fbpx

I’m Here Approach

A playbook of steps and tools to ensure humanitarian programs include and respond to adolescents affected by crisis or displacement

Group of women

Welcome! Thank you for your interest in the I’m Here Approach. Whether this is your first introduction to the approach, or you are well‐versed in I’m Here implementation, we hope this Playbook will enhance your knowledge and serve as a resource for you and your organization.

This Playbook is designed to provide interactive guidance on the I’m Here Approach, while also making the tools accessible and easy to use. Throughout the Playbook, you will find links to additional resources, as well as lessons learned from field implementation.

INTRODUCTION What is the I'm Here Approach?

Introduction

What is the I'm Here Approach?

Introduction to the I'm Here Approach

I’m Here is an operational approach that helps implementing partners reach the most vulnerable adolescents and supports partners in being accountable to adolescents’ safety, health, and well-being.

I’m Here enables humanitarian actors to engage adolescents in creating their own solutions—ensuring their rights are protected and programs are effective. The approach urges practitioners to go beyond seeing adolescents as a homogenous group, and to advocate for multisectoral action to meet the needs of different sub-groups of adolescents. I’m Here is adaptable to varying on-the-ground situations to ensure inclusion and engagement with adolescent girls and boys.

I’m Here provides concrete steps and field tools to proactively:

  1. identify adolescent girls and boys in a given community;
  2. assess their needs, risks, capacities, and interests; and
  3. monitor adolescents’ access to key services, programs, and assets.

What is the I’m Here Approach?

The I’m Here Approach is a methodology and complementary set of tools that helps us to answer the following questions:

  • Where do adolescents live and what key resources and services exist in these areas?
  • What is the vulnerability‐capacity profile of adolescents? How are vulnerability‐ capacity profiles different or the same for girls and boys within and across service areas?
  • What are adolescents’ self‐expressed priority needs and concerns? How do needs and concerns differ for different sub‐groups of adolescents?
  • Are existing programs meeting adolescents’ self‐expressed needs?
  • Are the most marginalized adolescent girls and boys being reached and retained by programs?
  • What are the program implications based on the actionable information from service mapping, adolescent mapping, and focus group discussions?
  • I

    Identify

    Identify the crisis-affected community and resources within it

  • M

    Make visible

    Make visible the context-specific profile of adolescents

  • H

    Hold group meetings

    Hold group meetings with girls of similar vulnerabilities and capacities

  • E

    Elaborate plans

    Elaborate plans responsiveness to girl’s needs, risks, and capacities

  • R

    Rally support

    Rally support across humanitarian sectors and local communities

  • E

    Engage capacities

    Engage the capacities of adolescent girls

The I’m Here Approach can be simplified into three pillars:

  1. Find them
  2. Listen to them
  3. Design, implement, and evaluate with them

The I’m Here Approach is just that—an approach. It is a methodology with an accompanying set of steps and tools meant to complement existing programming for adolescents.

I’m Here supports field staff in identifying and responding to the needs of adolescents in their communities and should be used as an entry point to developing more inclusive and holistic adolescent programs. The I’m Here Approach is a program tool, meant to strengthen insights into how programs can better reach adolescents who may be typically left out or forgotten in humanitarian response.

What is it not?

The I’m Here Approach is not:

  • A one‐size‐fits‐all program model
  • A standalone curriculum or toolkit for adolescent programming
  • A population‐based research tool
  • Only for those who already implement programming for adolescents
  • Meant to replace existing approaches to adolescent programming

The I’m Here Approach has been utilized by numerous on-the-ground actors in order to develop or refine programming for adolescents. In some cases, the approach has been adopted at an organizational level as a go-to methodology for outreach, recruitment, and program design.

Who is the I'm Here Approach for?

The I’m Here Approach is for:

  • Field staff who are already implementing targeted adolescent programming
  • Field staff who plan to implement targeted adolescent programming
  • Field staff who wish to tailor existing programs or activities for adolescents
  • Headquarters staff who wish to build the capacity of their organization to implement targeted and inclusive programming for adolescents
Group of women reading

This Playbook provides step-by-step instructions on how the I’m Here Approach works. Implementing partners are supported to adapt and adopt different tools that can be used at various stages of the program cycle. Utilizing the I’m Here Approach not only helps to improve programming for adolescents, it also builds the capacity of program staff to identify, reach, and engage adolescents in your community.

Typically, the Women’s Refugee Commission (WRC) has engaged with a local implementing partner and provided on-the-ground technical support for training, data analysis, and design of adapted programming models. However, with an eye toward more widespread implementation of the approach, this Playbook was designed to provide greater accessibility of the trainings and tools, with the goal of providing remote technical support to humanitarian actors.

How does the I’m Here Approach work?

  • The I’m Here Approach includes a set of tools used to identify, reach, and engage adolescents in your community.
  • Most of the tools that make up the I’m Here Approach should be adapted to your organization’s existing mobile data-collection software.
  • Typically, WRC has supported implementation of the I’m Here Approach using Magpi, but we recommend using whichever software your field staff are most comfortable using.
  • This Playbook will guide you through each step and corresponding tool of the I’m Here Approach.

Our resources include Magpi, KoBoToolbox, and Ona.

1

Find them

  • Identify
  • Make Visible

Tools

2

Listen to them

  • Hold group meetings
  • Elaborate plans

Tools

3

Design, implement, and evaluate

  • Rally support
  • Engage capacities

Tools

Introduction Background

Introduction

Background

Why was the I’m Here Approach created?

History

  • 2013 WRC set out to identify a series of accessible steps and tools to produce actionable information on inclusive programming for adolescent girls
  • 2014 Pilot programming in South Sudan resulted in the I’m Here Approach
  • 2015-2016 The I’m Here Approach was piloted and refined into a package of tools
  • 2017-2019 Additional tools were created and adapted to include marginalized adolescent boys and to support M&E

I'm Here implementation

Since 2014, I’m Here has been piloted in more than 30 communities across 10 humanitarian settings. WRC provides technical support to implementing partners through training, data analysis, and program design.

Each implementation of the I’m Here Approach has generated new learning, new adaptations, and new field tools. Each implementation has underscored that change is possible — change that almost always starts when practitioners view the actionable information and utter three words: “I didn’t know.” Stemming from this one moment, practitioners can begin to identify for themselves opportunities to improve their response.

INTRODUCTION Why 'I'm Here' Approach

Introduction

Why use the I'm Here Approach?

First, why adolescents?

Adolescence is defined as those ages 10-19. Adolescence is a transitional period of the life course encompassing rapid physical growth and sexual maturation combined with emotional, social, and cognitive development. The world is currently home to 1.2 billion adolescents, nearly 90 percent of whom live in low- and middle-income countries.

Girl holding book

Crises do not impact everyone equally; not everyone has access to the same information, resources, or social networks to navigate a crisis safely. According to real‐time evaluations, one of the populations that is the most marginalized and consistently overlooked by humanitarian actors is adolescents, particularly adolescent girls.

A default, one‐size‐fits‐all reflex persistently bundles adolescent girls’ needs and vulnerabilities with those of younger children or adult women. This status quo approach compromises adolescent girls’ safety and well‐being. In addition, it disproportionately sidelines the most vulnerable girls who are least likely to safely access lifesaving services or targeted programs. Shifting this status quo is necessary for the humanitarian community to better meet the needs of adolescent girls and their families. New field‐tested approaches, tools, and collaborations can help. 

Children drawing

Adolescents account for an increasing proportion of displaced persons and are at a comparative disadvantage both before and after humanitarians arrive to support displaced populations. Flight intensifies these disadvantages. Because of their age and gender, the roles and responsibilities that adolescent girls assume during crises swiftly isolate them, funnel them into adult roles, leave them dependent on others, and make them vulnerable to exploitation, abuse, and violence. Compared to their male peers or to adults, adolescent girls disproportionately lack the information, skills, and capacities to navigate the upheaval that follows displacement. Their limited assets, agency, and mobility restrict girls from accessing lifesaving resources, information, and social networks. Even well‐meaning relatives can isolate girls within their homes, shielding them from real threats, but also from programs that could benefit them.

Adolescent girls’ needs and vulnerabilities vary based not only on the social and gender dynamics that constrict their lives, but also on how humanitarian sectors respond (or do not respond) to their specific needs, risks, and disadvantages. Adolescent girls’ isolation and their gender‐based vulnerabilities have implications for how humanitarian actors set out to achieve their goals and objectives; adolescent girls’ safety and well‐being are not solely the concern of gender advisors, protection officers, or “girl‐focused” organizations. Being more responsive and accountable to adolescent girls from the start of an emergency is everyone’s responsibility. It also strengthens results.

Adolescents are not a homogeneous group

Although we define adolescents as those between the ages of 10 and 19, different adolescents have different needs.

