FINAL REPORT MIDTERM PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF THE KENYA YOUTH EMPLOYMENT AND SKILLS PROGRAM (K-YES) SEPTEMBER 2017 This publication was produced for review by the United States Agency for International Development. It was prepared by Management Systems International, A Tetra Tech Company. FINAL REPORT MIDTERM PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF THE KENYA YOUTH EMPLOYMENT AND SKILLS PROGRAM (K-YES) September 28, 2017 IDIQ No. AID-623-I-12-00001 Award No: AID-615-TO-17-00003 Prepared by Management Systems International (MSI), A Tetra Tech Company 200 12th St South, Suite 1200 Arlington, VA, USA 22202 DISCLAIMER This report is made possible by the support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The contents are the sole responsibility of the Management Systems International and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID or the United States Government. Midterm Performance Evaluation of K-YES: Draft Final Report i CONTENTS List of Acronyms ............................................................................................................................ii Executive Summary ...................................................................................................................... 1 Background and Purpose ........................................................................................................................................ 1 Findings ........................................................................................................................................................................ 1 Conclusions ................................................................................................................................................................ 3 Recommendations .................................................................................................................................................... 4 Evaluation Purpose and Evaluation Questions ........................................................................... 5 Purpose ....................................................................................................................................................................... 5 Audience and Intended Use ................................................................................................................................... 5 Evaluation Questions ............................................................................................................................................... 5 Project Background ...................................................................................................................... 6 Evaluation Design, Methods and Limitations ............................................................................. 6 Evaluation Design ...................................................................................................................................................... 6 Data Collection Methods........................................................................................................................................ 7 Analysis of Qualitative Interview Data ................................................................................................................ 8 Analysis of Survey Data ........................................................................................................................................... 8 Limitations .................................................................................................................................................................. 8 Findings .......................................................................................................................................... 8 Evaluation Question 1: To what extent and how has the program been effective in achieving its intended results? ................................................................................................................. 8 Evaluation Question 2: How well did the implementer(s) adapt to challenges and changing circumstances? .......................................................................................................................................... 25 Evaluation Question 3: What types of jobs have youth beneficiaries gained and what are their perceptions of these new opportunities? ................................................................................ 30 Supplementary: CVE and Other Outcomes ............................................................................. 34 Recommendations ...................................................................................................................... 35 Overall/Strategic ..................................................................................................................................................... 35 Operational .............................................................................................................................................................. 35 Vocational Skills and Internships ......................................................................................................................... 36 Business Skills and Financial Access .................................................................................................................... 36 Sustainability ............................................................................................................................................................. 37 Gender Integration ................................................................................................................................................. 37 Annex I: Evaluation Statement of Work .................................................................................. 38 Annex 2. Work Plan .................................................................................................................... 45 Annex 3. Data Collection Instruments ..................................................................................... 46 Annex 4: List of Interviewees per County ................................................................................ 83 Annex 5. List of Documents Reviewed ..................................................................................... 86 Midterm Performance Evaluation of K-YES: Draft Final Report ii LIST OF ACRONYMS AGPO Access to Government Procurement Opportunities CBET Competence-Based Education and Training CBF County Bunge Forum CDACC Curriculum Development Assessment and Certificate Council CVE Countering Violent Extremism GOK Government of Kenya IP Implementing Partner IRC International Rescue Committee KAVES Kenya Agricultural Value Chain Enterprises KCBF Kenya Commercial Bank Foundation K-YES Kenya Youth Employment and Skills Program LTE Learn to Earn M&E Monitoring and Evaluation M-Pesa Mobile Pesa (money) MSI Management Systems International NITA National Industrial Training Authority PWD Persons with Disabilities RTI Research Triangle Institute International SACCO Savings Cooperative and Credit Organization TOT Training of Trainers USAID United States Agency for International Development VSLA Village Savings and Loan Association VTC Vocational Training Center YBF Youth Bunge Forum EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Background and Purpose This report presents the findings from a midterm evaluation of the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills Program (K-YES). K-YES is a five-year activity funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and implemented by Research Triangle Institute International (RTI) and a consortium of partners. K-YES is to achieve the following primary USAID assistance objective: “To enhance employment opportunities and the overall labor supply, whether wage employment or self-employment, for underemployed youth (ages 18 – 35) with primary or some secondary education in focus geographic areas and sectors.” K-YES began in five counties in September 2015 and is due to expand to four more counties during the second phase, beginning in October 2017. The primary purpose of this midterm evaluation is to draw lessons to inform the implementation of K-YES, especially as it moves forward into phase 2. To aid this purpose, the evaluation set out to answer three questions: 1. How and to what extent has the program been effective in achieving its intended results? (With consideration of the overall relevance and design of K-YES, as well as the effectiveness of specific K-YES program components to date). 2. How well did the implementer(s) adapt to challenges and changing circumstances? 3. What types of jobs have youth beneficiaries gained (referring to the K-YES program’s definition of a job), and what are their perceptions of these new opportunities? The evaluation employed qualitative methods in the form of semi-structured key informant and group interviews with program implementers, partners and beneficiaries in all five counties where K-YES is implementing. Two phone surveys — one of 1,239 youth beneficiaries and another of 50 employers with which K-YES reported working — augmented the interviews. The evaluation also reviewed all available program documentation and monitoring databases, and analyzed across all sources to produce the findings that inform this report. Findings Evaluation Question 1: To what extent and how has the program been effective in achieving its intended results? Evaluation Design, Relevance and Theory-of-Change The need for and relevance of K-YES was readily apparent across all five counties. No elements of K￾YES were seen to be unnecessary or redundant. The initial phase of K-YES is understood best as a pilot. Although the initial theory of change inspired the overall program approach, pragmatic concerns on getting the program under way with the existing resources and capacity encountered were also important drivers. Furthermore, the program has changed in response to challenges. For both of these reasons, the current theory of change drives the program only partially, whereas experience has also highlighted areas in which the theory of change was underdeveloped and needs strengthening (see recommendations). Vocational Skills Development One K-YES goal was to reduce the stigma associated with vocational training centers (VTC), previously known as youth polytechnics, with the idea that doing so will increase demand and enrollment. The opinion of government officials and VTC staff in most counties is that K-YES has been effective in improving the quality and image of the VTCs with which it has worked. However, much of the enrollment increase was due to K-YES subsidies sponsorship, and when these subsidies are reduced or stopped, many youth drop courses or are unable to register for them. Thus, a major question that K￾YES has not yet addressed is what will happen to such youth when subsidies end. Government bursaries are widely reported to be unavailable to such youth. K-YES has worked with VTCs to assess and develop their capacity. However, it is too early to assess the program’s full effectiveness in this area because VTCs were at varied stages going into this process and, in many cases, this capacity development was still pending or in process. The evaluation found cases in which VTCs appreciated the capacity training and reported that it was successful, and cases in which VTC staff were dissatisfied with K-YES support. The county government’s commitment and engagement was a major factor that affected the K-YES program’s work in this area. Where the government was open to partnership, K-YES could further leverage their support to make a greater impact on VTC capacity, as best shown in Kericho. K-YES succeeded in developing and introducing competency-based vocational training that, to some extent, reflects employer and market realities and youth aspirations. The five pilot Competence-Based Education and Training (CBET) courses focus on sectors offering high potential for job creation. However, the course delivery lacked in three key areas: recognition of the varied abilities and background of youth, quality assurance in assessment and certification of the youth, and the underdeveloped structure and mechanisms for securing and managing internships (also known as attachments) for trainees. Business Skills and Access to Finance During implementation, K-YES merged its approaches to Objective 2 on business skills and Objective 4 on access to finance effectively, mainly by including both into a single curriculum and delivering it to both individuals and Village Savings and Loan Association (VSLA) members. Bringing these two aspects together made sense, and the curriculum’s practicality and its delivery are widely appreciated by both trainers and the youth receiving training. However, the length of the training, especially considering the material it covers, is widely viewed as insufficient. Especially for newly formed VSLAs, both youth and trainers had concerns about their sustainability without further guidance, which the VSLA curriculum developed by one of the implementing partners (IP), the International Rescue Committee (IRC), also stipulates. Youth still have a tremendous demand for improved access to finance, and they fear the risk and consequences of defaulting. Although K-YES has had some success efforts linking youth to financial institutions, this area is still undeveloped. Sustainability K-YES has largely followed its sustainability plan, which focuses on building sustainability through partnership. This appears to be yielding promising results for the VTCs and linkages to employers, though it varies from county to county. However, the program’s decision to deliver much of its training — especially the business skills and financial awareness training — through trainers it hired and trained directly means that these elements will be difficult to be sustain if a partnership plan is not put in place before the end of the program. . Additionally, support to VSLAs is judged broadly as insufficient in depth and duration and as a result it will likely not lead to long-lasting associations. Gender Integration K-YES has put significant emphasis