Call for the selection of implementing partner organizations
In the field of Expanding access to quality early childhood education and primary school
Call open until June 30, 2018
01. Background
In 2018, Roma Education Fund (REF) started implementing the project Increased education opportunities for Roma students and Roma youth in Western Balkans and Turkey, funded by EU DG NEAR. The project aims to reduce the gap between Roma and non-Roma in the participation and completion of quality education through gender-sensitive programming, to improve Roma students’ transition between education and employment and to promote durable systemic change and desegregation of education systems in the Western Balkans and Turkey.
The project objectives will be achieved through:
- supporting Roma children in pre-school education and enrolling them into integrated primary schools;
- awarding scholarships to Roma students in secondary and tertiary education;
- supporting transition between education levels and employment;
- building capacities of relevant authorities and their understanding of the specific challenges faced by the Roma community;
- supporting regional networking and exchanging experiences with the aim to contribute to the mainstreaming of Roma in national policies and, where relevant, changes in policies and legislation.
02. Objective of the call
The objective of the financial support is to: improve Roma children’s access to preschool education, facilitate access and enrollment of Roma children into mainstream primary schools and support the academic progress of children enrolled. Moreover, the activities will contribute to strengthening the link between parents and educational institutions.
The objective of the call is to select the partner organizations for the implementation of the early childhood education and primary school activities of the Increased education opportunities for Roma students and Roma youth in Western Balkans and Turkey project.
Particular attention will be paid to ensure that partners are aware of a gender-sensitive approach and to apply it in the project implementation.
3. Description of activities receiving financial support
Since the early childhood activities are closely connected to transition to primary education, REF encourages proposals which cover both the 3.1 and 3.2 priorities, as described below. The activities under the Expanding access to quality primary education (3.2) will be eligible from 2019 with the aim to ensure additional two years of support in primary education for the children enrolling from preschools of the Early childhood education activity (3.1).
3.1 Expanding access of Roma children to quality early childhood education (ECD)
Objectives: The objective of the financial support is to improve Roma children’s access to preschool education and, subsequently, increase their early childhood development skills and school readiness. The target groups are Roma children 0-3 and 3-6. This set of activities will further be focused on increasing parenting skills in early childhood development and care, health and nutrition. Moreover, the activities will contribute to strengthening the link between parents and preschool institutions.
3.1.1. Eligible activities
Activities to be fully or partially covered by the submitted proposals:
- Visibility materials
Preparation of visibility materials (publications, ads, posters, awareness raising materials) for outreach and household visits in local language and/or Romani language, following EU guidelines.
- Outreach and enrollment
– Home visits in selected target localities in each country – aiming to identify the number of children in the households aged 0-3 and 3-6, which can be enrolled to kindergarten, financial situation of the families, status of vaccination and health checks, identity documents, information about requirements for enrolment, assessment of children’s educational development needs, and pre-natal assistance to mothers;
– Assistance to parents in enrolment of children in kindergartens and preschools;
– Regular outreach and communication with parents and institutions – counseling to improve parenting practices, parental preschool involvement, attendance monitoring, emphasize the need for regular medical check-ups and immunizations, arrange vaccination campaigns for the children.
- Developing and updating databases/records
– Database of beneficiaries;
– Database of kindergartens (early childhood development service providers);
– Database of parents in the events and activities;
- Small-scale infrastructure investments where needed to expand access to quality ECD services – refurbishing rooms in line with identified needs;
- Establishment and operating of Toy Libraries and purchase of toys and didactic materials – Toy Libraries are community-based programs for children and their parents and aim to support early childhood education through playing with good quality toys.
– Establishing the Toy Libraries;
– Selection and training of toy librarians
– Encouraging the renting of toys, organization ‘play and stay’ sessions for the families as well as for communities;
– Reaching out of remoted area by the so called ‘mobile’ toy library, and
– Hosting parental events and session.
- Support to children enrolled in kindergartens and development follow-up
– Providing regular/daily support for children attending kindergartens;
– Providing l support for fees and meals for kindergarten children;
– Providing need-based material support and transport of children to kindergartens and preschool facilities;
– Monitoring attendance rates;
– Conducting International Development and Early Learning Assessment (IDELA) – an early childhood development (ECD) assessment tool which enables determining the level of individual development and progress of a child.
- Home-School-Community Liaison
– Involving Roma parents in pre-school activities;
– Organizing Community Motivation Events for awareness raising on good parenting practices
– Build trust between communities and early childhood institutions
– Facilitating professional work with mothers on early childhood development, nutrition, health, etc.
– Improvement of parenting skills and practices of parents, in particular mothers, through informal literacy training and lessons in storytelling to be utilized with their children.
- Enrolment of children to non-segregated primary schools
– Direct facilitation of enrolment of Roma children in their final year of early childhood education into mainstream non-segregated primary education by ensuring that all required documentation is prepared and that administrative criteria for enrolling into integrated primary schools are met.
3.1.2. Time frame for the implementation of projects by partner organizations:
September 2018 – June 2021
Project proposals need to be submitted for this period, however the grants will be signed with the supported entities on a 1-year basis and renewed for every school year during the project period. The renewal of contracts will be subject to successful implementation which will be monitored by REF.
3.1.3. Geographical coverage
Eligible countries: Albania, Kosovo[1], Bosnia and Hercegovina, The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Turkey
The applicant needs to take into consideration during the selection of specific locations that the proposed project activities cannot take place at those locations where there is currently an on-going REF supported project.