The I’m Here Approach helps us see adolescents not as a homogenous group, but one with diverse and ever‐changing needs and priorities. This approach aims to design programs and services that respond to these needs and priorities, particularly for those adolescents who are traditionally excluded from programming.

Click below to reveal demographic characteristics that may result in different needs.

WHAT FACTORS MIGHT AFFECT AN ADOLESCENT GIRL'S NEEDS AND ACCESS TO SERVICES?

Distance to Services

The distance between where adolescents live and services or program sites is critical. The ability to physically access services is necessary to increasing programmatic reach. Different groups of adolescents likely have different levels of freedom of movement; what is considered “nearby” to services may be very different for a younger adolescent compared to an older adolescent, or for a married adolescent compared to an unmarried adolescent.

Marital Status

In many humanitarian contexts, adolescents face an increased risk of early marriage. Beyond being married or unmarried, adolescents may be engaged, widowed, or divorced. Needs and priorities not only differ by marital status, but may also depend on age, number of children, and decision-making abilities at the household level.

Living with Parent/Guardian?

Unaccompanied adolescents may be at greater risk of violence, including early marriage, and may have very different needs from their peers who live with their parents or guardians. Engaging parents and guardians in programming for adolescents is essential to help ensure acceptability and appropriateness of program activities.

Literacy Level

While educational status is often used as a demographic indicator, literacy level is equally important in designing programs for adolescents. Activities should be adapted according to participants’ comfort with literacy, not just their educational status.

School Status

Crises and displacement often disrupt access to education, and adolescents may be more likely to drop out of school to take on more responsibility in their households. School can serve as an important protective factor for adolescents, and those out of school may be at higher risk of early marriage and unintended pregnancy, while also having fewer opportunities for safe employment. The effect of educational status on adolescent needs and priorities also depends on factors that include literacy level, disability status, and household composition.

Disability Status

Adolescents with disabilities are often overlooked when we are designing programs and services. Further, adolescents with disabilities are not a homogenous group: different abilities require outreach, recruitment, and programming approaches to be tailored in different ways. Meaningfully engaging adolescents with disabilities may also require certain capacity-building activities.

Number of People in Household

Household composition is an important factor in how adolescents are able to access resources and targeted programming. Adolescents living in a household with many young children or older relatives may have more caretaking responsibilities or may have to work to contribute to household income. Siblings and other relatives can also serve as protective factors for adolescents.

Number of Children

In many settings, childbearing begins during the adolescent years. The beginning of their reproductive life dramatically changes the needs of adolescents, especially regarding sexual and reproductive health needs. In many communities, adolescents with children may no longer be considered “adolescents,” and, therefore, may require targeted programming that also considers their childcare responsibilities.

Age

Adolescence is a time of rapid physical, emotional, and social development. Comparing the interests of a 10-year-old to those of a 19-year-old, for example, quickly demonstrates how different programming would be for these two age groups. Yet age is not a universal benchmark of needs and priorities. For example, what a 16-year-old adolescent girl requires depends largely on, among other things, her educational status, marital status, and number of children. Age serves as an important guiding factor, but it must not be the only characteristic considered when designing adolescent programming.

  • Distance to Services
  • Distance to Services

    The distance between where adolescents live and services or program sites is critical. The ability to physically access services is necessary to increasing programmatic reach. Different groups of adolescents likely have different levels of freedom of movement; what is considered “nearby” to services may be very different for a younger adolescent compared to an older adolescent, or for a married adolescent compared to an unmarried adolescent.

  • Marital Status
  • Marital Status

    In many humanitarian contexts, adolescents face an increased risk of early marriage. Beyond being married or unmarried, adolescents may be engaged, widowed, or divorced. Needs and priorities not only differ by marital status, but may also depend on age, number of children, and decision-making abilities at the household level.

  • Living with Parent/Guardian?
  • Living with Parent/Guardian?

    Unaccompanied adolescents may be at greater risk of violence, including early marriage, and may have very different needs from their peers who live with their parents or guardians. Engaging parents and guardians in programming for adolescents is essential to help ensure acceptability and appropriateness of program activities.

  • Literacy Level
  • Literacy Level

    While educational status is often used as a demographic indicator, literacy level is equally important in designing programs for adolescents. Activities should be adapted according to participants’ comfort with literacy, not just their educational status.

  • School Status
  • School Status

    Crises and displacement often disrupt access to education, and adolescents may be more likely to drop out of school to take on more responsibility in their households. School can serve as an important protective factor for adolescents, and those out of school may be at higher risk of early marriage and unintended pregnancy, while also having fewer opportunities for safe employment. The effect of educational status on adolescent needs and priorities also depends on factors that include literacy level, disability status, and household composition.

  • Disability Status
  • Disability Status

    Adolescents with disabilities are often overlooked when we are designing programs and services. Further, adolescents with disabilities are not a homogenous group: different abilities require outreach, recruitment, and programming approaches to be tailored in different ways. Meaningfully engaging adolescents with disabilities may also require certain capacity-building activities.

  • Number of People in Household
  • Number of People in Household

    Household composition is an important factor in how adolescents are able to access resources and targeted programming. Adolescents living in a household with many young children or older relatives may have more caretaking responsibilities or may have to work to contribute to household income. Siblings and other relatives can also serve as protective factors for adolescents.

  • Number of Children
  • Number of Children

    In many settings, childbearing begins during the adolescent years. The beginning of their reproductive life dramatically changes the needs of adolescents, especially regarding sexual and reproductive health needs. In many communities, adolescents with children may no longer be considered “adolescents,” and, therefore, may require targeted programming that also considers their childcare responsibilities.

  • Age
  • Age

    Adolescence is a time of rapid physical, emotional, and social development. Comparing the interests of a 10-year-old to those of a 19-year-old, for example, quickly demonstrates how different programming would be for these two age groups. Yet age is not a universal benchmark of needs and priorities. For example, what a 16-year-old adolescent girl requires depends largely on, among other things, her educational status, marital status, and number of children. Age serves as an important guiding factor, but it must not be the only characteristic considered when designing adolescent programming.

ACTIVITY

What risks do girls in your community face?

Take a moment to write down some risks that girls in your community face, and how crises and displacement exacerbate these risks.

Girls face more risks

Girls face more risks

  • Limited access to resources and services
  •  Less likely to remain in school, compared to boys
  • Increasing responsibility to care for younger siblings and other family members
  • High rates of violence, including physical, emotional, sexual and economic violence
  • Vulnerable to harmful social norms, such as child marriage
  • Risk of early and unintended pregnancy, with an increased risk of maternal morbidity and mortality 

Girls’ access to social spaces shrink dramatically at adolescence

Girls’ access to social spaces shrinks considerably as they age, in both urban and rural contexts. Click through this map to see how access to public spaces changes for adolescent boys and girls in urban and rural KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.

GRADE 5 GIRLS

GRADE 8–9 GIRLS

In Grade 5, females had self-defined community areas equal to or larger in size than those of males.

REFLECTION

Do you notice this in your communities?

How do boys and girls move through their communities as they age? Is there a difference in how 9- or 10-year-old girls can access social space as compared to girls ages 13 or 14?

What about boys?

While the I’m Here Approach was originally designed to target adolescent girls, we cannot ignore the fact that adolescent boys also face challenges and have a need for targeted programming. Expanding the I’m Here Approach to include adolescent boys allows for more holistic programming for adolescents.

What about boys?

Boys are:

  • Burdened by pressures to provide and protect
  • More vulnerable to harmful masculinities, aggressive survival, and violence
  • Pushed into formal and informal armed groups
  • Risk of mental health problems associated with substance abuse
  • Vulnerable to being pushed into risky work

What happens in this setting?

Migrant camp

In times of crisis and displacement, the following can impact the lives of adolescents:

  • Disruption of service provision
  • Breakdown of social and cultural systems
  • Exposure to violence and chaos
  • Disruption of school and friendships
  • Absence of role models
  • Taking on more adult roles and responsibilities
  • Personal traumas, including loss of family members, loss of protection mechanisms 

What services might adolescents need?

  • Formal and informal education
  • Health services, including sexual and reproductive health
  • Livelihoods and skills building
  • Peer networks
  • Gender-based violence (GBV) case management

At the onset of a crisis, taking proactive steps to identify and engage all girls helps ensure that they can access lifesaving services without experiencing violence, abuse, or exploitation. If girls have been consulted and are able to safely access emergency services, humanitarian actors and development practitioners who respond after the acute phase are well positioned to deliver evidence‐based interventions. Actions taken in the early days of a response are an opportunity to support girls’ development and actualize their rights.

How do we reach adolescents with these services?

ACTIVITY

Before we learn about the steps and tools of the I’m Here Approach, take some time to think about your current program approach for adolescents, starting with outreach and recruitment.

How do you currently recruit adolescents to participate in your program or attend services?