on including gender in all of its training and in advocating for gender policies within VTCs. These efforts are broadly appreciated, and the most visible outcome is that some young men and women are going against traditional gender norms in selecting their vocation, such as women choosing to become plumbers or auto mechanics. K-YES has also taken steps to improve the accessibility of its services to both genders, though some young men and women still report experiencing barriers to their successful completion and participation. Evaluation Question 2: How well did the implementer(s) adapt to challenges and changing circumstances? K-YES has experienced a range of challenges, such as issues with certifying vocational courses, weaknesses in communication, and employer expectations. Many of these challenges cannot be readily categorized as either fully internal to the program or external, but could be better characterized as a disconnect between program expectations and processes and encountered needs. Even challenges largely due to internal bottlenecks, such as widespread delays in processing mobile Pesa (M-Pesa) payments to participants, appear largely because the issue or demand had not been fully anticipated. The pressure and expectation to meet targets has strained systems in the first year of K-YES implementation, which led to numerous communication issues and some abrupt changes in policy that caused confusion or difficulties among partners. Numerous mismatches and errors occurred along the way, but in most cases, mechanisms were in place to identify these and efforts were made to correct them. The key challenges for K-YES now are to make sure that the program’s design and structures going forward fully encapsulate these lessons, and to find ways to improve the balance between expectations with resources. Evaluation Question 3: What types of jobs have youth beneficiaries gained and what are their perceptions of these new opportunities? Sixty percent of youth who received training through K-YES reported some increase in income. These results are impressive, especially given that most of the training received consisted of the equivalent of three full training days. Youth conveyed a great need for this type of intervention, and many are highly motivated to leverage any learning they receive. For many of them, K-YES training has been easy to translate to practical application, though most youth reported their incomes are barely sufficient to meet their needs, and about half of surveyed youth were satisfied with their current means of earning a livelihood. When comparing the two main streams — vocational and business — in the short term, business training appears to provide larger dividends to youth, most likely because of its ease of entry compared with formal job markets. Clearly, however, the true winner is both in combination. The qualitative data suggests that there is potential to leverage much stronger outcomes with improved linkages to youth￾friendly financial services and improvements to the various program elements, as noted throughout this evaluation. Conclusions K-YES is a much-needed and appreciated program. Demand for the type of support that K-YES offered was immense across all counties, among youth, employers and training institutions. At the time of this evaluation, K-YES had been implementing activities for about one year, so many aspects — especially regarding partnership development and capacity building — were still quite recent. The program has also made ongoing adjustments throughout this year, which means this first phase is understood best as a pilot. Overall, K-YES has managed to adapt itself based on experiences, but there are still areas that require further attention. Although many specific elements of its operations have proven effective (including training modules), they are still fragmented in implementation and limited by shallow scope or lack of follow-through. County coordinators have managed to learn and make adjustments on the ground. The main challenge going forward is to capture and institutionalize this learning. K-YES also faces a challenge of competing goals — it has managed to meet most of its target numbers, though often at the expense of quality. USAID can be a supportive partner by recognizing the need to prioritize long-term objectives and solidify quality over short-term numeric targets. Recommendations This evaluation offers 27 recommendations organized into six categories: overall/strategic, operational, vocational skills and internships, business skills and financial access, sustainability, and gender integration. The end of the report lists all recommendations. The seven overall/strategic recommendations are summarized as follows: 1. The K-YES theory of change should be developed further to reflect K-YES experience to date and to show how the program can respond with different interventions to the various types of barriers that youth face. 2. The K-YES program design needs to be revised to recognize and address more explicitly the differing capacities and needs of youth entering the program in terms of education, learning capacity and aspirations. 3. The K-YES program design needs to more explicitly recognize and address the genuine financial barriers to full participation/benefit in the program that many youth face. 4. K-YES should improve linkages among its components so that youth can be assessed and receive multiple services as needed. 5. K-YES should adapt its monitoring and evaluation (M&E) system (in discussion with USAID) to track measures on soft and strategic elements, such as building partnerships and the capacity for sustainability, as well as measures of outcome quality (such as post-training tests of youth. 6. USAID should consider revising target numbers downward if there is a clear argument that the program cannot meet them without sacrificing quality and increasing the risk of negative outcomes because of poor follow-through. K-YES should consider organizing study visits for key officials of the four new counties to counties already in the K-YES program that have a demonstrated, visible government commitment. EVALUATION PURPOSE AND EVALUATION QUESTIONS Purpose The primary evaluation purpose is to draw lessons to inform implementation of the current K-YES activity. Overall, the evaluation seeks to do the following:  Determine the extent and nature of progress K-YES is making in meeting its overall objective of enhancing employment opportunities and the overall labor supply (wage employment or self￾employment) for underemployed youth (ages 18 – 35) with primary or some secondary education in focus geographic areas and sectors.  Understand whether evidence supports the intervention’s overall logic and whether processes are in place to lead to success for components of K-YES where it is too early to assess outcomes.  Provide USAID/Kenya and East Africa with information and lessons from 18 months of implementation to guide modifications and, if necessary, mid-course corrections to inform expansion of the program into four additional counties. Audience and Intended Use As a midterm evaluation, the findings presented in this report primarily intend to inform K-YES implementers and stakeholders as they move into the program’s second phase. This includes USAID, RTI and partners, county compact members, the youth bunge forums (YBF), and K-YES beneficiaries. USAID/Kenya and East Africa expects to use this evaluation to inform ongoing and future programming. The K-YES technical team expects to use the evaluation to inform and/or revise its Phase 2 work plans. USAID/Washington, including the Youth Corps Group, may also be interested in the broader lessons learned from this evaluation. USAID may share the final report with other stakeholders, including donors and funding partners, and the national and county governments. Evaluation Questions To meet this purpose, the evaluation specifically sets out to answer the following three evaluation questions: 1. To what extent and how has the program been effective in achieving its intended results? (Considering the overall relevance and design of K-YES and the effectiveness of specific K-YES program components to date.) 2. How well did the implementer(s) adapt to challenges and changing circumstances? 3. What types of jobs have youth beneficiaries gained and what are their perceptions of these new opportunities (referring to the K-YES definition of a job)? In addition, the evaluation team will assess the extent to which K-YES activities appear to have leveraged or resulted in outcomes other than improved youth employment, with particular attention to combating violent extremism (CVE). PROJECT BACKGROUND K-YES is a five-year activity funded by USAID and implemented by RTI and a consortium of partners, including IRC, McKinsey & Company, SSG Advisors, GeoPoll, and Land O’Lakes International Development. This is in addition to the National Youth Bunge Association through the county bunge forums (CBF), the county bunge youth savings cooperative and credit organizations (SACCO), and other local private sector and public organizations and agencies. K-YES is aligned with the Kenya National Youth Policy (2006); Kenya’s Vision 2030 Second Medium￾Term Plan (2013 – 2017); the Kenya Ministry of Education, Science and Technology’s Policy Framework for Education; County Government Annual Operational Plans and Training (2012); USAID/Kenya Country Development Cooperation Strategy; USAID’S Youth in Development Policy; and USAID’s Global Education Strategy. K-YES is to achieve the following primary USAID assistance objective: “To enhance employment opportunities and the overall labor supply, whether wage employment or self-employment, for underemployed youth (ages 18 – 35) with primary or some secondary education in focus geographic areas and sectors.” K-YES is being implemented through a phased approach by intervening in five counties for the first two years (Phase 1): Bungoma, Garissa, Kericho, Kwale and Nairobi. Much of the first year was devoted to a comprehensive assessment, after which intervention began in mid-2016. K-YES will expand to four additional counties — Kisii, Migori, Nyeri and West Pokot — at the start of year 3 (Phase 2). Limited activities promoting national ID card registration and SACCO capacity building implemented by youth partners, the county YBFs and county youth bunge SACCOs were implemented in Phase 2 counties during Phase 1, from 2015 to 2017. The activity has four strategic and two crosscutting objectives: Strategic  Objective 1: Improved technical and vocational skills of youth participants  Objective 2: Increased business skills  Objective 3: Improved effectiveness of market and employment information, career counseling, mentoring and job placement for youth participants in target areas/sectors  Objective 4: Youth awareness and utilization of financial services Crosscutting  Objective 5: Gender equity  Objective 6: Sustainability through partnership EVALUATION DESIGN, METHODS AND LIMITATIONS Evaluation Design This evaluation used a combination of qualitative and quantitative data triangulated across sources for greater rigor and validity. The evaluation team visited each of the five Phase 1 counties and conducted interviews with program implementers, partners, and youth beneficiaries, then analyzed these at the county and cross-county levels. These were triangulated further with program documentation and survey data. Data Collection Methods The study used the following data collection methods:  Semi-structured interviews with individuals and groups at the county level  Semi- structured interviews with individuals and small groups at the national level  A review of program documents at the national and county levels, as well as M&E databases and other program records as provided on request  A survey of 50 employers across all counties with which K-YES reported having had some interaction, 15 of which included open-ended questions  A phone survey with 1,239 youth beneficiaries selected randomly from the combined K-YES database of youth beneficiaries from all five counties The survey instruments were developed based on the initial document review and scope of work, and were reviewed by USAID and RTI at a half-day workshop. The full instruments are available in Annex 3. The team conducted 98 qualitative interviews. Table 1 shows the number of interviews and roles of persons interviewed by location. Although the interviews initially targeted a specific number of roles, the team found that interviewees often fulfilled multiple roles, such as a government representative who was also a gender facilitator, or a SACCO official who was also a K-YES trainer. Many youth beneficiaries were also VSLA members. For this reason, the evaluation often ended up with more data points in a particular category than it targeted, even though the team followed the initial sampling plan. TABLE 1: SUMMARY OF QUALITATIVE INTERVIEWS Agency/Group Bungoma Garissa Kericho Kwale Nairobi National Totals USAID 1 1 IP 1 1 1 1 1 3 8 Government 2 1 2 1 1 2 9 VTC (with CBET) 1 1 1 1 1 1 6 VTC (without CBET) 1 1 1 1 1 1 6 Financial service provider (formal level) 1 0 1 1 0 0 3 YBF SACCO 0 1 1 1 1 0 4 VSLA 1 0 1 1 1 0 4 Mentor 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 Gender facilitator 1 1 1 2 2 0 7 Trainer of trainers 1 1 1 1 1 0 5 Trainer 1 1 1 1 1 0 5 Male youth (group) 1 1 1 1 1 0 5 Female youth (group) 1 1 1 1 1 0 5 YBF members (group) 1 1 1 1 1 0 5 Youth beneficiaries (individual) 4 4 4 4 5 0 21 Other partners 1 2 3 Totals: 18 15 20 18 19 8 98 Analysis of Qualitative Interview Data First, the team typed the qualitative data from detailed notes or sometimes transcribed it from interview recordings (made only with permission and used to fill gaps in notes). The team then coded these detailed notes by evaluation question and by subquestions or themes under each question using qualitative analysis software (ATLAS.ti). For each county, coded quotations were then extracted by subquestion or theme, analyzed across respondents, and summarized into findings. The team then compared findings against a review of documents classified in a similar manner. Once this was complete at the county level, the team compared the county-level