AIMS operational plans and mechanisms made possible by the Program; o AIMS academic programs specific to areas supported by the Program; and o AIMS research component specific to areas supported by the Program.
Identify best practices, opportunities, lessons and corrective actions needed for the next phase of implementation and to ensure the realization of the expected results.
2.1 Evaluation Scope

The investigation will focus on the areas of AIMS operation, academic and research work that is being funded under the AIMS-IDRC-DFID Program. The mid-term evaluation will focus on the AIMS operations in South Africa (both the Centre and the Secretariat), and centers in Ghana, Senegal and Cameroon. At all four locations, the evaluation will assess AIMS’ operations (administration and finance arrangements, systems etc.), research and academic work. Specifically, the MTE will review of the AIMS Master’s Program, AIMS Industry Initiative and the Research program. Also, there will be a global survey of AIMS students (current and graduated) to assess and document the perceptions of AIMS’s direct beneficiaries.

The mid-term evaluation will seek to capture information from all levels of stakeholders including:
Selected AIMS senior management team (Secretariat and Centers) and staff in, UK, Germany, Canada;
AIMS professors and tutors (regional and international, etc.);
AIMS students and alumni (Alumni survey);
AIMS partners in government, targeted sector agencies, institutions and companies;
AIMS researchers and scientists and academia;
Employers of AIMS graduates to date (representative sample);
Management and program staff at IDRC and DFID.
2.2 Evaluation Methodology and Approaches

The methodology should combine a wide range of methods (e.g. quantitative, qualitative, and participatory), tools and information sources to allow triangulation of information and ensure impartiality. In particular, there should be an extensive review of all relevant documents; a representative sample of key stakeholders should be consulted, their opinions and feedback considered in order to determine the scope and quality of the outputs and ensure a comprehensive understanding of diverse perspectives on issues, performance and results. The approaches should assess the extent to which each of the implemented outputs fulfilled their initial objectives. It is expected that the analysis will focus on the immediate outcome level results and will comment on the extent to which the Program is progressing towards higher level outcomes and impacts. To measure this progress, the evaluation will be informed by the DFID Logframe and IDRC’s Schedule of Performance Indicators (SPIs). Finally, the analysis must be informed by gender-disaggregated data.

The methodology should be presented in the inception report. It will include an evaluation matrix aligned to the key evaluation questions and data collection tool to guide the desk review and field work; outline the evaluation team’s overall work plan including site visits schedules and division of responsibilities between evaluation team members. The methodology will ensure that all four centres/countries are considered in the assessment. To allow aggregation of findings across the countries, the team will use the same data tools in each country visit.

2.3 Evaluation Management

The evaluation will be managed by AIMS-NEI. AIMS’s Senior Evaluation Adviser will be responsible for hiring the evaluation team; preparing and managing all evaluation related contracts in collaboration with the Executive Vice President; and monitoring the evaluation process against the deliverables articulated in the Terms of References (TORS).

An Advisory Committee comprised of AIMS Senior Evaluation Adviser, one member of AIMS Senior Management team, and representatives of IDRC and DFID. The Advisory Committee will be responsible for reviewing and approving the MTE TORs, the Inception report and the draft Evaluation report.