CLICK THROUGH THE DIFFERENT OUTREACH METHODS TO SEE HOW CERTAIN GROUPS MAY BE REACHED

Door-to-door outreach

School-based recruitment

Referrals from other services or programs

Text message / social media

Public messaging, such as radio or flyers

  • icon name Younger
  • icon name Older
  • icon name In-School
  • icon name Out-of-School
  • icon name Married
  • icon name Younger
  • icon name Older
  • icon name In-School
  • icon name Out-of-School
  • icon name Married

Now, let’s think of some benefits and limitations of each recruitment strategy

Door-to-door recruitment

Has the potential to reach all adolescents in a community

Can be time-consuming; may only reach those who live close to the program site; recruitment depends on who is home and whether or not they support the adolescent attending a program

School‐based recruitment

Easy to reach a large number of adolescents in a short amount of time

Excludes out‐of‐school adolescents, who may be more likely to be older, married, or living in poverty

Referrals from other services or programs

Helps ensure a holistic approach to adolescent programming

Only reaches those who are already able to access other services or programs

Text messages or social media

Easy to reach a large number of adolescents in a short amount of time; can allow for follow‐up messaging to participants

Excludes those with limited literacy or access to technology; requires existing platforms to contact adolescents

Public messaging

Easy to reach a large number of adolescents in a short amount of time

Provides limited information on programming; may exclude those who are less aware of existing services

Too often, outreach and recruitment strategies limit the adolescents who can come to your programs, reaching only the more privileged who have access to your strategies. The I’m here Approach aims to expose the range of adolescents living in the community that your program serves, and thus demand specific, tailored outreach strategies that would reach them and enable their participation.

WALKTHROUGH The Approach

Let's do a walk through

Let’s review a quick introduction to how this is done. You can then dive into each step of the I’m Here Approach in more detail in the other modules of this playbook.

There are three main pillars of the I’m Here approach:

  1. Find them
  2. Listen to them
  3. Design with them
Walkthrough The Approach

Start by seeing the community from the perspective of adolescents

Taking a step back, we must start by seeing the community from the perspective of adolescents. An adolescent’s community is not merely physical but also social. Here is a depiction of a community through the eyes of an adolescent girl.

Click through the graphic below to explore factors that might expand or limit her access to resources and services.

  • Female relatives
  • Female relatives can be an important protective factor for adolescent girls. How might you ensure that adult women are also aware of services and programs for adolescent girls?

  • Bar/café
  • Adolescent girls may not want to be seen accessing certain services. How might the location of the bar/café affect girls’ comfort in accessing nearby services?

  • Spaces Where Men Hang Out
  • Adolescent girls may feel unsafe spending time near places where people congregate. How might this space’s location affect girls’ safety?

  • Well
  • Adolescent girls may be responsible for fetching water, and may spend time with friends and peers while doing so. Might adolescents face any risks to their safety when accessing water? How might this area be used for outreach and recruitment?

  • School
  • Schools are often considered a safe haven for children and adolescents, but not all adolescents have the opportunity to attend school. What adolescents may be less likely to attend school? How might the school’s location in the community impact attendance?

  • Clinic
  • Adolescents may face stigma if they are seen going to a health clinic, especially if it provides sexual and reproductive health services. Does the clinic have a discreet entrance? Does it have special hours for adolescents and young people?

  • Adolescent-Friendly Space
  • Think about the location of where you provide programming for adolescents. How might its location impact accessibility and attendance?

  • Community Center

Female relatives

Female relatives can be an important protective factor for adolescent girls. How might you ensure that adult women are also aware of services and programs for adolescent girls?

Bar/café

Adolescent girls may not want to be seen accessing certain services. How might the location of the bar/café affect girls’ comfort in accessing nearby services?

Spaces Where Men Hang Out

Adolescent girls may feel unsafe spending time near places where people congregate. How might this space’s location affect girls’ safety?

Well

Adolescent girls may be responsible for fetching water, and may spend time with friends and peers while doing so. Might adolescents face any risks to their safety when accessing water? How might this area be used for outreach and recruitment?

School

Schools are often considered a safe haven for children and adolescents, but not all adolescents have the opportunity to attend school. What adolescents may be less likely to attend school? How might the school’s location in the community impact attendance?

Clinic

Adolescents may face stigma if they are seen going to a health clinic, especially if it provides sexual and reproductive health services. Does the clinic have a discreet entrance? Does it have special hours for adolescents and young people?

Adolescent-Friendly Space

Think about the location of where you provide programming for adolescents. How might its location impact accessibility and attendance?

Community Center

Female relatives

Bar/café

Spaces Where Men Hang Out

Well

School

Clinic

Adolescent-Friendly Space

Community Center

1 Find them

FIND THEM: In everything we do, we must continue to see the community from the perspective of adolescents. The first pillar of the I’m Here Approach, “Find Them,” includes Service Mapping and Adolescent Mapping. These two steps help us understand what resources exist in a community and provide insight on the demographic profile of adolescents in the community. Mapping is crucial in examining who is not being reached by current programs and services and helps us think through immediate actions to better serve adolescents living in the community served by our program.

2 Listen to them

The I’m Here Approach also provides guidance on participatory methodologies aimed at better listening to adolescents when designing programs. Often, needs assessments fail to account for the varied needs of adolescent sub‐groups.

Let us continue with our example. You have recruited your cohort of 100 adolescent girls and plan to use a life skills curriculum developed by your organization, although it has never been used in this community before. You hold several focus group discussions with the girls you have recruited, and many mention that they would appreciate livelihoods training and more information on menstrual hygiene.

The I’m Here Approach provides tools to conduct participatory, targeted focus group discussions, paying attention to the different needs of different sub-groups of adolescents. By listening to adolescents, it becomes immediately clear that there is no one-size-fits-all approach for adolescent programming.

3 Design, implement, and evaluate with them

  • Let’s go back to the end of your programming, when you learned more about what adolescents in your community need. Taking all you learned from the first months of your safe space activities, you embark on the next cycle of programming. You decide to do more targeted outreach for older adolescents, and add several modules on pregnancy and family planning for married adolescent girls.

  • You and your team also decide to build washrooms where girls can wash and dry their reusable pads. At first, you are encouraged by your efforts; now, out of 150 girls you have recruited, close to half are married, and they appear to enjoy getting together with other girls their age. Word‐of‐mouth has resulted in a waitlist for the next cohort, and you are planning on purchasing some sewing machines to respond to girls’ requests for livelihoods training.

  • About one month in, however, you notice fewer and fewer girls coming for the weekly life skills sessions. You can’t be sure, but you believe it’s the married girls who have stopped attending. Some have said that they can no longer come in the afternoon because of household responsibilities.

  • At the end of the intervention, you want to know how your programming is supporting adolescents. In focus group discussions, girls repeat things they have learned, but it isn’t clear if there has been any real impact on girls’ safety and well-being.

  • Monitoring and evaluation are critical components of any program. When implementing targeted programming for adolescents, the I’m Here Approach provides tools to meaningfully involve adolescents in program design, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation. Real-time Monitoring supports program staff to improve retention, and Adolescent Benchmarks provide a framework for evaluating how programming has built adolescents’ strengths and assets.

As you navigate through this Playbook, keep in mind how your current programming finds and listens to adolescents in your community, and how design, monitoring, and evaluation involves adolescents. Remember, the I’m Here Approach is not meant to completely replace your current program approaches, nor is it a one-size-fits-all solution. As the expert , it is up to you to decide which parts of the I’m Here Approach are most useful and applicable to your program setting, and how best to adapt these tools to meaningfully meet the needs of different sub-groups of adolescent girls and boys.

Tools Overview

Tools

Tools Steps of the Approach

Tools

Steps of the Approach

Tool 1 Service-Area Mapping

TOOL 1

Service-Area Mapping

Identify the area, locate existing services, determine whether they are adolescent-friendly

Service-area mapping is used to understand the availability, accessibility, and appropriateness of existing services in the community where you work. It can be used before deciding where to carry out your program, but can also inform outreach activities and referral pathways.

Service-area mapping is done using mobile data collection software.

Service-Area Mapping has 4 Key Steps

  • Identify geographical area you wish to map

    What do adolescents consider to be the physical boundaries of their community? It may seem obvious that the community is a predefined physical area, such as a village or a refugee camp. However, adolescents may have a different idea of what constitutes their community. It is important to consult with adolescents as much as possible to understand what they consider to be the physical area of the community. This can be done in greater detail through participatory focus group activities, which will be described in a later section.

  • Walk the perimeter

    Once you have an idea of the geographical area considered to be the community, you will physically walk (or drive) the perimeter of the community. Using mobile data collection software, you will collect a series of GPS points as you travel the perimeter of the community, and connect these points to create a map.