analyses. For most questions and themes, the analysis showed the same issues raised across counties, sometimes varying in degree or expression. Approaching the analysis in this way helped the emerging patterns to be more robust. The team conducted the final level of analysis by coding and drawing on national-level interview data (conducted mainly with government officials and representatives from various IPs), augmented by a second round of document review (the first round informed the initial study design). Analysis of Survey Data The team analyzed survey data using descriptive statistics (frequency data, in most cases, because most response categories were nominal) with open-ended questions categorized and coded where relevant. The surveys were finished after the qualitative analysis was complete, and they augmented qualitative findings, triangulated further, and filled in gaps. The employer survey specifically informed analysis regarding partnerships with the employers, employer satisfaction with K-YES interns, employer engagement with CBET and sense of satisfaction with the resulting curriculum, and employer perceptions of the Youth Employment Compact. The analysis drew on the youth beneficiary survey to inform evaluation question 3 on employment outcomes. Limitations The decision to include all five Phase 1 counties (combined with time limitations) added robustness in comparison, but it meant there was less time to interview more than one or two representatives of each stakeholder group. This limited the evaluation’s capacity to analyze in-depth dynamics within a county or to understand some of the more subtle or complex issues, such as varying VTC capacity and different strategies to deal with them. Similarly, although the evaluation team interviewed all county coordinators (and/or assistant coordinators) and talked with several key staff at headquarters, the evaluation did not include interviews with the technical leads of the different areas and thus might have missed some of the internal reasoning on specific technical decisions. County coordinators at least mentioned this in most cases, but in some cases, the team did not have the full details or history of the processes involved. FINDINGS Evaluation Question 1: To what extent and how has the program been effective in achieving its intended results? K-YES Relevance, Design and Theory of Change The evidence clearly shows that K-YES is relevant. A clear consensus exists across all respondents that the K-YES program addresses an immense and pressing need. No part of K-YES was seen as redundant, and most recommendations or critiques suggested that it should do more and strengthen the type of activities to which it was already committed. Some areas of the design still appear somewhat underdeveloped, and the initial design no longer matches the reality of the program in some ways because it has been adjusted in practice. As set out in the K-YES documentation, the K-YES theory of change consists simply of three suppositions: 1. If the demands of the private sector and of young people drive the development and delivery of vocational and business training at a local level, then the results are better employment and self￾employment outcomes for youth and increased economic competitiveness of businesses; 2. If youth have access to youth-friendly services (e.g., information, capacity building and finance), they will make informed and empowered decisions about education and business investments and achieve greater success; and 3. If local relationships and capacity are built and information impediments are removed, the incentives for diverse local actors can be aligned so that they work together to increase the efficiency, effectiveness and sustainability of education and employment outcomes. There are no further linkages made among these three suppositions, and they are not tied explicitly to specific program elements and intended outcomes, meaning that the theory of change is rather underdeveloped as a basis for driving program interventions. The program itself is structured conceptually around six objectives, as described in the background section. To date, all reporting is structured around these six objectives. Regarding implementing the objectives, Objective 4 has come to be seen as integrally linked to Objective 3, and in practice, most of Objective 3 was implemented in association with vocational training, which is under Objective 1. Agribusiness training activities — an important program element in several provinces — are not included explicitly under these objectives. The design is also premised on eight critical assumptions (also listed in the M&E plans). Four of these assumptions concern partnerships: that the county government, youth bunges, VTCs and employers will have the capacity and will to engage productively with K-YES, and that K-YES will be able to reduce the stigma associated with vocational training. Based on interviews with K-YES implementers at the head office and in the counties, RTI reports that early experiences contradicted some of these assumptions, primarily those about government support and VTC capacity. Because public VTCs were underfunded, understaffed and lacked equipment, K-YES resorted to direct implementation in the short term while building VTC capacity and gradually shifting implementation to the VTCs. Specifically, RTI directly hired and trained individuals to conduct trainings on life skills, career counseling, work readiness, business skills and financial management. Over time, they have also trained VTC instructors and gave them responsibility for some elements of these trainings, mainly the unit on life skills and career counseling. In practice, K-YES implementation fell into two main streams: vocational training and business skills training (which also includes training on finance and VSLAs), and agribusiness was implemented somewhat separately (Figure 1). Recruitment of youth into the program’s activities is based on the need to meet quarterly target numbers — for example, mobilizers might be asked to recruit 50 youth specifically for participation in a plumbing course. This means youth rarely have full access to the program or any choice over how they enter and move through it. Division into two streams also means that the theory of change and sustainability plan appear to provide an appropriate guide to the vocational stream and implementation approach. Indeed, experience in the vocational training stream largely confirms the theory of change in terms of creating a virtuous circle of increased institutional capacity and increased demand for services. One area on the vocational side where the design assumptions are not substantiated is that they focus only on stigma against vocational training as a reason for low enrollment, overlooking the significant role of poverty or an inability to pay. The initial K-YES design and theory of change do not encompass the realization of the business skills training, which is implemented largely by trainers who are directly hired and mobilized by K-YES. This component of the system appears unlikely to outlive the program, and so the only sustainable outcome would be the skills transferred and, potentially, the VSLAs created or strengthened. Although some documentation and the implementing partners’ staff mention the need for integration, 1 key informants expressed various views regarding whether or not it was always in the design, and the degree to which it is now in practice. From youth experiences, integration of program components is largely absent because they were mobilized or recruited for specific activities with a limited range of options, if any. Follow-up communication is normally limited to monitoring activities, which are often experienced as somewhat extractive, especially in the face of sometimes-unmet expectations for further training, or internship placements that might not have materialized. The theory of change was revisited during the K-YES Year 2 work planning session with the intent of addressing some of these gaps. One element considered was to differentiate categories of youth with regard to their needs and experience. However, this was not formalized and does not seem to have influenced practices involving youth identification and recruitment. Similarly, K-YES realizes its commitment to the principles of continuous youth engagement and positive youth development largely through its links with the YBFs. Although this has some solid benefits, it has not always translated effectively into a channel in which beneficiary youth can have an effective voice in the program.2 Figure 1 is a diagrammatic representation of how the K-YES program’s main elements operate in practice, according to the evaluation team’s understanding of the program, which emerged over the course of the evaluation. The rest of the findings under Evaluation Question 1 are organized by the following program elements (corresponding to the capital letters in the diagram): A. Targeting and mobilization of youth into K-YES B. Vocational training (including all VTC capacity building, career counseling, internships and job market information) C. Business training and financial awareness (including links to financial service providers and work with VSLAs) D. Agricultural training E. Links to other youth service organizations and projects F. Sustainability through partnerships G. Gender integration 1 ‘Integration’ as used in the context of K-YES refers to a more holistic approach to the K-YES services, including linkages between the vocational, business and agricultural streams, and what youth often referred to as ‘follow up’. 2 For more detail on issues around youth representation and corresponding evidence, please see the section on “youth representation” under the findings for Evaluation Question 2. FIGURE 1: OVERVIEW OF K-YES Targeting and Mobilization of Youth Mobilization of youth beneficiaries from the K-YES target group has been mainly through youth bunges, which reached out to youth through groups and networks in the communities, religious organizations, chiefs, and sometimes politicians. Many youth respondents reported receiving the message about trainings from their relatives and neighbors. YBF representatives and trainers reported that youth were recruited based on the program’s need to meet numeric targets set in the quarterly work plans. As such, youth are typically recruited for a particular stream of training rather than inducted into the program, assessed and given a range of options. Within vocational training, they sometimes have a range of options depending on what a specific VTC offers. This appears to vary somewhat by county. Several key informants, including representatives of partner organizations, have been impressed with the YBFs’ capacity to rapidly reach and mobilize youth for various activities. However, trainers across counties noted some concerns with mobilization. Sometimes it appeared that youth were mobilized based on the mobilizers’ convenience or because they were friends. In such cases, trainers complained that the youth were not genuinely interested in the training, but instead were present to collect transportation funds or any other associated stipends. Trainers also noted that some youth were outside the target criteria, particularly some who had completed high school, and some who had post￾secondary education. Estimates of the degree of this problem varied, though typically the estimate is about 20 percent, which reflects the self-reported education of those within the youth beneficiary survey (14 percent claimed to have completed secondary school and 6 percent claimed to have some post-secondary qualifications). Relatedly, a substantial portion of YBF representatives interviewed expressed disappointment or resentment that K-YES excluded the representatives themselves and many of the bunge members because of their higher level of education, and they raised this as a challenge for the program. For vocational training, sponsorships were not offered initially to youth to cover tuition costs. However, county coordinators and VTCs reported that the program introduced sponsorships because initial enrollment numbers were too low to meet targets.3 Sponsorships have worked in increasing enrollment — many beneficiaries reported that they were attracted to the VTCs because of the sponsorships, and they would have been unable to attend otherwise. In some counties where sponsorships were reduced, enrollment figures have also reportedly reduced. Vocational Training Stream Addressing Stigma To address VTC stigma, K-YES developed a behavior change communication strategy aimed at improving perceptions of technical training and careers and increasing youth demand for them. Multiple stakeholders reported that renaming the youth polytechnics to vocational training centers or VTCs (a strategy the county governments used before K-YES and reinforced during K-YES) had contributed to reducing stigma. In Kericho, the county government had made impressive efforts, with the support of K￾YES, to implement its own concept of “centers of excellence”, in which one VTC in each of the six sub￾counties was rebranded as a center of excellence specializing in a specific trade.4 This included refurbishing the VTCs and equipping them appropriately, something that youth beneficiaries and county government representatives reported increased the value and relevance of the VTCs. Across counties, most youth, VTC staff, and government officials mentioned that the short courses that K-YES had introduced to VTCs were relevant, more practical, less costly and saved time. VTCs, government representatives and K-YES staff thought that stigma was reduced because more graduates were getting jobs. Stakeholders in Kericho County noted that image-building activities, such as conducting graduations for students, have contributed to building a positive image and visibility for VTCs. Overall, stakeholders felt that the changes in the VTCs were helping to slowly change perceptions. However, what would ultimately reduce stigma for stakeholders is for more VTC graduates to complete their courses, get certificates and secure productive employment. “K-YES in the short period we have been together they one thing they have really helped in make a name for the institute. Those who get out from here sell our name. Those who have been lucky to get employed from the short skills still sell our name better because they say, “We trained in [this VTC] for maybe 6 or 7 weeks and we have been able to get employment,” so they are proud that they passed through here. That’s why we are thankful to K-YES. That why we are trying to get more short courses.” — VTC, Kwale Building Capacity The evaluation team found mixed achievements across the five counties in capacity building of VTCs. Notes from many interviewees and project reports show that VTCs — particularly public VTCs — significantly lacked resources before K-YES. The IP reported trying to leverage government funding to VTCs, which had a varied impact across the counties. In Kericho, the county government was broadly reported to have a strong commitment to supporting vocational training and a pre-existing county vocation training strategy. Combined with K-YES activation and advocacy, the Kericho county government provided equipment, training materials, and built modern workshops in six VTCs designated as centers of excellence plus basic equipment to 14 other VTCs. In Kwale, according to K-YES quarterly reports, VTCs increased from 13 to 30, though this did not translate to capacity in the VTCs because the budgets allocated were still small and prioritization of funds remained for early childhood education. 