3.1.4. Budget:
The annual available country-based budget, which cannot be exceeded, is listed in the below table:
| Countries | Maximum annual budget (Euro/year) |
| The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia | 118,250 |
| Albania | 60,500 |
| Kosovo | 27,500 |
| Bosnia and Herzegovina | 35,750 |
| Turkey | 33,000 |
| Total | 275,000 |
3.1.5.Target group:
Roma children of pre-primary age (0-6) and Roma parents. Distribution of final beneficiaries according to countries are indicated in the below table. REF plans to increase the scale of interventions and number of new activities in countries where it has cultivated strong partnerships and solid implementation capacities, thus the size of target groups might be changed slightly due to this reason.
| Expanding access of Roma children to quality Early Childhood Education | ||
| Countries | Total number of children/ year | Total number of parents/ year |
| The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia | 216 | 216 |
| Albania | 110 | 167 |
| Kosovo | 50 | 50 |
| Bosnia and Herzegovina | 65 | 66 |
| Turkey | 60 | 58 |
| Total | 501 | 557 |
3.2 Expanding access to quality primary school education
Objectives: The objective of this activity is to facilitate access and enrolment of Roma children into mainstream primary schools and on support of the academic progress of children enrolled. Moreover, the activities will contribute to strengthening the link between parents and schools.
3.2.1. Eligible activities:
The supported entities will conduct activities which will encompass the following:
Outreach and enrolment
Home visits in target localities having been identified/selected through the community needs assessment described under Activity 1.4 to raise awareness of Roma parents on the importance of education;
Regular outreach and communication with parents and institutions – mediation between families and primary education institutions;
Providing enrolment assistance to parents with children who completed this project’s ECD program (Activity 2)
Support to Roma parents in making well-informed decisions about school choice, with the aim to prevent them from enrolling their children in segregated, low-quality schools or special schools. The activity will require intense communication with and among schools and parents.
Support to children enrolled in primary school and development follow-up
Providing academic and mentoring support to the children enrolled to first and second grade
Providing regular/daily support for children attending primary schools
Monitoring attendance rates and academic achievements – monitoring of school attendance during project activities, identification of early school leavers, and reintegration of early school leavers. A diagnostic and formative assessment of students and development of student individual learning plans will be envisaged with all information being shared with the pupil’s class teachers.
Providing material support such as, education materials, transportation: etc.
Developing and updating databases – Databases will contain information on schools and beneficiaries of the project and will be regularly updated in order to effectively manage the beneficiary selection process and track students’ academic progress, attendance rates, data about the students’ personal and learning needs
Database of beneficiaries that will attend primary schools
Database of non-segregated primary schools
Home-School-Community Liaison
Organizing Parents/school meetings
Capacitating parents to participate in school councils
Working with volunteers to make the school environment more inclusive for all children – this sub-activity will be optional for the supported entities and will be implemented in line with their abilities to introduce volunteers into activity implementation.
Establishing network of primary schools and sharing of lessons learned – the aim of this activity is to ensure a platform for schools to support each other, share experiences but also to advocate for inclusive education:
3.2.2. Time frame of the project
September 2019 – June 2021
Project proposals need to be submitted for this period, however the grants will be signed with the supported entities on a 1-year basis and renewed for every school year during the project period. The renewal of contracts will be subject to successful implementation which will be monitored by REF.
3.2.3. Geographical coverage
Eligible countries: Albania, Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Turkey, Serbia
The applicant needs to take into consideration during the selection of specific locations that the proposed project activities cannot take place at those locations where there is currently an on-going REF support project.
3.2.4. Budget
The unit cost per children is 5 Euro/child/year including all activity and administration related costs.
The total available annual country-based budget is listed in the table below:
| Countries | Maximum annual budget (Euro/year) |
| The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia | 36,548 |
| Serbia | 24,365 |
| Albania | 14,619 |
| Kosovo | 14,010 |
| Bosnia and Herzegovina | 13,401 |
| Turkey | 17,056 |
| Total | 120,000 |
3.2.5. Target group:
Roma children in the 1st and 2nd grade of primary education, having participated in one year of preschool education under the 3.1. Expanding access of Roma children to quality early childhood education (ECD) activity.
Distribution of final beneficiaries according to countries are indicated in the below table. REF plans to increase the scale of interventions and number of new activities in countries where it has cultivated strong partnerships and solid implementation capacities, thus the size of target groups might be changed slightly due to this reason.
| Expanding access to quality primary school education | |
| Country | Total number of beneficiaries/ year |
| The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia | 100 |
| Serbia | 67 |
| Albania | 40 |
| Kosovo | 38 |
| Bosnia and Hercegovina | 37 |
| Turkey | 47 |
| Total | 328 |
4. Application procedures
Applications should be submitted and received by June 30 at project.rare@romaeducationfund.org. Please include in the subject line the name of the specific call and country, e.g.
Expanding access to quality early childhood education and primary education, Country name
Annexes:
- Application form (link)
- Budget template (link)
- Questions for organizational eligibility assessment (link)
In addition to the above documents the applicant should attach the following documents:
- Annual financial reports for the last three years and audit report, if available;
- Organizational statutes;
- Proof of registration.
For additional general project information and selection criteria, please visit Call for the selection of implementing partner organizations (link).
[1] This designation is without prejudice to positions on status and is in line with UNSCR 1244/99 and the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo declaration of independence