  • Locate existing services

    Locating existing services, as well as risks or structures that are relevant to adolescents: Once you have the defined physical area, your team will walk (or drive) through the community and use mobile data collection software to pin existing services, such as schools, health centers, safe spaces, and community centers. It is also essential to pin potential risks, such as bars or cafes where men gather, army checkpoints, markets, or busy roads. This will help get a fuller picture of how adolescents navigate their community. Again, more in‐depth participatory activities with adolescents can be done at a later point in the I’m Here Approach. It can be incredibly useful to compare the results of the participatory activities with the service-area map you have created, highlighting how adolescents’ perceptions of their community can be quite different from adults’.

  • Determine whether services are adolescent friendly

    The last step of the service-mapping activity is to determine whether existing services and programs are adolescent friendly. While adolescent friendly can mean many things, it is typically defined as services that are accessible, acceptable, and equitable. Keep reading for more information on determining whether services are adolescent friendly.

What to mark on a map

  • Schools (noting whether they are primary, secondary, religious, or an informal learning centers)
  • Health clinics (noting what types of health services they provide)
  • Food distribution points
  • Distribution points for shelter and other nonperishable items
  • Women and girls’ safe spaces
  • Youth centers
  • Community centers
  • Markets
  • Latrines and washrooms
  • Police stations
  • Busy roads
  • Checkpoints
  • Latrines and washrooms
  • Police stations
  • Markets
  • Bars, restaurants, or other locations where people gather

*It is important to note that services and structures can be both assets and risks*

  • NGO offices
  • Water collection points
  • Entry points to the camp
  • Clusters of houses
  • Steep hills or difficult terrain

The term “adolescent friendly” is traditionally used to describe health services, but it can also be a useful framework for examining other services and structures. At the core, it is asking whether a service is accessible to adolescents, if it is appropriate for their needs and lived realities, and if it reaches adolescents equitably. Providing adolescent-friendly services is just one part of adolescent‐responsive programming that actively seeks to understand the unique needs of different groups and meaningfully engages adolescents in program design, implementation, and M&E.

Starting to reflect on whether services are adolescent friendly during the first stage of the I’m Here Approach is useful to seeing the community through the eyes of adolescents, recognizing the importance of listening to them, and designing programs with them. While the service-mapping exercise challenges us to determine if existing services and programs are “adolescent friendly,” we recognize that this question cannot be fully answered by program staff. Nevertheless, when conducting service mapping, we urge teams to answer the following questions about services and structures.

REFLECTION

Are the services adolescent friendly?

  • Is the service located within walking distance or close proximity to a place where adolescents congregate? 
  • Is the service open during hours that are convenient for adolescents, such as in the evenings or on the weekend? 
  • Are there specific times or spaces set aside for adolescents? 
  • Are drop-in clients welcome without appointments?

Practicalities of service mapping

  • How long does service mapping take? We typically set aside two days for service mapping: one day to conduct the service mapping and one day to review results.
  • Who should conduct the service mapping? Service mapping should be done by those who are familiar with the community and who have a good sense of where services are located. We suggest two to three team members to conduct the service mapping activity)
  • What do we need in order to conduct service mapping? In addition to the above (two days and two to three team members), it is useful to have a mobile phone with internet connectivity, GPS capabilities, and a mobile datacollection software pre‐installed.

Potential challenges and alternatives for service-area mapping

Potential challenges and alternatives for service-area mapping

  • What if the area is not accessible? It may be that your team is not able to access the physical area, due to restrictions on movement, safety concerns, or physical barriers. An alternative is to use Google Maps, draw the boundaries of the community, mark where key services are with pushpins.
  • What if we do not have mobile datacollection software with GPS capabilities? While we suggest doing service mapping using mobile data collection, it is possible to do by hand. This would require drawing the physical boundaries of the community and physically marking the key services on the map.
  • What if we do not have time to determine whether all the services are adolescent friendly? That’s okay. Determining whether services are adolescent friendly can be time consuming and also requires an understanding of how to evaluate services. The purpose of assessing whether services are adolescent friendly is to start to think about how existing services and programs do or do not respond to the needs of adolescents. You will have more time throughout the I’m Here Approach to further examine what constitutes being “adolescent friendly” in a given community, and whether services and programs are considered accessible, appropriate, and equitable by adolescents themselves.

Other considerations when preparing for service-area mapping

Have you…

  • identified a community?
  • spoken with stakeholders to get any necessary permissions or support?
  • considered if you can walk around the area or if you need a car? OR do you need to do it via Google Maps?
  • considered other potential security issues?
  • created a list of services and sites to include in your mapping? Do you havealistofresources/servicestofind?
  • set your parameters of the service area, while including any services that might be nearby (even if they fall outside the parameters)?
Activity

Using the service-area mapping form

Instructions

  • Download form in Word or Excel format
  • Ensure questions and response choices are applicable to your context
  • Translate questions as necessary
  • Upload questions to mobile data-collection software
  • Test mobile instrument to ensure it is functional

Reflection on service-area map

After conducting the service-mapping activity, it is helpful to regroup with your team and reflect on the service map. When examining the service-area map, think through the following questions:

  • How does distribution of services compare to the areas where people live?
  • When you think of walkable community for girls, what is the distribution of services like?
  • What are some of the major risks or barriers adolescents face in accessing services? How might these risks or barriers differ across sub-groups of adolescents?
  • What were some surprises when conducting the service-mapping?
  • How does the service map differ from what you knew?
  • How did you determine whether services were adolescent friendly? What additional information do we need to better understand how services are responding to the needs of adolescents?

Example of service-area mapping

This is a program catchment area in Haret El Tanak, Lebanon.

Next
Prev

Location of key partner impacts program design.

Next
Prev

Plan to host some activities at an NGO closer to the girls (more well known by caregivers).

Next
Prev

Only one clinic?

Start Over
TOOL 2 Adolescent Mapping

TOOL 2

Adolescent Mapping

Once we have an idea of the community and available services, we will want to know more about the adolescents living in this community. Adolescent mapping allows us to see the demographic characteristics of adolescents living in a program catchment area and gives us an idea of which adolescents in a community are particularly marginalized. Adolescent mapping collects data through a short set of questions, administered to the female in the household who knows the most about children in the household.

Girl Roster™

Often we look at girls in a community like this.

Whereas in reality, girls are in extremely different life situations.  Older girls have different needs from younger girls. Some girls are in school; some aren’t. Some have children, and some don’t.

The Girl Roster™ is a tool developed by the Population Council to translate subjective understandings of adolescent girls and their unique situations into an actionable plan to meaningfully improve their lives. It is a short household survey that asks very basic questions about the adolescent girls: age; education status; marital status; if they have children of their own; and if they’re living with parents. Rather than using objective words such as “vulnerable,” this tool categorizes girls as “on‐track” or “off‐track”—meaning they are out of school or in the wrong grade for her age, they are married or mothers before age 18, or they do not have parental sponsorship.

We collect data on ALL the girls in a target community, rather than a sample. Our goal is to make sure we don’t miss the girls who are often overlooked and understand the overlapping vulnerabilities in a given community. The tool is intended to capture information on all girls, including those who might otherwise be overlooked. This allows practitioners to visualize the different and overlapping forms of exclusion that may be present in a community.

Read more about the Girl Roster™.

From Girl Roster™ to adolescent mapping

  • The Girl Roster™ serves as the foundation for adolescent mapping. In collaboration with the Population Council, WRC has supported adaptations of the survey tools for administration in humanitarian settings.
  • Questions from the Girl Roster™ survey were also adapted for adolescent boys and young men, with input and guidance from ProMundo.
  • Recognizing the additional barriers that adolescents with disabilities may experience, the adolescent mapping tools also collect information on disability using the Washington Short Set of Disability Questions.

What information does adolescent mapping collect?

  • Adolescent mapping is administered using mobile data collection software.
  • A short survey is administered to the female head of household, or the person in the household who knows the most about household members. The survey takes approximately 7 to 10 minutes per household.
  • Information is collected about each person in the household younger than 25 years old. While we are mainly interested in the demographic profile of adolescents, collecting data on all children and young people provides additional insights into how adolescents transition from childhood to adulthood.

Adolescent mapping collects information on key demographic variables:

  • Household composition

    How many people live in the household? For each person in the household under 25: Does his/her mother or father live here? Does anyone in the household have a disability?

  • Education status

    For each person in the household under 25: Has he/she ever gone to school? Is he/she currently attending school? What is the highest level of education he/she has completed?

  • Marital status

    For each person in the household under 25: What is his/her marital status?

  • Children

    For each person in the household under 25: Does he/she have any children? How many children?

  • Disability

    For each person in the household under 25: Does he/she have any difficulty with seeing, hearing, walking, speaking/understanding, or self‐care?

With the data, we can see how vulnerabilities and capacities overlap, urging program staff to go beyond viewing adolescents as a homogeneous group. Creating this vulnerability‐capacity profile of adolescents in your community is a necessary step for program outreach, recruitment, and design.