3 RTI national and headquarters staff clarified that RTI did not offer sponsorships, but only funding towards material sources. However, this contradicts the broad understanding on the ground, including amongst VTC management and county coordinators. 4 Two of these were visited by the evaluation team. Interviews with K-YES county staff, government representatives and VTC staff confirm that K-YES had played a positive role in allowing and encouraging the government to realize this vision. VTCs in Garissa, Nairobi and Bungoma indicate that they did not receive much in infrastructure development from government or from K-YES, and many of the VTCs still lack resources. VTCs in the five counties reported that K-YES had various roles in introducing the new short courses and building capacity for them, but that K-YES brought them a curriculum for the CBET pilot VTCs. Non-CBET pilot VTCs were guided to develop a shortened (three-month) curriculum for several of the courses they offered. They and government officials in most of the counties also reported that K-YES had trained some of their instructors in the CBET course delivery, and some VTC instructors trained in entrepreneurship, life skills and career counseling. Multiple stakeholders from all categories reported that to a limited extent, K-YES had provided VTCs with links to employers where they could attach students. However, the VTCs interviewed in Nairobi felt that K-YES did not do enough to link them with employers. Another capacity-building aspect cited by a few of the VTCs and government was strategic planning, which most of the VTCs found useful. One VTC said that the exercise was futile because they had already developed their own strategic plan before K-YES. The VTCs also reported that they highly appreciated the training sessions on gender and disability because they were able to recognize the various ways they could mainstream gender in their VTCs. VTCs, IP, government officers and trainers reported that sponsorships were used to buy materials for the training courses offered. However, most also reported delays in receiving K-YES funds to support the training, plus an eventual decrease in funds, which they found to be challenging and disappointing. Curriculum Development and Adaptation According to the K-YES 2016 annual report, the program conducted ecosystem surveys in each county to determine the skills employers needed and available opportunities for youths. A number of the IP staff noted that the county ecosystem assessments, critical for determining the employment sector of focus for each county, took a long time to complete. This delayed the start of competency-based education and training (CBET) course design. In Bungoma, the ecosystem survey identified agribusiness as offering more opportunities for youth. Nairobi selected construction as a promising industry, and Kwale chose housekeeping because of the vibrant hospitality and tourism industry. In Garissa, the retail trading sector was noted as the most likely entry point for youth, leading to a focus on trade and marketing skills. In Kericho, the initial selection of the tea industry during the ecosystem assessment was later changed to masonry, due to high barriers to entry and a reported lack of youth interest in the tea sector.5 The development of the CBET curricula was led by a consultancy firm (McKinsey), with the involvement of expert instructors drawn from the VTCs. Four CBET curricula were developed within three months (from August until December of 2016).6 Each course comprised of practically focused training, ranging in length from six weeks to three months, depending on the curriculum. Staff reported that the process for developing the curricula was rushed, limiting their ability to consult with employers. Nonetheless, most employers involved in this process had a positive view of it: the evaluation team surveyed 14 employers who reported being involved in the CBET curriculum development, of which 12 reported it being useful or very useful. Another key challenge, which has been largely outside the control of K-YES, is the certification of CBET graduates. At the time K-YES was introduced, the Curriculum Development Assessment and Certificate Council (CDACC) was still a new national body and a number of stakeholders noted that it was not possible to involve it in the curriculum development process without causing further delay. However, 5 The ecosystem assessment provided initial sectors with potential, but the selection was ultimately based on the industry scans and employer walkthroughs led by McKinsey. 6 Based on an interview with staff from the firm. RTI reports five curricula were developed at this time. CDACC has the mandate to develop the curriculum and certification for technical and vocational education and training institutions. CDACC officials report that, while they have now been brought on board and are in the process of advising curriculum development, they consider the materials developed by K-YES prior to their involvement to be training manuals, not CBET curriculum. In the meantime, the evaluation found that lack of certification greatly weakens the value of CBET to its graduates. Almost all the vocational training graduates interviewed across the counties reported that the CBET courses did not assess or certify them. Multiple stakeholders viewed this as a major weakness of the VTCs, which reported that they lacked clear guidance on the processes of assessment and certification for CBET/short courses. Most VTCs reported that they were asked to direct their trainees to take the National Industrial Training Authority (NITA) trade test exams, while a few others advised trainees that there was no certification for CBET courses they took. Lack of course certification also makes it difficult to assess the overall quality of CBET courses. Of the 50 employers surveyed, 8 reported having placed at least one CBET graduate (with a total of 23 males and 13 females placed in internships or jobs). Six of these reported that the CBET graduates were of higher quality than regular VTC graduates. However, a challenge noted by those involved in the curriculum development is that structured apprenticeship lasting up to two years is often a key component of CBET, as are subsequent training modules (depending in part on the sector). As such, K￾YES’s approach to introducing CBET has not been comprehensive, largely due to time constraints. Many VTC staff likewise raised concerns about the degree to which CBET graduates were job-ready after a single short training course.7 Further, some VTC instructors noted the K-YES target cohort tended to have a low capacity at entry, and so needed a longer period of time to effectively learn and master the material. “When we were approached by K-YES we were asked to run courses that would last for three months and which had a focus on practical use of the skills in industry, so we removed the theory parts of the courses and designed practical courses. So for the short courses under K-YES initially we took students from MVM, hairdressing, solar installation, electrical.” — VTC, Nairobi VTCs reported that they were also asked to offer the other courses as three-month courses, and K-YES would provide sponsorships for its targeted group trainees to attend.8 The VTCs adapted several of their regular two-year curricula to much shorter courses of about two to three months. This was done for courses including motor vehicle mechanics, hairdressing and beauty, and catering and food production Topics not directly related to the vocation and most of the theory sections of the original courses were removed, leaving only the practical content. Most VTC instructors were positive about these changes, in some cases noting that even their regular students were planning to switch from the longer courses to the shorter ones. Amongst youth, they were often reported to be seen as more accessible, affordable, and relevant than the traditional courses.9 Improving Access and Enrollment to Vocational Training Multiple respondents in the counties reported that enrollments had increased in the VTCs because of K￾YES sponsorships, short courses, linkages with employers, and expectations for funds and tools. 7 For example, instructors raised this concern for the plumbing course in Nairobi, whereas both employers and the Kwale quarterly reports noted that the lack of English language skills had been a problem for some housekeeping graduates. This led to one employer dismissing some of its housekeeping interns prematurely. 8 This was triangulated with reports from McKinsey and RTI staff. 9 It should be noted that many youth were not in a position to directly compare the courses, so this feedback is largely indirect, from VTC staff, YBF representatives and some government officials, as well as K-YES county staff. However, many youth dropped out and did not finish the courses when some of their expectations were unmet. “We had an enrollment of around 70 students when they heard K-YES they were expecting a lot like sewing machines they came for training on entrepreneurship and they involved youths from around and there were students to be involved and they took two and before the training was over almost half the class disappeared.” — Youth in Garissa Many of the VTCs reported that they had large numbers of interested youth, but many dropped out for various reasons, including unmet expectations (such as reduced sponsorship and reimbursements) and other priorities (to take care of their families). VTCs reported that some youth did not show commitment to the training. Career Counseling and Life Skills Life skills and career counseling is a three-day course offered to K-YES vocational trainees before the vocational courses.10 Many youth reported that it helped them clarify what is expected of them and helped them think about what they want to do with their lives, and some changed courses as a result. Instructors from VTCs, some YBF instructors and some independent consultants said they were trained as TOT trainers for this training course. Many beneficiaries reported that they were offered work readiness training as a one-day group mentorship session, mostly by trainers who were already running businesses and working. Youth beneficiaries noted that the training helped them see the realities of work, showed them how to prepare for work, and gave them hope for their careers. Internships and Job Placement K-YES, to various extents, assisted VTCs, especially those piloting CBET, by linking them to internships.11 The linkages were made through direct relationships with employers and informing them about the youth’s skills and needs, through youth bunges seeking internships, by sensitizing employers, and through the compact meetings established in the counties. Some youth reported receiving internships, while a substantial number said they were never placed, or were not able to take on the internships due to their inability to pay the transport costs. Of the 50 employers surveyed for this evaluation, 24 had taken interns from K-YES (a total of 60 male and 35 female interns), and the majority (20 of the 24) were satisfied with the interns’ work. Nine of them (38%) hired the interns afterward, and all but one of these said they were willing to continue hiring VTC graduates after internships. “K-YES only trained and left us like that. There was no internship. The organization seems to have just forgotten about us after training. There was no job placement after the training.” — Youth beneficiary, Nairobi In Kericho, the government, youth, VTCs, trainers and IP all reported that the compact (which had high private sector and government involvement) helped in increasing the availability of internships and jobs. For example, all masonry trainees in Kericho who were in the first cycle of CBET pilot course found jobs. A county government representative and VTCs in one county reported that the biggest achievement was training VTC managers and instructors on how to conduct job placements themselves, 10 As reported by youth, trainers and VTCs 11 As reported by government representatives, youth bunges, youth, and trainers manage attachments, and have good rapport with employers. However, across counties, a significant number of youth reported that they had to search for the internship and job placements themselves, without K-YES support. In Kwale, the number of internships and job placements is poorly documented and appeared to be quite low.12 According to the employer survey responses, the tourism industry has criteria such as language that can be challenging for the K-YES target groups to meet, while the big firms had numerous requirements, as reported by the VTC. The IP reported that they helped youth navigate through this as it came up. In Nairobi, stakeholders reported