جمعية عايشة لحماية المرأة والطفل جمعية أهلية غير ربحية مسجلة لدى وزارة الداخلية رقم تسجيل 8136 تهدف لخدمة النساء ضحايا العنف بكافة أشكاله في قطاع غزة.
ترغب جمعية عايشة لحماية المرأة والطفل باستقطاب باحث رئيسي لتنفيذ دراسة بحثية حول "مواقف الرجال/ النساء والفتيان/ الفتيات نحو تحقيق المساواة بين الرجل والمرأة في حقوق الإنسان والمساواة بين الجنسين؛ دور الرجل والمرأة في المجتمع، دور الذكورة والأنوثة في خلق حواجز للحصول على حقوق المرأة والمساواة بين الجنسين؛ استخدام العنف لإثبات السلطة أو حل الصراعات"، وذلك ضمن مشروع" التغيير في وجهات النظر: إشراك الرجال والفتيان في مناهضة العنف المبني على النوع الاجتماعي ضد النساء والفتيات في قطاع غزة".

يرجى لكل من يرغب بالتقدم لتنفيذ البحث، الاطلاع على الشروط المرجعية المرفقة، و ارسال عرض فني ومالي، والسيرة الذاتية للباحث في موعد أقصاه 5 ابريل 2016 على الإميل التالي aisha.jobs@hotmail.com
 

Terms of Reference

Baseline Action Research

Aisha Association for Woman and Child Protection is looking for a consultant  (main researcher) to conduct a baseline action research on "attitudes of men/women, boys/girls towards the equal entitlement of women and men to human rights; gender equality; role of men and women; the role of masculinity and femininity in creating barriers for obtaining women’s rights and gender equality; the use of violence to demonstrate authority and/or resolve conflicts” within the project “Shifting Perspectives: Engaging men and boys in addressing GBV against women and girls in Gaza Strip” funded by Kvinna till Kvinna (KTK) organization. The consultant should have profound knowledge in the context of the occupied Palestinian territory, of working with gender issues, a profound knowledge of human and woman rights.

1. AISHA’s Background

AISHA Association for Woman and Child Protection (AISHA), established in 2009, is an independent Palestinian women organization working to achieve gender integration through economic empowerment and psychosocial support to marginalized groups in the Gaza Strip with focus on Gaza City and the North area.  Prior to 2009 and since 1996, AISHA used to operate under the name "Women Empowerment Program (WEP)" as the women department within the Gaza Community Mental Health Program (GCHMP). Given the change in the mandate and expanding scope of the GCHMP into a knowledge-based organization focusing of action research, training and advocacy, a restructuring process took place by which the WEP evolved into an independent organization, namely: AISHA.

AISHA seeks to protect women and children from violence through supporting, empowering, and raising awareness of important psychological, social, legal, and economic issues. Furthermore, during implementation of its strategic plan, AISHA has developed and applied a Gender Mainstreaming in all fields of implementation. On the other hand, focus has been given to influence the community agenda through the sensitization of key individuals and organizations towards the issues of domestic violence, gender equality, and feminist issues. Also, AISHA works on mobilizing and lobbying opinion to influence and pressure on decision-making to get a favorable laws and legislation for women and children in all fields.

1. Project’s Background

Aisha is implementing this project to achieve the following objective “Discrimination against women and entitlement to the use of violence as a means to resolve conflicts is less accepted”. This objective will be reached by engaging men in different activities to change their perception, beliefs/thoughts, position and take initiatives to promote women's human rights, gender equality, and combat gender based violence and violence as a means to resolve conflicts; also by targeting women to increase their knowledge, change perception, attitudes, and beliefs and to be enabled to protect and demand their human rights; and finally, targeting university staff and students, judges and counselors at Shari's courts, young men at CBOs/NGOs, community leaders, religious leaders, and police will create supportive environment of positive attitudes for women's rights and gender equality.