The Girl Roster™ and Boy Matrix provide actionable information to identify beneficiaries in your program catchment area. This information should be used to design programming, recruit participants, conduct targeted focus group discussions, and set program goals and objectives. Adolescent mapping should be done in conjunction with the other tools of the I’m Here Approach.

Adolescent mapping steps

  • Select area to be mapped and estimate the number of surveyors and days needed

    • The first step is to select the program catchment area that you wish to map. Remember, adolescent mapping is a programming tool and is not meant to collect representative data.
    • Every household in the area you select will be surveyed. This requires having an idea of the number of households in a given area so you can accurately estimate the amount of time and the number of surveyors needed to complete the adolescent mapping.
    • Click here for a tool to estimate the number of days and surveyors needed.
  • Ensure adolescent mapping tool is contextualized and translated

    • The adolescent mapping tool includes questions on a set of demographic characteristics that should always be measured. However, it might be required to adapt the tool to your setting. For example, for the question about schooling, you may need to change the response options to be in line with local education.
    • You may wish to add one to two questions if there are key demographic variables that are relevant in your community that are not included in the adolescent mapping tool. For example, if registration status as a refugee is a critical determinant for accessing services, you may wish to ask the household if they have a ration card.
    • Translate the tool into the local language of administration. Make sure the questions are understood by the entire survey team.
  • Upload tools in mobile data-collection software

    • The adolescent mapping tool can be administered using any mobile data collection software. This will require a phone with internet connectivity.
    • Data can be collected offline but will need to be uploaded for analysis.
  • Recruit and train data collection team

    • We recommend a data collection team of 10-15 people. The team should be half male and half female and will work in pairs to ensure that a surveyor of the same gender interviews the head of household. Each pair will have one mobile phone for data collection.
    • The survey team should be familiar with the local context; ideally, they are from the community being mapped and must speak the local language.
    • Surveyors should be experienced collecting data using a mobile platform.
    • Training can take one to two days depending on the team’s experience collecting data. Activities for the training are found in subsequent slides in this section.
  • Data collection

    • Data collection can typically be completed in two to three days, depending on the number of households and surveyors.
  • Data analysis

    • Adolescent mapping results in two main outputs: The Girl Roster™ and the Boy Matrix. Stored in an online platform, these provide easy‐to‐interpret information on various segments of the adolescent population.
    • We recommend engaging WRC for assistance in data analysis. The aim of adolescent mapping is to provide actionable information and requires looking at the data in specific ways. Please contact us for more information on the Girl Roster™ and the Boy Matrix.
  • Utilizing information to identify beneficiaries

    Specifically, you can identify program beneficiaries in order to:

    • Establish what on‐track and off‐track means in your setting: At what age do most girls stop attending school? Are girls more likely than boys to have access to targeted adolescent programming? Are married adolescents less likely to attend programming?
    • Define your program’s target segments: What groups of adolescents have distinct differences in your community? What groups have less access to services and programming than others?
    • Understand which groups are being reached or not with current programming: How do the demographics of adolescents in your community compare to the demographics of your program participants? What groups are being excluded and what might the reasons be?
    • Set desired coverage level to achieve saturation within the program community: What are your target recruitment and enrolment rates? Will you have different targets for different groups of adolescents?
    • Determine segment‐specific recruitment strategies for adolescents: Now that you understand which groups are not being reached and the desired coverage level, consider how should your recruitment strategies be adjusted? How might current recruitment strategies reinforce exclusion of certain groups? What alternative recruitment strategies can be adopted for hard‐to‐reach groups?

Linking adolescent mapping to other I’m Here tools

In conjunction with community mapping, you can:

  • Learn where certain adolescent groups cluster and where they live in relation to community resources
  • Note meaningful differences between program communities and communities who are not accessing programs
  • Identify appropriate communities and venues for groups of adolescents to meet with their segments

In conjunction with targeted group discussions, you can:

  • Plan which groups you should consult with and how groups should be organized
  • Learn more about specific risks and assets that were identified through adolescent mapping

In conjunction with the Asset-Building Exercise, you can:

  • Identify segment‐specific content based on the needs of different groups of adolescents
  • Plan what “core” and “desirable” assets you will build for each group of adolescents

In conjunction with the Real-Time Monitoring, you can:

  • Plan which benchmarks you would like to achieve through your programming, and decide how benchmarks may differ for different groups of adolescents
ACTIVITY

Assumption crosscheck

The assumption crosscheck activity is an extremely useful step prior to adolescent mapping. It highlights how our beliefs about adolescents in our community may be skewed based on which groups programming reaches. For example, you may assume the majority of adolescents in your community are in school, when in reality, there is a significant portion of adolescents who are out of school, but these adolescents are not being reached with your programming.

Assumption Crosscheck Activity

  • Have program staff complete a table like this with their estimates of what percentage of adolescents fit in each category. The categories can be adjusted based on your context and can be filled out separately for girls and boys.

  • After completing the adolescent mapping, produce tables that match those filled out during the assumption crosscheck activity.

  • Discuss differences between the program staff’s assumptions and reality. What were the most common assumptions that we made about adolescents in our community? Why might we have made these assumptions? How might our current outreach and recruitment strategies reinforce our assumptions? How might our program activities reinforce our assumptions?

  • Contact WRC for additional information and support in conducting the assumption crosscheck activity.

Another example of an assumption crosscheck table.

An example of an assumption crosscheck table comparing boys and girls.

Additional tips when conducting the adolescent mapping

  • Remain respectful and polite but objective
  • Ask to speak with the female head of household first
  • Come back two times before giving up on empty homes
  • Manage concerns and expectations
  • Obtain consent
  • Clarify translated meanings but avoid paraphrasing
  • Thank them

 

What if…

  • A child opens the door?
  • No adult is home?
  • No one answers the door?
  • A man answers the door?
  • A woman answers the door?
  • A woman answers the door and then looks nervous and uncomfortable speaking with you?
  • More than one family lives in the home?
  • The adult invites you inside the home?
  • You sense hesitation to provide contact information?
  • A young, unaccompanied minor answers and say, “I speak for the household.”
  • A young women answers, says she speaks on behalf of the house. When you collected ages, she report the oldest adult is 17. It’s her. She’s married, with a son.
  • Other scenarios?

We suggest using these scenarios to role play with surveyors during training.

Additional resources for adolescent mapping:

Tool 3 Participatory Activities

Tool 3

Participatory Activities

Now that we know more about the adolescents in your community and we’ve thought about what it might be like to be one of them, it’s time to hear their perspectives.

There are a range of participatory activities that you can use to conduct targeted group discussions. The key is to ensure that different sub-groups of adolescents are consulted, particularly those you have identified as the most marginalized in your community. This module will take you through some of these activities.

Participatory Ranking Methodology (PRM)

  • PRM is a mixed-methods approach that can be used to rapidly assess a population’s needs
  • A facilitator sets up the exercise but has limited involvement
  • He/she asks participants to list and rank their needs and priorities, using physical objects
  • PRM provides rich, contextualized data that can be counted, ranked, and compared across or within groups.

Download the resource document to read more about PRM

Participatory Ranking Methodology

  • Decide on a framing question and gather supplies

    • The PRM exercise begins with a simple framing question. One of the following usually works well:
      • What are the greatest needs for girls/boys like you in this community?
      • What are the biggest concerns for girls/boys like you in this community?
    • Gather a variety of everyday objects to use in the PRM activity (e.g., pencil, marker, piece of paper, stuffed animal or toy, sunglasses, book, piece of cloth, stick).
  • Gather a group of participants

    • The PRM exercise works best with six to eight participants.
    • Create groups according to age, gender, and other important characteristics (e.g., married or not, in school or out of school).
    • Obtain informed consent and remind participants about confidentiality.
    • Inform participants that this exercise will take around 30 minutes.
    • Conduct the PRM activity in a location with sufficient auditory and visual privacy.
  • Listing

    • Pose the framing question and have participants list their needs and concerns.
    • Write down responses in the order in which they are mentioned.
    • Once the list is complete, read back the responses to make sure you captured everything.
    • You may have to summarize responses into a concise word or phrase. For example, if a girl describes in detail how she has trouble finding a washroom that has privacy, you may list “washroom privacy.”
    • Similarly, make sure that each need or concern is distinct and understood by all participants. For the example above, you want to make sure the concern is related to washroom privacy, and not to a low number of washrooms in the community.
  • Assigning physical objects

    • Tell the participants that they will now select a physical object to represent each of the needs or concerns that they listed.
    • Spread out the physical objects you have brought for the activity. Participants can also add to the pile of objects with items as they wish.
    • Read out each need/concern from your list and ask participants to agree on an item to represent each need/concern, writing down which item represents each need/concern.
    • Once participants have assigned a physical object to each need or concern, make sure they remember what each represents. Hold up each physical object one by one and ask participants to repeat what need/concern it represents. Refer to your list to remind them, as necessary.
  • Ranking

    • Explain to the participants that they will now work together to rank the needs and concerns in order of importance, using the physical objects.
    • Instruct participants to place the item that is the greatest or most important need or concern at one end of a line, followed by the second most important, the third most important, and so on until they have placed the item that is the LEAST important.
    • While disagreements among participants are fine, they should understand that the ranking should be done collaboratively and not by one of two members of the group.
    • Once the line is complete, ask the participants if they wish to make any changes to the order.
    • List the items in order from greatest to least need/concern.
  • Discussion

    • PRM can serve as an entry point for further discussion about adolescents’ needs and priorities. You can probe for further discussion by asking:
      • Who do adolescents typically talk to about the needs/concerns they have mentioned?
      • What kind of services would help address these needs/concerns?
      • Are there any needs/concerns that might be more important for different types of adolescents (e.g., needs/concerns that may be more important as a girl gets older).