limited activity in linking youth to jobs and internship placements. When students were placed in internships, they struggled with transportation, and many eventually dropped out because they were unable to pay for transportation. Improving Market and Employment Information K-YES had sought to design a labor market information system. K-YES national staff note that initial attempts that focused on using information and communication technologies were not appropriate to the target group, with many youth having limited access. For example, K-YES had reportedly worked with GeoPoll to develop an SMS platform for sharing information with target youth. However, the platform had some problems, such as outdated information that was of no use. Respondents also reported that the target youth, in most cases, could not read or understand the texts sent. Due to such difficulties, K-YES changed its strategy to focus more on word-of-mouth using the YBFs and other networks. According to respondents, K-YES had tried to pass employment information to its beneficiaries, and RTI staff noted the program using opportunities like the ID card registration campaigns to increase information to youth. RTI staff in the counties also cited regular engagements with employers in which the program collected labor and market information, and K-YES partners in the counties contributed to generating labor and market information. According to the IP in Garissa, the County Compact meetings were another avenue through which K-YES collected labor market information. However, most beneficiaries believed that K-YES had done little to improve access to market and employment information because youth still had no clear channels for receiving information. Business Training and Financial Awareness Stream Curriculum K-YES developed a Learn to Earn (LTE) curriculum based on the IRC’s LTE curriculum. K-YES then conducted pre-test TOTs with trainers who then supported the rollout of the program’s business skills training in all the five counties. The county coordination team identified most of the trainers, who were independent consultants (“volunteers”), YBF members and community resource people. Trainers in Bungoma, Nairobi, Garissa and Kericho were happy with the curriculum because it embraced participatory learning over lecturing. The trainers felt the curriculum enabled them to impart knowledge and skills directly by encouraging the youth to participate in trainings. To the trainers, this form of training encouraged the youth to come up with their own ideas, and the trainer’s role was to guide and moderate. The LTE curriculum was more than just business skills, it included facilitation skills so that a trainer, realizing a student was weak, could work with the student on those practical skills. According to one respondent, “The training is of quality, some of the youths we have trained haven’t gone through schools and the Somali are a listening community so we use more talking and less writing. 12 This statement is based on the information available in the M&E database, which only listed 18 graduates of the housekeeping CBET, contrasting with the quarterly reporting data, and which did not include any data on tailoring graduates. However, the county coordinator confirmed in reviewing this report that all 30 graduates of housekeeping CBET had been placed in jobs or internships, and that 48 youth had graduated garment making or industrial tailoring training at Mabati Technical Training Institute and placed at Mobasa Apparels EPZ. We also try to change the training depending on the situation and use local examples because the training materials are in English, we have tried to make them more relatable to the local context.” However, beneficiaries felt the business management curriculum did not deliver what they wanted, which was to start businesses, but the curriculum did not meet this need. To them, the curriculum was about business management, meaning for people who were already in some sort of business, but not for students who are just starting. Trainers in all the counties also felt the curriculum addressed the needs of those already in some form of business, but not those hoping to start a business. Respondents felt that the duration of training contained in the curriculum affected the training quality. According to IP staff and a partner in charge of developing the LTE curriculum, initially the curriculum was meant to be covered in five days, but was shortened to three days and integrated with VSLA and other topics, such as gender and agribusiness. To beneficiaries and trainers, this greatly undermined the quality of the training, particularly considering the K-YES program’s target group, which requires participatory methods and time to absorb what the learning and application entail. A partner in developing the curriculum observed, “Three days is not ideal. We advised K-YES but the issue was resource and target constraints, which were huge. The pressure to reach targets was heavy.” Business Skills Training Beneficiaries reported receiving business skills training from K-YES and spoke of several topics that were covered, including investment, debt management, establishing a business, expanding a business, keeping records, and customer relations. According to one beneficiary, “We were trained on how to open a business and how to understand the profits or loss.” Another stated, “I was trained on business skills and how to continue with vegetable and grocery and retail shop business and how to make profits from business I was engaged in.” Another said, “I was trained in how to record profits and losses, and how to capture the customers and how to identify their needs so that you can get the right stuff for customers and how to plough back profits to expand the business.” The majority of respondents, including beneficiary youth, trainers, and YBF representatives, reported positive outcomes in the lives of many youth who received business skills training through K-YES. Some reported gaining new knowledge about business management, while others reported gaining motivation. According to one beneficiary, “Before the training, I was just at home doing nothing. After the training, I realized I can achieve something. I have now achieved so much and can say I am a successful woman. It has inspired me.” “Now I’ll find women calling me and telling me, ‘Now, teacher, I can keep records, and I know where my money goes, now at least I know how my business is operating. … I can keep my profit.’ … Sometimes it’s been hard on how to engage the customers, that’s another thing that has changed. They can call you and tell you, ‘Teacher, now I know how to communicate to my customers. Before I did not know.’” — K-YES Trainer in Nairobi Respondents also reported beneficiaries starting new businesses because of the training they had received, and some beneficiaries were managing their businesses better after receiving K-YES business skills training. According to a trainer in Bungoma, “We have youths who have already started their businesses. We have youth groups, those village youth bunge, who are doing their selling and joining associations.” Another trainer in Garissa stated, “Youths have changed in their perception. Even today, they are in kiosk business. Girls also know they can run businesses similar to men. The youths’ idleness has reduced.” Despite the reported positive outcomes of business skill trainings, respondents reported some issues. Respondents were apprehensive of K-YES treating youths between 18 and 35 years with less than form 4 education as a homogenous group. To them, this was not an appropriate approach because these youth had different needs. Some respondents felt that K-YES needed to train the youths who did not complete primary school separately from the youths who did not complete secondary school. They recommended that youths who did not complete primary-level education take a different program and after they achieve sufficient proficiency, join their counterparts who did not complete secondary school. The reason they stated for this is that some lessons, if applied directly to those who did not join secondary school, would be difficult for them to understand. Apart from disaggregating youths based on the level of education, some respondents felt that K-YES should disaggregate training based on the youths’ area of focus instead of grouping them all together. According to a beneficiary, “If you bring 50 youths together and you are training them on business skills, dreams of a colleague aren’t mine and yours aren’t mine and to would be good to categorize people as per their passion. Doing this kind of grouping would be healthy, so that they may do whatever they wish with passion, for example we got trainings from youths working on welding, others were mechanics, others hawkers and others farmers.” A government official and a VTC official in Kwale and trainers and VTC officials in Garissa all echoed this sentiment and felt it would be worthwhile to group the youths based on the trades they were undertaking. Some beneficiaries felt the three-day training was too short. Many beneficiaries and trainers expressed the belief that K-YES was “lumping” things together into three days just to get the numbers. In addition, many beneficiaries reported K-YES did not conduct follow-ups after the training, which they felt made it difficult for them to really internalize and practice what they had learned. There were references of K￾YES being a one-touch program, and bunge forums in all the five counties stated that the reason for the high number of one-off business skills training sessions was that K-YES was just trying to achieve its numerical targets. Furthermore, many respondents felt that K-YES lacked the “what next” in their program. Various groups felt the business skills training K-YES offered was insufficient on its own because the youths still needed extra support in getting loans, grants, materials or equipment to start their businesses. According to one beneficiary in Garissa, “We find the training ok because we acquired skills, however, they just left us after the training.” Financial Awareness Respondents reported that K-YES raised awareness of financial services available to the youth and cited K-YES inviting government officials from Access to Government Procurement Opportunities (AGPO), the Youth Enterprise Development Fund, the Women Enterprise Development Fund, and the Uwezo Fund to participate in K-YES forums to educate youth on the processes and procedures to access such funds. According to a beneficiary in Kwale, “People from Uwezo fund came and taught on where to go for finance and those has increased their knowledge and their life skills have improved. Their business skills have also increased a lot and their lives have changed.” Training sessions about the nature and ways to access government-related affirmative funds were conducted to selected youth bunge leaders first, who were then expected to mobilize and train youth in their wards on the AGPO processes and procedures. Respondents also reported K-YES raising awareness about financial services through partnerships with microfinance institutions — Yehu Microfinance Trust in Kwale and KUKU Faida in Bungoma were such microenterprises. According to a microfinance official in Kwale, K-YES held sensitization classes with their organization on how to improve delivery of financial services to youth within the K-YES target group. K-YES also formed partnerships with larger financial institutions like the Kenya Commercial Bank Foundation (KCBF), with which it signed a Memorandum of Understanding. KCBF also operates a youth empowerment project called Tujiajiri with a goal to empower and equip unemployed and out-of-school youth to grow microenterprises by providing them with technical skills training opportunities as well as up-skilling, and certifying existing microentrepreneurs who want to move their businesses from the informal sector to the formal sector. Specifically, in Bungoma and Kericho, respondents cited KCBF’s training for beneficiaries on financing from banks and the requirements. According to one KCBF official, the foundation had given the beneficiaries about 10 – 12 million Kenya shillings in Bungoma for soya agribusiness. However, respondents in Garissa cited challenges with the K-YES partnerships with financial service providers because in Garissa County, very few sharia-compliant institutions exist where youth can access loans and other financial services. Interviews with the IP and a government official revealed that K-YES had opted to work with the Youth Bunge SACCO and through VSLAs activities to ensure youth within its target group have access to financial services. Capacity Development of the Youth Bunge SACCOs Respondents reported efforts by K-YES to increase access to financial services for youth by building the capacity of the Youth Bunge SACCOs in all five counties so that they could better serve the needs of the targeted youths. The SACCOs in all five counties reported receiving training, especially the management team to improve management capacity while providing quality services to the members. According to a Bunge SACCO official in Garissa, they also received training in governance and leadership roles during these sessions. Another Bunge SACCO official in Kwale said that K-YES helped in institutional strengthening and ensuring their systems and process were up to date, especially when they were applying for a grant. K-YES conducted an organizational capacity assessment as part of institutional strengthening, according to respondents from the Bunge SACCOs. The assessment was intended to be a precursor to already￾earmarked grants that all the Bunge SACCOs were to receive. However, at the time of this evaluation, none of the Bunge SACCOs in the five counties had received a grant from K-YES. Village Savings and Loan Associations One way that K-YES sought to increase access to financial services for its beneficiaries was through the concept of Voluntary Savings and Loan Associations (VSLA). K-YES developed a VSLA manual and trained TOTs to roll out the curricula, and monitor new loans and the health of VSLAs. The VSLA manual was adapted to suit the program’s youth target