CHILD THEMATIC PROGRAMME in Jaffna, Sri Lanka.

News from country coordinator Dr. V. Anavarathan
Health Net TPO, based in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, is currently implementing community-and school-based projects in five identified countries, namely Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Burundi and Sudan. These projects involve providing psychosocial support to children in areas of armed conflict, and more specifically for displaced child populations, for war orphans and child soldiers.

Year one focuses on capacity building, preparation and first cycle implementation. Capacity building includes both a CBI training of trainers program combined with follow-up training course, and needed capacity building for the Minimal Psychosocial Care Package development. Preparation includes mobilizing and adapting the existing interventions and setting the stage for carrying out the planned interventions, leading to several CBI groups (cycle 1 – pilot phase). Each trained CBI facilitator leads and co-leads a group during the first cycle, which is followed by an in-country refresher course. Hereafter, the master-trainers start a training program for a group of 20-30 CBI facilitators that subsequently initiate cycle 2 implementation. Furthermore year one is used to develop guidelines and protocols for the interventions (e.g. detailed CBI plan of action, screening protocol, referral mechanism, public awareness package, project monitoring tool) and translation of the existing CBI manual in the local languages. As the present project has a major research component, to assess the efficacy of the CBI intervention (as explained in more detail above), year one is used for preparation of research design and tools and a thorough and systematic in-country training of national research coordinators.

Year two emphasizes research implementation. The project research coordinator works with the national research teams to execute an empirical study following a Randomized Control Trial methodology. Each country receives a thorough (approximately 4-5 weeks per country) in-country training on the research project, research methodologies, data-collection, data-entry, SPSS/statistics etc. This initial training course is followed up through regular supervision and booster visits by the research coordinator, during research preparation and data-collection periods. The research adopts a methodical procedure to translate the research tools, to augment cultural sensitivity. Moreover, a qualitative pre-study (through semi-structured interviews of key informants) is conducted to collect contextual data. All interventions (both CBI and MCPC) are continued during this period, however Without expanding them. Furthermore, year two is used for material development, specifically the preparation of a final adapted and translated CBI manual for each of the participating countries. This manual is adapted for cultural appropriateness and based on the experience of cycles one and two interventions. Secondly, the MPCP module is elaborated and further developed, based on year one experiences, on quality assessment and continued monitoring.

Year three: entails expansion of the interventions, to increase the number of children reached through the project. More facilitators are trained, who conduct the planned activities following the prepared documents. During year three final adaptations – informed by the initial results of the impact study - are made to come to the intervention package for psychosocial assistance for children in areas of armed conflict. Year three also entails analyzing and writing up the research data, collected during year two, followed by dissemination of results.