Safety mapping/community mapping

Safety mapping/Community mapping is another participatory tool that can be used to identify adolescents’ needs and priorities. It can also be incredibly useful to compare the findings from the service mapping to those from community mapping to better understand how adolescents navigate their communities. You may be surprised at how differently adolescents view availability and accessibility of services.

Community Mapping

  • Introducing the activity

    • Gather 10-12 adolescents with similar background characteristics (age, gender, marital status, etc.)
    • Explain to participants that they will be drawing a map of their community in order to identify places where they do and do not go, and those that are safe and unsafe. Inform participants that this activity will help to design programming for adolescents in their community and will inform you and your team how best to refer adolescents to other programs services.
    • Divide participants into smaller groups of 3-4. Instruct them to begin by thinking of a central reference point, such as a main road, marketplace, or the group meeting place.
    • If the participants are having a hard time deciding on a central reference point, have them brainstorm a number of possibilities and write them on the flip chart.
  • Draw the maps

    • Ask each small group to start at the central reference point and then begin drawing all of the major places they know (e.g., schools, religious buildings, markets, bars, shops, clinics, bus stops, railroad tracks, roads, recreational areas, police stations).
    • Circulate around to each group and encourage them to discuss other places they know, and ask them to draw these on their maps.
    • Give the groups 10-15 minutes to finish drawing their maps.
  • Identify places in the community where adolescents visit

    • Once all small groups are finished drawing their maps, tell them they are now going to label their maps. Ask them to draw:
      • A heart next to places where they spend the most time;
      • A triangle next to places where they spend some time;
      • A square next to places they rarely go; and
      • An X next to places they never go.
    • To assist the participants, draw the shapes and their meaning on a chalkboard or flip chart so they remain visible during the mapping exercise.
  • Exploring unsafe places

    • To assist the girls in identifying and discussing the places in their communities that may be unsafe, ask them to draw a circle around the places they feel are unsafe.
    • Then instruct them to rank each of the unsafe spaces by writing a number 1 through 5 next to each circle, where 1 is unsafe and 5 is extremely unsafe. If a space is safe, they can leave it marked with only the shapes from Step 3.
      • If participants are unable to write numbers, you can choose additional shapes or colors in place of numbers.
  • Discussion

    • Initiate a discussion about the places in the community where adolescents cannot go and explore the reasons why.
    • Use the following probes to stimulate discussion on each location participants have placed an ‘X’ (i.e. they do not go there):
      • Why do they not go there?
      • Is the location unsafe?
      • Do their parents or guardians forbid them from going there?
      • Is the location too far from home?
      • Do they have to go through an unsafe area to get there?

Additional tips for targeted group discussions

Preparation

  • Arrange groups based on age (10-12, 13-15, 16-17), school status, marital status, and other relevant groups relevant to your program context.
  • Ensure group discussions are held in a private space that allows for confidentiality.
  • Assign female facilitators and notetakers for girl groups, and male facilitators and notetakers for boy groups.
  • Ensure facilitators have experience in protection/GBV.
  • Identify informal/formal protection contacts for referrals.
  • Obtain consent/assent as needed from parents and adolescents

Obtain informed consent through the following process:

  • Introduce yourself and your organization.
  • Be respectful, professional, and friendly.
  • Make the process as private as possible.
  • Introduce the program if it already exists, as well as the purpose of your visit.
  • Let participants know they can stop at any time.
  • Explain there are not direct benefits to participating and that it’s voluntary.
  • Mention the length of the discussion.
  • Obtain consent before beginning questions.
  • Clarify any expectations.

Handling disclosures

  • Have designated informal and/or formal protection contact information and make it available to all participants.
  • If someone brings up an experience of violence, let them finish their thought and then say, “I know this must have been difficult to share, thank you. I think this is really important to continue discussing, so let us talk in private after this session.”
  • If someone starts crying and is having trouble speaking, offer them water/snacks and ask if they’d like to take a break or speak in private.
  • DO offer information about all available services and a direct referral contact. Ask how you can support. Understand the principles of Psychological First Aid (PFA).
  • DO NOT offer them advice, make false promises, raise expectations, or ask them about whether they have reported the incident.
  • Ensure that any referrals or support are in line with your organization’s procedures for disclosure.

Psychological first aid (PFA) principles

Inter-Agency Standing Committee. 2015. “Guidelines for integrating Gender-Based Violence Interventions in Humanitarian Action: Reducing risk, promoting resilience and aiding recovery.”

  • Understand the context in which you work (conflict, natural disaster, vulnerable groups, etc.)
  • Understand the available services and supports
  • Understand safety and security concerns
  • Check for safety
  • Check for people with obvious urgent basic needs
  • Check for people with serious distress reactions
  • Approach people who may need support
  • Listen to people and help them to feel calm
  • Do not ask details about GBV
  • Ask about people’s needs and concerns

Key messages

  • Survivors needs to feel that their request has been seen, heard, and supported
  • Believe survivors
  • Ask for their consent to inform them of their options
  • This may be an “opposite reaction” to how we are “trained” in all other aspects of protection

People who need more than PFA alone

Some people will need more than PFA alone. Know your limits and ask help from others who can provide medical or other lifesaving assistance. Those who need more support include:

  1. People with serious, life‐threatening injuries who require emergency medical care
  2. People who are so upset that they cannot care for themselves or their children
  3. People who may hurt themselves
  4. People who may hurt others

Source: World Health Organization. 2011. War Trauma Foundation and World Vision International. Psychological First Aid: Guide for Field Workers. WHO: Geneva.

Facilitation

  • Try to encourage everyone to participate, but never force a participant to talk.
  • Remind participants that you are asking about experiences of adolescents like them (their age, their gender) in their community, not personal experiences. Always try to frame questions to be about adolescents in general, and avoid using “you”.
  • Check in continuously on whether participants agree that you have heard and understood them correctly.
  • Rephrase questions to solicit more responses, and probe with questions like “Can you tell me more about that?” or “Can you give an example?”
  • If one participant is dominating the discussions, tell them “That’s great that you know so much about this topic. Let’s hear what others in the group have to think.”
  • Confirm participants’ suggestions reflect the experiences of other adolescents like themselves.

Notetaking

  • Document quotes, rather than paraphrasing.
  • Note disagreements or other observations regarding dynamics, such as body language.
  • If possible, you may wish to have two facilitators: one to lead discussions, and another to take notes.
  • You may choose to audio record discussions, but make sure this is part of the informed consent process. Any audio recording should be destroyed after transcription.
Tool 4 Asset-Building Exercises

Tool 4

Asset-Building Exercises

First, what are assets?

An asset is a person’s own store of value, which shapes what they can do or be. Assets can be categorized as:

Factors that help protect adolescents’ lives and the lives of those around them

The networks that adolescents can access to help take advantage of opportunities

Specific skills that help girls plan for the future

Competencies often nurtured in school (and ideally beyond)

Assets can include resources, knowledge, and skills that girls can draw upon to shape their lives and contend with emergencies on their own and others’ behalf.

Adolescents working together

Asset-building is an approach rooted in an understanding that adolescents’ chances of making a safe and healthy transition to adulthood improve when they have the support they need to build knowledge, skills, and relationships, and have or can access critical resources to make healthy choices as they get older.

Asset-building reflects an inherently multi-sectoral approach to girls’ health and well-being. Yet, while stand-alone programs may not build all assets, they can help cultivate specific assets as age-bound benchmarks for measuring program success that are developmentally and socially appropriate.

Asset Exercise

  • What is the Asset Exercise?

    The Population Council’s 2015 Building Assets Toolkit supports an interactive exercise to identify program activities that build protective assets.

    The Asset Exercise invites participants to consider what concrete information, skills, relationships, and other assets girls should have, and by what age, in order to make a safe transition to adulthood. Different groups may produce different visions for what assets girls need, and when. The Asset Exercise can help to identify both common and competing views from girls, caregivers, or program staff, which can help inform decisions about program content.