groups by reducing its size, simplifying it, and Africanizing the content, according to IP staff and a partner involved in the manual development. (For example, the original manual was developed for Lebanon and used Lebanese examples and pictures.) The VSLA’s title was also changed from village to voluntary to be more inclusive of urban and rural participants and to remove the stigma that youth associated with a village methodology. To IP staff and partners in its development, the manual targets both existing groups and new groups. Trainers pre-assess the target trainees so they can choose the sections or modules that are most relevant for their target group. The first section of the manual targets pre-VSLA activities, such as identifying target groups, needs assessments, and mobilization, while the last sections cover sample forms and record-keeping tools used in VSLA management, along with sections to complete weekly follow-up actions. To trainers, the VSLA manual had several flaws. One problem is that it presumed a specific structure for VSLAs that pre-existing community groups, selected to receive the VSLA training, often did not fit. A second issue was that the training provided to groups was too short to cover the process as outlined in the manual. A trainer in Kericho explained, “We’re supposed to send community facilitators to the ground, and do community assessment and facilitation on the ground … But we don’t do this, and we skip all that in the manual …” This issue was compounded by the fact that training for VSLAs was initially conducted in three days, but was later merged with business skills training and gender facilitation into a single three-day training. This meant the total time allocated for training on VSLA issues was less than a single day. Beneficiaries in all the counties spoke of receiving VSLA training from K-YES. For example, in Kericho, beneficiaries reported starting a VSLA group with 20 members within three weeks of receiving K-YES training. They are running a merry-go-round. In Garissa, beneficiaries also reported starting a VSLA after receiving K-YES training on how to start and manage a VSLA. However, it emerged from discussion from beneficiaries of VSLA training and other stakeholders that these groups still have a long way to go before becoming self-sufficient. Beneficiaries reported that K￾YES was not following up with the VSLAs they had helped establish or strengthen to monitor their progress. To beneficiaries, this was likely to make many of these associations collapse with the exit of K￾YES. There were attempts to work with existing groups in all five counties, but it was challenging to make already-established groups fit the K-YES program’s target group criteria because pre-existing groups were of mixed composition. Respondents cited dropping members from a group who did not meet the K-YES target group requirements or members starting a new group so they could meet the requirements. In such cases, respondents recommended that K-YES waive some of its requirements, especially in pre-existing groups because having people with over form 4 education (and in some cases, over age 35 years), even though a minority, was in itself a strength for the group. K-YES had planned to link the VSLAs it supported to other financial service providers, such as SACCOs and banks, to ensure their sustainability. However, all VSLA officials interviewed noted that K-YES had not yet linked them to any financial service provider. According to a VSLA in Kericho, “We don’t yet have enough savings to give out loans, and we are still establishing … we have not yet been linked to a SACCO, but hope to. We were told by the trainer that K-YES would provide access to loans we progressed.” Agricultural/Agribusiness Stream The implementing partner, RTI, noted that agribusiness as a sector presented emerging opportunities in the counties for youth to participate and create incomes for themselves, thus K-YES embarked on promoting agribusiness training in all five Phase One counties. From interviews and documentation, K-YES promoted agribusiness using two strategies: offering agricultural CBET courses, and including agribusiness as part of an integrated package for entrepreneurship development training. The December 2016 quarterly progress report for Bungoma County states that the poultry course was offered as a CBET course, with the pilot course offered at Mabanga Agricultural Training Center with 50 initial registrants — 34 males and six females, while 20 females and 6 males enrolled and completed the training.13 Some of these were attached to farms for practical learning. The reports show that three-day courses in agriculture (poultry farming, dairy farming, and sweet potato and indigenous vegetable farming) were also rolled out and bundled with business training. 13 P4 of December 2016 report for Bungoma County. However, RTI leadership, in reviewing this evaluation, noted that the actual number of poultry CBET participants were 26: 20 females and 6 males who enrolled and completed the trainings, also reported in the February 2017 report for Bungoma County. Three respondents in Bungoma (two trainers and one IP) mentioned that youth were trained successfully in the various courses outside of a VTC (sweet potato and indigenous vegetables farming). The IP in Bungoma also reported that the value chain approach was being piloted. A group was trained on soya production and had been linked to BIDCO, which would buy the produce and also provide the inputs to the youth, while KCBF was linked to provide capital. KCBF said that if this succeeded in Bungoma, it would also test it in Kericho. The process had just started, and it was too early to evaluate the outcomes. Many youth interviewed in Kericho reported that they had taken three-day business training coupled with agricultural training and were able to apply the skills. Ninety-nine percent of the youth surveyed were satisfied with the agricultural training they received, and 95 percent had applied the training. Interviews with the youth corroborated that many reportedly started businesses immediately after training and had some income diversification. The youth trained in sweet potato farming had also been provided with vines for planting, which they successfully planted, harvested and sold. Youth in both counties reported that they were not assisted in marketing as promised, and they were concerned that their products would not sell if their immediate market were flooded with the product. Female youth in Kericho and Bungoma reported that the issue of access to land was a challenge for them to apply their agricultural training because their culture does not allow young, unmarried women to own land. Some youth reported that they had not been able to farm because of this. K-YES leadership noted they were aware of this issue and were encouraging such youth to involve themselves in other value chain activities that did not require land. Links to Other Youth Service Organizations and Projects K-YES has made partnerships within each county, and sometimes at a national level, with organizations and USAID projects with similar or complementary missions. It appeared that K-YES had been effective in doing this, though most partnerships were still in an early stage. The partnership with KCBF described in the agricultural section of this report is an example of this and appears promising, but it is still untested until the first round of youth repays their loans. The United States Government integration model was applied in Kwale County, thus all youth-related USAID-funded projects make a particular effort to refer youth to each other. Representatives of different projects made sure to invite others to their event and to attend the events of others, where they could make a short announcement about the programs they had available. The main benefit of this regarding K-YES was that it helped youth to become more aware of the different services available to them. This appears to be a good practice. For example, Kwale government staff observed a high level of cooperation amongst the different youth related programs. However, K-YES already appeared to be somewhat effective in working with other youth-related efforts or efforts that complemented K-YES, such as Kenya Agricultural Value Chain Enterprises (KAVES). Therefore, it was an additional enhancement instead of a radical shift. Sustainability (Crosscutting) According to its Sustainability Plan, K-YES was designed to ensure sustainability through designing project activities that would build local capacity, cultivate ownership, and grow platforms that empower partners to operate, coordinate and drive collective action. To that end, K-YES has undertaken activities to build partner capacity, especially of VTCs and of the YBFs, with plans to build capacity of youth bunge SACCOs also. In each county, Youth Employment Compacts are a major platform aimed at sustaining collective action on youth employment. The K-YES sustainability plan (as articulated) addresses most of the program’s vocational components. Specifically aligning employers, VTCs, and the government; introducing CBET curriculum; and building VTC capacity to deliver training that is more oriented toward the needs of the job market all have a clear path to sustainability and are moving in the right direction. The speed of movement varies by county — governments tend to move slowly, especially on mobilizing resources, and VTC capacity was lower than expected. More detail on these activities can be found in the findings section on vocational training. Some K-YES components do not have a clear path to sustainability. Trainers who largely implement the business training are directly hired (compensated per training delivered) and trained by K-YES, with no means to continue after the program ends. The financial support K-YES offered to youth to attend short courses at the VTC (youth who were unable to finish secondary school) is unlikely to be substituted in most cases, meaning that most youth in this target group will not be able to attend after K-YES stops providing these sponsorships. The long-term viability of VSLAs started through K-YES is also questionable without further training and mentoring. The timeline is a challenge to sustainability. Even when partnerships look promising, most are still in the early stages. It makes sense to clarify what partnerships and capacities might look like at the exit stage and recognize that different counties might need different engagement durations. Partnerships Working through partners has been the primary strategy for realizing sustainability from K-YES. The program has also performed a substantial amount of work in building the capacity of VTCs at a managerial level and in instruction skills and curricula. It has provided training to YBFs, led a strategic planning process and, at the time of this evaluation, had just issued grants to Bunges to implement their plans. Interviews with partners across the counties showed high willingness overall to engage with K￾YES and an appreciation of the program’s aims. One overall challenge (discussed further under EQ 2) is the high level of ongoing communication this requires, which appears to have been very challenging for K-YES to maintain consistently across all partners. For example, an employer from Kericho commented, “They have shown us very low interaction levels and they don't even visit us. They have no consistent contact persons we know of.” Table 2 summarizes the sustainability prospects by partner type, based on the evidence this evaluation collected, including the partners’ stated intention to continue and their apparent capacity, and their links and relationships to other key actors. The potential per type often varies because the capacity and orientation of individual partners varies within each type. TABLE 2: SUSTAINABILITY PROSPECTS BY PARTNER TYPE Partner Role Potential for sustaining activities County Government Support to VTCs, policy, political will/leadership on youth employment Variable by county: high in Kericho, low in Nairobi VTCs Provision of vocational training, supporting youth to be work-ready, VTC partnership with industry/ Linking CBET graduates to industry Most report intent to continue life skills training, CBET, and shorter, more practical courses; some plan to maintain links to employers for internship placement. Varied capacities will influence likely outcomes (depending on government support). Partner Role Potential for sustaining activities Employers Industry continuous engagement with VTC, Taking on interns, mentoring youth, providing jobs, input into curriculum Varied depending on whether employer needs are met by vocational graduates, sense of corporate social responsibility Youth Bunge Forums Mobilization of youth for various K-YES components, ID registration campaign YBFs intend to continue — the degree to which they would support activities related to K-YES mandate is less assured Youth Bunge SACCOs Provision of youth-friendly financial services (but links to K-YES youth still weak) Limited, unproven; depends on their capacity to address high default rates VSLAs Some pre-existing, some newly formed because of K-YES training. Role to provide small-scale savings and loans to members, potential for income generation projects, and links to larger institutions K-YES training largely judged insufficient in duration and depth to lead to sustainable VSLAs. Not currently following the practices/stages set out in the manuals because of lack of time Gender equity facilitators Deliver gender training, which is now integrated into business skills or life skills training modules Gender issues may be taken up/integrated by VTCs and government departments, but no sustainability strategy for gender facilitation done through the business skills component Business/VSLA trainers Delivery of business skills, financial awareness and VSLA training Trainers independently hired by K-YES, currently no prospect for sustainability Other development actors/projects Varies by county, most partnerships are still quite new. Balloon Ventures, KCBF, KAVES, OVC project: quite a bit of promise Only if K-YES links the development project with another partner, most likely with the county