1. Research purpose

The research aims to measure the attitudes of men/women, boys/girls towards the equal entitlement of women and men to human rights; gender equality; societal role of men and women; role of masculinity and femininity in creating barriers for obtaining women’s rights and gender equality; the use of violence to demonstrate authority and/or resolve conflicts in the Gaza Strip, considering the wider context of protracted crisis existing in the Gaza Strip, in order to develop a deeper evidence base which can be used to inform the design of a better and effective programmatic response in the area of combating GBV against women and girls in the Gaza Strip. The report will be available and could therefore assist other organizations in doing so as well could be used as a tool for lobbying and advocacy

The research should:

• Explore knowledge, attitudes and behavior men/women and boys/girls in  communities in the five districts of Gaza towards the equal entitlement of women and men to human rights; gender equality; societal role of men and women; role of masculinity and femininity in creating barriers for obtaining women’s rights and gender equality.
• Explore what masculinity, femininity and the construction of gender roles mean in the Gazan society under the on-going conflict.
• The use of violence to demonstrate authority and/or resolve conflicts in the Gaza Strip,
• Provide an overview of the different types or manifestation of violence such as physical violence, emotional, verbal, economic etc. and cycle of violence in interpersonal relationships.
• Provide data on the prevalence and incidence of violence to demonstrate authority and/or resolve conflicts in the Gaza Strip in general and gender based violence (men’s violence against women and women’s violence against men), what triggers gender based violence, and its purpose While doing this, it is important to make reference to the types of violence used.
• Gather recommendations on survivors and community members on the possible future improvements in terms of service provision, humanitarian response and government’s GBV protection, response and prevention structures, methods such as community based protection, strategies and other related issues in GBV response and prevention.

1. Scope of the research

The selected consultant shall keep up coordination closely with Aisha staff during all the phases of the research.

The consultant will:

• Define the research target group(s), problem statement, questions, objectives, importance, reference / normative framework, and methodology.
• Identify research stakeholders being the sources of quantitative and qualitative sources of information.
• Define research sample size and sample distribution.
• Train collectors to collect data using quantitative (questionnaire) and qualitative methods (key informant interviews and focus groups).
• Supervise quantitative data entry and statistical analysis.
• Undertake qualitative data analysis.
• Conclude findings of qualitative and quantitative data.
• Develop conclusions and recommendations related to how to engage men and boys to advance women's human rights and gender equality and reduce GBV. The recommendations should be presented in order of priority.
• Write the research report in Arabic and English incorporating feedback remarks from AISHA, Kvinna till Kvinna and other key stakeholders. The consultant should give full consideration to the objective and requirements of the research as outlined in the ToR.

1. Deliverables

• Draft research report in Arabic (maximum 40 pages, excluding the annexes)should include the following: introduction, executive summary, methodology, limitations, finding, conclusions and recommendations and appendices, TOR, abbreviations, persons interviewed, references, tables with survey data, questionnaire forms used, etc
• Final Research (maximum 40 pages per version, excluding the annexes).
• Consultant is expected to conduct a workshop to present on his/her baseline findings

Particular attention should be paid to the following: formatting in the report in paragraphs, titles, subtitles, tables, abbreviations, footnotes and endnotes; also the report should be analytical in nature (both quantitative and qualitative), and should be structured around issues and related findings.

1. Required skills and expertise: 

• Advanced degree in research oriented social studies/women's studies.
• Extensive knowledge of and proven experience in leading (designing and undertaking) social surveys/research and analysis using both qualitative and quantitative tools
• In-depth knowledge  of the socio-cultural , economic and political context of the Opt and Gaza Strip in Specific
• Proven experience in gender equality and GBV research methodology and protocols, and preferably of working with gender issues and human and women rights.
• Extensive knowledge and experience to undertake rigorous analysis of both qualitative and quantitative data; 
• Strong analytical skills.
• Excellent writing and oral skills in Arabic, ability to produce a high quality research report.
• Understanding of  the national legislation and the international conventions related to women’s rights 
• Availability and accessibility to move within Gaza Strip (at least part of the team), especially rural, marginalized and border areas.
• The consultant should be from the Gaza Strip.

1. Time Frame

The expected timeframe for this research should be 3 months from the date of signing the agreement, until the approval of the final report document of the Research by Aisha Association and KtK.

1. Submission of Proposals.

Interested researchers/firms should submit:  letter of interest, technical proposal, financial offer and CVs/profiles no later than 5 April 2016. The proposal should have detailed methodology including following:

a. Objectives and researcher/ research team understanding of the scope of the research.

b. Tools that researcher/research team will use in English.

c. Plan of data collection and analysis

d. Timeframe

e. Detailed budget on a separate sheet. The budget should reflect the efforts of main researcher (according to her\his responsibilities in the research) in man-days and the rate per day in USD including all costs.

f. The due income tax will be deducted for the individual applicants.

Interested applicants should submit their proposals to aisha.jobs@hotmail.com.

For more details: contact person - Reem O. Frainah, AISHA's Executive Director, and Email: reemf_1974@hotmail.com; mobile: 0599553085.