    Assets can serve either as content for tailored, community-based girls’ programming or as indicators of program quality.

    While designed to inform adolescent girl programming, the Asset Exercise can be adapted to inform programs that also work with boys.

  • The Asset Exercise is intended to:

    • provoke critical thinking among practitioners about program goals, content, and potential links with services or programming across sectors;
    • operationalize the idea that girls’ abilities to make and act on healthy choices rests in part on what assets they control and can mobilize when needed;
    • engage girls, practitioners and community stakeholders in the same process; and
    • inform decision-making about concrete program components, such as priority age “segments” for programming, age-appropriate content, and potential indicators of programs’ success.
  • The current version of the Building Asset Toolkit includes:

    • eight age cards ranging from age 6 to age 20
    • a deck of 100 asset cards, and a 70-card version is available for humanitarian settings
    • the background, or “origin story” for each card;
    • a list of resources on key learning from girl-only programming; and
    • a worksheet that guides practitioners from the identification of key assets to their use in program design or evaluation.

    View the Building Assets Toolkit.

How has the Asset Exercise been adapted for humanitarian settings?

The Population Council and WRC conducted in-depth interviews with 12 practitioners who have used the Asset Exercise in more than 10 countries, and drew on direct observations and activity reports from field implementations.

The aim of this review was to document how and with whom the exercise is currently being used and, based on these findings, to propose refinements to the Asset Exercise for humanitarian contexts.

Based on findings from the consultations, the Asset Exercise was adapted to:

  • prioritize assets according to their relevance across settings and emergency response stages;
  • simplify concepts and reduce the number of cards; and
  • categorize assets according to domains (e.g., health, social, economic).

Read more about how the Asset Exercise was adapted for humanitarian settings.

Steps for Conducting the Asset Exercise

  • Gather a group of eight to 10 participants (e.g., adolescents, program staff, parents/caregivers, or community members.) Groups participants should be from a similar background and be familiar with one another.

  • Lay the eight age cards in order on the floor or tape to a wall.

  • With your group, identify a few assets and invite different participants to model placing the asset card. Participants should place the asset cards directly underneath the age card representing the latest age or stage at which a girl should have that particular asset.

  • Divide participants into smaller groups of three to four and distribute the asset cards evenly. This approach is best used if you have a large group.

  • Invite groups to discuss each asset card and decide where to place it. Remind participants that the card should be placed under the age card that represents the latest age or stage at which a girl should have that particular asset.

  • After the groups place their asset cards under the age cards, look at the results and discuss the following questions as a group:

    • For girls in this community, does this asset typically come at the right age?
    • For girls in this community, does this asset prepare her for risk scenarios?
    • Which assets come earlier or later as a result of conflict and displacement?
    • Are there certain subgroups who achieve these assets either earlier or later? For example, out-of-school adolescents, adolescents with disabilities, adolescents without a parent or caregiver
    • What are the most important or desirable assets (‘core assets’)?
      • For the core assets identified: i. Under the current program arrangements, does the content exist and do mechanisms exist to deliver these assets to these girls? ii. Does your identification of core assets line up with the measures you are using to assess progress?
  • The Asset Exercise can be repeated with different groups of participants. If your organization implements programming for adolescent boys, the exercise can be adapted for this population.

Informing program design, monitoring, and evaluation

The Asset Exercise is a valuable tool for programming. It helps to:

  • identify core assets that your programming should focus on
  • understand how programming should differ for different age groups, or any other subgroup of adolescents (i.e. married, out-of-school, adolescents with disabilities)
  • reveal gaps or areas where adolescents in your community are lagging behind
  • create key benchmarks to be used for monitoring and evaluation. Benchmarks will be introduced in Tool 5 (Real-time monitoring dashboard)
Tool 5 Real-Time Monitoring Dashboard

Tool 5

Real-Time Monitoring Dashboard

The final component of the I’m Here Approach is real-time monitoring. This component was added in recent years with the recognition that, while adolescents are being reached by recruitment efforts, retaining them in programming is a persistent challenge—especially for particular sub‐groups. For example, in many settings we see adolescent girls start to drop out of programming at age 16 or 17 if they get engaged or married, or if they become pregnant. Real-time monitoring also provides information on what other services adolescents are accessing and, importantly, what the impact of programming is.

Real-time monitoring

Real‐time monitoring is designed to support program staff in collecting meaningful data to immediately inform implementation. There are two key components: QR cards to support with monitoring and Benchmarks to support outcome and impact evaluations.

Real-time monitoring consists of quantitative tools to help us answer the following:

  • Who is participating in your program? Who is still not being reached?
  • How does retention differ between different groups of adolescents?
  • What are the key assets of adolescents participating in your program? What are their key vulnerabilities?
  • What other services are program participants accessing?
  • How does access to other services differ between different groups of adolescents?

Real-time monitoring tools

QR Cards

  • Monitors recruitment, retention, and access to other services
  • Allows adolescents to “check in”, either at safe space or other service points
  • Simplifies registration and attendance tracking for improved recruitment and retention

Benchmarks

  • Evaluates changes in assets and allows for comparison of adolescent asset-vulnerability profiles

QR cards

What is a QR Code?

  • Short for “quick response,” QR codes are used to transmit information. Like a barcode, the code can be generated by anyone using a computer and can be read quickly by any mobile device.

Why would I use a QR code card?

  • QR cards can greatly simplify tracking program attendance or utilization of other programs or services. They provide real-time data that can be used to inform decision making.
QR code

QR code benefits

  • Streamlines registration and attendance tracking
  • Encourages adolescents to attend programming and other services
  • Ability to merge monitoring and evaluation data (i.e. linking information from QR codes with information collected from Adolescent Benchmarks)

QR challenges and considerations

  • Ensuring that QR cards are scanned every time a participant comes to your program can be challenging. It is essential to train program staff and make sure that more than one person has the ability to scan the QR cards.
  • Make sure there is a system in place should a participant lose their QR card or forget to bring it with them QR cards can be linked to registration data in order to link a new QR card to a lost one.
  • QR cards might be tied to basic demographic information, but otherwise there is no guarantee that someone is using the QR card that was assigned to them. Make sure participants understand that there are no additional benefits to using a QR card, and that the card should only be used by whomever it is assigned to.
  • Before adopting QR cards, make sure that there are no security risks for adolescents to have and carry a QR card.
  • Ensure that parents/caregivers and other influential community members are aware of the function of the QR card. If there is any potential risk for adolescents, you may wish to keep the QR cards at the program site for girls to use when they are at the program site.

Steps for QR card utilization

  • Carry out assessments

    Carry out assessments to understand any potential challenges, barriers or risks of utilizing QR cards in your community

    • Talk to adolescents: Are they familiar with QR cards? Do they use them for any other program or service? Would they feel comfortable carrying around a card? How would they keep track of their card?
    • Talk to parents and caregivers: Are they familiar with QR cards? Would they feel comfortable for their adolescents to carry around a QR card?
    • Talk to other service providers: Are QR cards used by any other program or service? If so, what have been the successes and challenges? If not, why not? Have they identified any risks that you may not have thought of?
  • Think through the logistics

    Think through the logistics of QR card utilization

    • How will you print and laminate the cards?
    • How will you keep track of QR cards? What will you do if a participant loses their card? How will you ensure that the owner of the card is the only one using it?
    • How will you train program staff on QR card utilization?
    • Who will be responsible for scanning QR cards?
    • Do you want to track access to any other services or programs? If so, how will you coordinate QR card scans?
  • Set up QR card registration questionnaire

    • QR cards will be linked to demographic information, similar to information collected during adolescent mapping.
    • Utilize this form [link to form] as a starting point for QR card registration.
    • Upload the form to your mobile data collection platform.
  • Create, print, and laminate QR cards

    • QR cards can be created for free using this QR code generator.
    • To simplify the process, open an excel file. Create a list of numbers. Copy/paste list of number into this QR code generator.
    • Copy/paste the QR codes generated into a word document. Space out the QR codes on the word document. If you wish to add additional information to the card – such as emergency contact information – you may do so now.
    • Print the word document – normal paper is fine – and cut around each QR code in the shape of an ID card.
    • You may wish to let participants draw on or decorate their card before laminating the cards
  • Disseminate QR cards

    • Decide who will get QR cards. You may decide that only program participants will get a QR card, or you may choose to disseminate QR cards to all adolescents in your program catchment area to track who is accessing your programming.
    • Collect demographic data when you provide the QR card, using the QR card registration form. The QR card should be linked to an adolescent’s demographic information, but not to any identifiable personal information such as name or address.