YBF (as in Garissa, where YBF is linked to AKF) Youth Employment Compacts A critical part of the K-YES program’s sustainability rested on the formation and growth of Youth Employment Compacts. Each county was to have a compact that would facilitate collaboration, reduce information breakdowns, leverage meaningful commitments, and prepare young people for the work environment. The compact is composed of a county government representative, private, and civil society stakeholders meant to work together toward improving youth employment. The extent to which the Compacts have been realized varies across the counties. Initial meetings took place in all the counties, and some formed subcommittees around specific sectors. The strongest compact process is in Kericho because of the engagement of key county government officials and the private sector. Their goal is to have it running under local control by October, and they believe they are on track to meet this date. Furthermore, private employers have already pledged to provide in-kind support to VTCs, and the deputy governor hopes to use the linkages to find ways of linking private mentors to youth entering their sectors. The Compact is less developed in Kwale, but it appears promising, according to both government staff and IP staff. In Nairobi, Bungoma and Garissa, getting government buy-in has reportedly been more difficult, and K-YES coordinators are now seeking to position the Compacts to be led by the private sector. In short, the Compact appears to be a viable concept, though it is uncertain whether it will work in all contexts. Furthermore, it will take some time and experimentation to find the right combination of linkages in each county, a process in which K-YES appeared engaged. Gender (Crosscutting) Objective 5 of K-YES (Gender Equity) states, “Gender equity and equality are integrated into all aspects of program design, implementation and monitoring and evaluation (M&E).” The program accomplished this partly by conducting a gender assessment in each county and identifying about four key gender issues in each, specifically focusing on gendered barriers to accessing the labor market. Issues identified that cut across counties included time poverty among young mothers, women lacking collateral to access loans, and gender division of labor following traditional norms of men’s work and women’s work. K-YES also considered the needs of persons with disabilities (PWD) along with gender considerations and did so through the same mechanisms. K-YES had a dedicated gender specialist at the national level focusing on these issues, though this position is due for phase out. Actions that K-YES took to integrate gender issues fall into three main areas: 1. Integrating gender into K-YES training 2. Gender advocacy to community leaders and partners 3. Adjusting program implementation to address gendered barriers to participation This evaluation considers the status, results, and effectiveness of each of these issues in the next sections. Integrating Gender into Training Modules K-YES recruited gender equity facilitators in 2016 and trained them through a three-day training-of￾trainers course. The topics covered included an introduction to gender, gender-sensitive programming, gender analysis, gender-based discrimination and violence, inclusion of people with disabilities, and advocacy. Participants also learned facilitation skills. Most trainers reported satisfaction with the training and made some suggestions to expand the course with more practical examples. They also noted that a refresher course would have been in order. Most gender facilitators have no institutional affiliation because K-YES recruited them directly, though some are youth bunge members. Furthermore, K-YES also trained some government staff to be K-YES gender facilitators — this was reported in Bungoma, for example. As reported in the K-YES program’s first annual report, the program began integrating gender discussions into all existing training curricula at the start of 2017 rather than delivering separate gender training. At this point, all K-YES trainers received gender training, while some gender facilitators also received the business and financial awareness training-of-trainers. At the time of this evaluation, trainers reported that gender was integrated (along with training on business management and VSLA groups) into a standard, three-day curriculum that they called “K-YES training.” Gender was the focus of the third full day of training. As described by one of the gender trainers, the sessions covered “Various aspects of gender including the role that women and men play within their family and society, the position of certain genders in their communities, and at what point or what level can they be made to have equal roles. The training goes beyond the content and goes toward the attitude that we have as men on certain issues of gender.” Youth response to the gender training varied by county, and some trainers reported high interest and engagement because many youth could relate to the topic and would sometimes seek personal advice. However, trainers generally said it was difficult to know the training’s impact because of the nature of the topic. Some had observed that men seemed to change their attitudes on women’s roles by the end of the training. Others were concerned that although gender training raised issues, it did not do much in offering solutions. Within VTCs, gender training was integrated into the career counseling and life skills training sessions offered to most of the youth within the K-YES vocational stream. Many youth, both men and women, reported that they found the training empowering and motivating because it emphasized choosing what they love to do most rather than what society or their parents directed them to do. Young women were particularly encouraged to consider going into traditionally male vocations, such as plumbing and motor vehicle mechanics, and some chose to do so. VTCs noted there girls were now joining male￾dominated courses, including in Garissa, where the cultural barriers for women are higher. In Kericho and Nairobi, VTCs highlighted the experiences of female youth who are taking nontraditional courses to demonstrate to other female youth that it is possible. Gender Advocacy to Community Leaders and Partners Community leaders were trained on gender issues in Kwale and Garissa. Gender facilitators in Kericho suggested its community leaders should receive the same training because it is hard to change community gender dynamics without including everyone. K-YES has also advocated for gender and PWD policies and strategies in VTCs and within county government. Kwale has a high number of PWD, but no VTCs are able to enroll them. K-YES made efforts to lobby for vocational training options for PWD and provided special training to some VTC staff on how to teach the blind. Although it is hard to assess the longer-term outcome of such efforts, they appeared to be gaining some traction within institutions, and many key informants welcomed these efforts and saw them as greatly needed. Gender Responsiveness in Program Delivery K-YES implementers spoke often of the need to respond to gender needs in their program delivery. For example, the Nairobi K-YES staff spoke of encouraging VTCs to provide childcare and considering the physical accessibility of VTCs regarding location. The decision to devolve training delivery and allow the trainers to negotiate training times with their trainees also reduced the barriers to youth participation that tend to be highest for parents, particularly young mothers. However, such efforts appeared to be incomplete, and many youth still reported barriers to participation, especially for vocational training. This was mostly due to distances and higher participation costs (both direct and in terms of opportunity cost) that again tended to affect parents and especially mothers. CONCLUSION: TO WHAT EXTENT AND HOW HAS THE PROGRAM BEEN EFFECTIVE IN ACHIEVING ITS INTENDED RESULTS? At the time of this evaluation, K-YES had been implementing activities for about one year, so many aspects — especially regarding partnership development and capacity building — were still quite recent. The program has also made ongoing adjustments throughout this year, meaning that this first phase is understood best as a pilot. It has managed to meet most of its target numbers, though often at the expense of quality. It has had greater reach and greater positive outcomes for youth with its business skills training, which is partly attributable to the short duration of training and the low barriers to putting actions into practice. It has encouraged some youth to take up vocations traditionally considered off-limits to their gender, but still has some gender barriers to participation, mainly related to costs and timing. Financial service links remain undeveloped, as are the mentorship component and the job market information component. Evaluation Question 2: How well did the implementer(s) adapt to challenges and changing circumstances? Challenges Encountered and Responses The findings in this section are derived from two data sources: interviews with K-YES staff and stakeholders (including youth beneficiaries), and a review of K-YES program documentation. Although the initial analysis was conducted on a county basis, almost all the challenges identified occurred across counties. Each county has its own dynamic with respect to partner relations, the strength of the county government role, the nature and size of the formal and informal economies, and religious and cultural issues, but the same program challenges are noted. What seems to differ are the details and the degree of overall optimism people express toward the program. For example, youth in Kwale and youth in Kericho raised the same concerns, but youth in Kericho appeared more positive overall about the benefits they could gain from the program, despite these challenges. Findings that answer this question are presented in two parts. The first part considers the key challenges encountered to date (as identified in documentation or by interview respondents) and the K-YES response to these challenges. The second part considers the existing program structures and processes (formal or informal) and their adequacy in the face of these challenges and role in addressing them to date. This leads to conclusions and recommendations. Key Term Description of Challenge and Responses Age/education criteria Challenge: A number of challenges were noted regarding the K-YES criterion that beneficiaries must be between the ages of 18 and 35 with less than secondary school completion. This criterion was seen as too restrictive among some partners, including VTCs and the YBFs, and this appeared to be the source of some tension. Those arguing for a broader inclusion criteria note that no alternative program was available for those who had completed form 4, although their needs were also high (especially for those unable to continue to further education). Also, many YBF members do not meet the K-YES criteria, potentially weakening its position as an effective advocate/voice for K-YES beneficiaries and creating risks of conflict of interest when identifying and mobilizing beneficiaries for K-YES. Across counties, it was noted that some people outside the target group were “sneaking in” (mainly those with form 4 completion and some older participants). Response: To date, the program’s main response was to introduce a vetting system to validate age and education using follow-up phone calls from the head office in Nairobi, and checking the numeric code on IDs to determine date of birth. In some counties, K-YES representatives said they emphasized that the McKinsey Generations program targets form 4 completers and would be coming to the county eventually. Certification Challenge: Graduates of existing pilot courses and other shortened CBET-style courses are not graduating with certificates, though K-YES has been working to get its CBET curriculum officially approved. Lacking certificates weakens their employability because they have no evidence to show employers that they received training. Response: K-YES is working on the certification issue (as described in the findings under EQ 1), though it appears likely to be a protracted process. Meanwhile, some youth report being promised certificates of completion, but not receiving them. Youth are also encouraged to enroll and take NITA exams, though the youth must bear the costs of the examinations, which many cannot manage. Communication Challenge: Inconsistent or lacking communication on behalf of K-YES was a major issue reported by government representatives, VTCs, youth, and employers to some degree across counties, most severely in Bungoma and Nairobi. Specific examples include K-YES enrolling vocational trainees and informing them that they would pay all the tuition, then changing the policy halfway through, leaving trainees halfway into their courses without the means to pay; trainees being told they would be placed in internships, and then not hearing anything; and various reported examples of K-YES beginning a communication with a partner and then not following up for a long time (more than five months). The reasons for this appear to be sudden changes in K-YES policy, especially related to budgeting, staff turnover, the fast pace of the project and Key Term Description of Challenge and Responses relatively few K-YES staff on the ground to maintain communication with partners. In some cases, this led to distrust among partners and even conflict between parents and VTCs, who assumed a VTC must have taken the tuition fees that they understood K-YES to have promised to their children. Response: This problem originated from K-YES in most cases, and K-YES had not addressed it. In one case in Nairobi, some youth reported that they had been told there was an internal issue of mismanagement within K-YES and it was being sorted out, but they never heard anything more, and the issue was not resolved. Employers Challenge: Coordinators in several counties noted that employer expectations were hard to meet and sometimes did not match youth capacity. This includes formal human resource requirements