    Link to QR card registration form

  • Scanning QR cards

    • Staff members should be trained in how to scan QR cards. Most mobile data collection software can accommodate QR card scanning.
    • QR cards may be scanned only at your program site, or you may wish to provide other service providers, such as health clinics, with the ability to scan QR cards. This depends on the capacity of other service providers and the level of coordination that exists between your team and others.
  • Making use of the data

    • Use data from QR cards should be used to monitor recruitment, registration, attendance, and retention.
    • Review data on a regular basis to see any changes in attendance and identify what groups of adolescents attend programming more or less.
    • Considering linking data to the adolescent benchmarks to see how attendance affects program outcomes.

    The I’m Here adolescent benchmarks were developed to offer program staff ways to meaningfully measure outcomes and impact of programming, and to identify how adolescents may benefit differently from programming.

Adolescent benchmarks

The adolescent benchmarks were designed to evaluate changes in adolescents’ assets as a result from programming.

The benchmarks were adapted from existing program evaluation tools, with input from multiple stakeholders working with adolescents in humanitarian settings.

The benchmarks are designed to be adapted to different contexts and should be linked to program objectives.

Realms of assets

Like the Asset Exercise, the benchmarks are organized by realms of assets: human/health, social, economic, and cognitive. Two additional realms have been added. The first is physical documents/identification, to assess whether adolescents have what is necessary to obtain citizenship or refugee status, or to qualify for employment or certain programming for displaced populations. The second realm is gender norms and attitudes, geared to assess adolescents’ attitudes toward gender equality.

Benchmark questionnaires may also ask participants about certain demographic information, such as household composition, marital status, or disability status.

Benchmark questionnaire

  • Select which benchmarks you wish to include

    • The full Benchmark questionnaire has 100 items. While it may be possible to administer the full questionnaire, program teams should make sure that they are not collecting data for the sake of collecting data.
    • Ideally, your survey should include no more than 60 benchmarks and include benchmarks from all realms.
    • Make sure whatever Benchmarks you include are applicable in your program context, and are clearly linked to your program objectives.
    • Benchmarks should be linked with the assets identified in the asset exercise.
  • Translate the benchmark survey

    • Translations should be validated to ensure that benchmarks are well understood by adolescents
  • Upload benchmark survey into mobile data collection platform

    • Benchmark surveys should be administered using a mobile data collection software, such as Magpi, Kobo, or Ona.
    • Uploading the survey into the mobile data collection platform should be done by someone who has experience programming such tools.
    • Make sure the survey is coded correctly for skip patterns and response options.
    • Pilot the survey with three to four adolescents to see how long administration of the tool will take.
  • Hire and train surveyors

    • Surveyors should have experience with quantitative data collection, ideally using a mobile device.
    • Surveyors should be fluent in the local language, and ideally have some experience collecting sensitive information from adolescents or young people.
    • We recommend a three-day training with surveyors. Day one of the training should be dedicated to reviewing the benchmarks one-by-one. Small adjustments to language and phrasing can be made at this time. The first day of training should also involve reviewing ethics of research and informed consent.
    • Days two and three of the training should be used for practice and role play until all surveyors are comfortable administering the full set of benchmarks.
  • Administer the survey at baseline

    • If benchmarks are being used as an evaluation tool, they should be administered before any program activities begin.
    • While it is ideal for all participants to take the benchmark survey, no participant should be forced to do so.
    • Informed consent and assent should be obtained prior to administration of the benchmarks.
    • You may choose to collect identifiable information, such as participant ID, as part of the benchmarks in order to track individual changes from baseline to endline.  This can also be done by scanning participant QR cards – which are linked to their demographic information and participant ID – at the start of the benchmark survey.
  • Administer the survey at endline

    • The same exact set of benchmarks should be administered at endline. Ideally, endline data collection should take place 2-4 weeks after completion of the intervention.
    • Additional questions regarding program participation can be added to the endline survey. For example, you may wish to know how often participants attended sessions, or how many they missed. You can also include some questions to assess the quality of the intervention, and how participants hope to utilize what they learned.
  • Data analysis

    • Data analysis can be as simple or complex as you wish. Simple data analysis looks at overall changes between baseline and endline. For example, comparing what percentage of adolescents know about puberty changes at the start of intervention to the end of the intervention. This will show where the intervention was successful in building adolescents’ protective assets.
    • More complex analyses would look at how changes in assets differ for different sub-groups of adolescents.  For example, do older adolescent girls benefit more from programming than younger ones? Do adolescent boys’ assets change less than adolescent girls? This kind of analysis requires support from someone who is experienced with advanced statistical analysis using statistical analysis software such as STATA, SPSS, or SAS.
  • Utilizing data for programming

    • What is perhaps most important is how data will be used for future programming.   A simple way to do this is to answer the following questions with your team:
      • Which assets showed the most “improvement” from baseline to endline? What does this say about your program? Why do you think it succeeded in building these assets? How can you continue to build these assets through your future programming?
      • Which assets showed little or no change from baseline to endline? Were these topics covered in your intervention? If so, why do you think your program failed to build these assets? What else is needed to do so? If your intervention did not cover these topics, should you cover them in the future? Are they important and relevant for adolescents in your community?
      • Did any assets “worsen” from baseline to endline? Why might this be?
      • Did any sub-groups of adolescents experience greater improvements in their assets than others? Why might this be? What changes could be made to support sub-groups of adolescents who experienced less improvements in their assets?
      • What changes cannot be captured using quantitative data? Or, what changes do you want to understand in more-depth using qualitative methodologies?
Bringing It All Together Bringing It All Together

Bringing It All Together

Thank you for taking the time to explore our I’m Here Playbook! We hope it serves as a useful resource for your organization. Now that you have taken the time to learn about the approach and its various tools, you may be wondering how your organization can use this information and apply it to your context and program.

Bringing It All Together So, What Next?

Bringing It All Together

So, What Next?

The I’m Here Approach has typically been supported through in-person training and on-the-ground support from WRC. WRC will work with an implementing partner to develop a Scope of Work for the I’m Here Approach and work with program staff to create an implementation plan.

The goal of this Playbook is to make the I’m Here Approach and associated tools more accessible and support humanitarian actors to implement the approach without direct field support from WRC.

Make sure you understand why the I'm Here Approach is being implemented

  • The I’m Here Approach is recommended as one possible way to reach more adolescents with essential information that responds to their needs and priorities, with the overall goal of building their protective assets to make healthy transitions to adulthood.
  • Throughout implementation, keep this end goal in mind to guide adaption and adoption of the various tools, analysis of data, and utilization of data to inform program design.
  • You should already have a good idea of why the I’m Here Approach is suitable to your program context, and whether your organization has the capacity to utilize the Approach.

Questions to answer before launching the I'm Here Approach

  • Be mindful of what your organization is doing well to respond to the needs of adolescents. Which sub-groups are being reached, and how have you observed changes in their protective assets? How can you use these successes to reach different sub-groups?
  • What has motivated you to potentially utilize the I’m Here Approach?
  • Where are the major gaps in your current programming for adolescents?  How do you believe the I’m Here Approach will help to fill these gaps?
  • Who will be responsible for overseeing implementation of the I’m Here Approach? Does your organization have sufficient resources (both financial and time)?
  • What are other organizations in your community doing to meet the needs of adolescents? How can you collaborate with them and share learnings and best practices?
  • View a summary of considerations for your organization before implementing the I’m Here Approach.

Creating a concept note

A concept note is a useful way to think through a project and hold your team accountable to certain activities and deliverables. WRC always creates a concept note or scope of work with the organizations we work with to implement the I’m Here Approach.

A concept note should include the following information:

  • Proposed dates of I’m Here implementation
  • Project focal points, their roles and responsibilities, and percentage of time they will be allocating to I’m Here implementation
  • Implementation timeline, covering (broadly):
    • Tool adaptation
    • Training of program team
    • Training of surveyors
    • Service mapping and adolescent mapping activities
    • Analysis of mapping data
    • Participatory group discussions
    • Asset exercise
    • Creation of benchmark tool
    • Outreach and recruitment
    • Program launch
    • Endline data collection
    • Benchmark data analysis
    • Sharing findings with participants and community members
    • Conducting learning sessions with program team and participants to strategize for future program implementation
  • Budget

Learning more about the I'm Here implementation

  • I’m Here has been implemented in over 30 communities affected by crisis or displacement. View reports from select implementation experiences.

Acknowledgements

This Playbook was made possible with funding support from the Office of U.S. Foreign Disaster Assistance. The I’m Here Approach was conceptualized and developed by Omar Robles (then at the Women’s Refugee Commission (WRC)), and further refined through partnerships and piloting by Mercy Corps, Danish Refugee Council (DRC), Population Council, International Organization for Migration (IOM), and others. This playbook was conceptualized and written by Julianne Deitch (WRC), with support from Omar Robles and Anna Myers. It was reviewed by Christine Show (WRC), Dale Buscher (WRC), Diana Quick (WRC), and Sarah Blake (Population Council). Playbook design was led by Radish Lab.