for formal education and certification, and requirements for other documents. Relatedly, some employers — especially in hospitality and tourism — have seasonal fluctuations in human resource requirements. Response: K-YES is well set-up in many ways to deal with this issue through engagement agreements with employers, consulting employers in curriculum development, and the county Youth Employment Compacts. Sometimes, county coordinators could advocate directly for their youth, convincing employers to waive formal certification requirements and adopt their own assessment criteria. Loans/capital Challenge: The single greatest demand from youth is to improve access to loans and capital, despite K-YES efforts to connect youth to loans (mainly achieved through VSLA mobilization). This expressed need appears to have various dimensions: limited availability of suitable financial options, a distrust of group loaning mechanisms, a distrust of existing loan options as inaccessible or likely to lead to default and negative consequences, and a desire for “easy options,” such as loans that will not have consequences for defaulters. Response: K-YES has a formal program component addressing access to finance (evaluated under EQ 1 above). It reports that youth-friendly options are low, and it was in the process of giving grants to youth SACCOs to strengthen their operations. However, opinions across stakeholders suggest that this issue requires more attention and resources and is rather complex. Payments Challenge: Several challenges were widely reported from program partners and youth participants across all counties. One challenge was in the slowness in processing M-Pesa payments to program participants as reimbursement for transportation costs. Another was in changes in payment policies, sometimes made abruptly and with poor communication (as previously noted). Specifically, payments to cover student tuition at VTCs were reportedly set at KES 15,000, then KES 10,000, then KES 5,000, and students were asked to make up the shortfall, sometimes after they were already enrolled. Bunge SACCOs similarly reported awaiting grant awards, but had not had communication for about three months regarding the delays. These delays were reportedly resulting in tension and distrust in the communities because youth sometimes assumed that their trainers had kept the money. The delays also created difficulties for youth who had to borrow money to cover transportation fees to reach the training sites. Response: K-YES is aware of the issues with M-Pesa payments and was reportedly improving its processes. However, on the ground, delayed payments were reported as a continuing issue up to the present. Officially, changes were made to K-YES sponsorship rates because enrollment rates were high enough to demonstrate that the shortened VTC courses were proven and had generated demand. Poverty versus cost of participation Challenge: Poverty is a major barrier to attending vocational training and completing testing for many K-YES target youth (i.e., those who did not manage to complete secondary school). Even if full or partial sponsorship is in place for the Key Term Description of Challenge and Responses training itself, financial barriers also lead to many youth being unable to complete internships or take tests. Although government bursaries nominally exist, they are largely allocated to secondary students, not paid out, or the amounts paid out are nominal (except for Garissa, where the government fully funds VTC tuition). Response: Addressing financial barriers to attendance and test-taking was mentioned in the K-YES Contract (P8 of K-YES Contract Section C), but it was reportedly not anticipated in the program design, and K-YES sponsorship of registrants was introduced only in response to initially low enrollment rates. The K￾YES program’s official position is that now the value of vocational training is proven and they no longer need to cover the full costs, but many partners across counties question this assertion and state that without sponsorship, many of the target youth will be unable to attend. Indeed, many youth drop out of secondary school because of poverty and inability to pay fees. Variations in youth capacity/learning speed/motivation Challenges: Trainers noted challenges that are due to the youths’ varied attitudes and learning capacities, which, in turn, are linked to the varied backgrounds of those in the program’s target demographic. This means some youth need more time to learn than others (the three-day trainings are short, even for very fast learners), and sometimes youth have addiction or behavioral issues that need addressed. Response: K-YES has some capacity to address these needs, but it is very rarely customized to the needs of specific, individual youth. Some of the K-YES program components, such as life skills training, appear to address some of these issues, but they might not always be sufficient. Similarly, there is some partnership and referral to other youth services, but it is not consistently applied throughout the program and is sometimes reported to be insufficient. K-YES has adjusted the training curricula to be more accessible to youth with lower levels of education, but the training periods are fixed and are widely reported to be too brief. Adequacy of Existing Program Systems to Respond The review of challenges and K-YES responses to date shows the capacity of existing program structures and systems to respond effectively within their given contexts. This section reviews key elements of the K-YES system and their capacity to work effectively and responsively to deliver K-YES. Role of county staff: The county staff has a critical role in the program, often problem solving and field testing K-YES approaches, though the original K-YES design did not envision this role. One of the program’s strengths is the apparently high capacity and relationship skills of its county coordinators and assistant coordinators, and it has given them enough flexibility to adapt the program to county realities.14 However, the frequent communication issues that partners raised suggests that staff are overburdened, which is amplified by the need to find personal, ad hoc solutions to issues that arise (for example, when youth need additional support to meet employer requirements during formal hiring processes). This evaluation confirms the importance of the K-YES program’s decision to place two additional staff at the county level. Another key consideration is finding ways to capture the county coordinators’ solutions and institutionalize them for consistency, and to make sure that staff workloads remain manageable. County ecosystem assessment: The broad consensus among those consulted in this evaluation is that K-YES had appropriately adapted to the counties’ needs, particularly in identifying relevant employment sectors, opportunities and partners. The county ecosystem assessment was also an 14 As noted in interviews with various stakeholders at the county level, including government staff, VTC staff, YBF representatives and county coordinators themselves. effective means of beginning to engage with partners, though the lag between the assessment and follow￾up was sometimes noted. Kwale and Garissa are counties where further adaption appeared necessary, but not fully addressed by the ecosystem assessment, particularly with respect to the limited sharia￾compliant finance options in Garissa. M&E system: The K-YES M&E system is extensive. Many trainers and bunge members reported participating in monitoring activities, and there are positive examples of the system leading to decisions to respond to challenges. Examples include the decision to devolve business training from wards to the sublocation level to reach more youth, and the decision to sponsor youth to attend vocational training. However, some negative tendencies are associated with the M&E system, mainly with its focus on meeting preset, time-bound numerical targets. For example, in some reported cases, a new tranche of youth mobilized for training before the previous one received internships, and concerns were raised over very short training durations for business training, both of which suggest that the drive to meet targets has tended to favor quantity over quality and short-term numerical results over building sustainability. Another issue that emerges clearly is that the monitoring system is currently captured by manually entering data in Excel with numerous errors and typing inconsistencies. Although K-YES has a formal definition of employment, its databases do not use consistent or clearly defined terminology when tracking employment outcomes from youth or referring to its training. Some duplication and inclusion of youth who did not receive K-YES services within the databases were also noted across counties, suggesting that greater attention needs to be placed on data quality control and validation. At the least, standard terminology needs to be used for K-YES services delivered and the types of employment outcomes tracked. Engagement with youth: K-YES has a strong, stated commitment to the principle of “continuous youth engagement,” but this translates somewhat unevenly in practice. Broadly, K-YES is clearly meeting a huge need for the target youth and is greatly appreciated. However, the program’s target population is large and heterogeneous, but the program does very little to respond to differing youth capacities and needs within this group. Mobilization of youth is normally driven by the quarterly targets in county work plans, which specify the number of youth “required” for a specific training or workshop, with attempts to balance these by gender and ward. This limits the program’s responsiveness to specific youth needs and means support often appears to end abruptly after a target is met, without follow-through. This does not allow the program to consider whether a specific youth or group of youth is at a stage where they should “graduate” from K-YES support. Youth representation: YBFs are the main means of youth representation/voice within K-YES. For example, they usually hold a seat on the Youth Employment Compacts and are also the key mobilizers within K-YES, widely noted as capable of providing fast, effective mobilization of youth down to the village level. However, YBF executive members typically have higher levels of education that the K-YES target group, so they are not direct representatives of the target group’s interests. During this evaluation, some expressed commitment to advocating on behalf on this target group, but others conveyed frustration or resentment that they could not benefit from K-YES themselves, and some expressed unsympathetic opinions of the target youth. Combined with widespread observations (mainly from trainers) that YBF mobilizers were sometimes favoring their villages or friends and were enrolling people who did not meet the criteria, this suggests that at present, YBFs are not the strongest channel for accurately representing K-YES youth perspectives. Partner leveraging/communication to partners: Work to leverage partners involving clearly defined processes, such as the ecosystem assessment or aspects of the compact development, have included protocols for consultation that appear to result in good communication and positive relationship building. By contrast, communication during program activities is widely reported to be problematic. Commonly reported communication issues include a lack of follow-up, a sudden break in communication, failure to follow through on a previous verbal commitment, and failure to communicate why. Also noted was failure to communicate expectations clearly. Reimbursement policy and systems: As noted in the challenges discussion, K-YES has made some changes in its reimbursement policy, and at times inconsistencies across counties. As reported in various anecdotes across the counties, reducing reimbursement quantities midstream and/or delaying payments tends to create a variety of problems, including distrust, conflict, and demotivation among K-YES partners and beneficiaries. Furthermore, the official K-YES stance regarding initial sponsorship of students only as proof of concept of the training does not appear to be evidence-based because many target youths simply do not have the ability to pay. CONCLUSION: HOW WELL DID THE IMPLEMENTER(S) ADAPT TO CHALLENGES AND CHANGING CIRCUMSTANCES? K-YES has experienced a range of challenges, such as issues with certifying vocation courses, weaknesses in communication, and employer expectations. Many of these challenges are not readily categorized as either fully internal to the program or external, but could be better characterized as a disconnect between program expectations and processes and encountered needs. Even challenges that are mostly because of internal bottlenecks (such as widespread delays in processing M-Pesa payments to participants) appear largely because the issue or demand had not been fully anticipated. In this first year of K-YES implementation, the pressure to meet targets has strained systems, leading to numerous communication issues and some abrupt changes in policy that caused confusion or difficulties among partners. There have been numerous mismatches and errors along the way, but in most cases, mechanisms were in place to identify these and efforts were made to correct them. The K-YES program’s key challenges now are to make sure that the program’s design and structures going forward fully encapsulate these lessons, and to find ways to better balance expectations with resources. Evaluation Question 3: What types of jobs have youth beneficiaries gained and what are their perceptions of these new opportunities? From the youth survey, 45 percent of youth reported being self-employed, and 35 percent report being unemployed (with 61 percent of these looking for work or self-employment), 16 percent have wage employment, and the rest (i.e. 4 percent) are working in a family business or other arrangement. Most youth report being engaged in either retail (33 percent), agriculture (27 percent) or hospitality (8 percent), with the rest covering a wide variety of other sectors. The survey of beneficiary youth found impressive results noted in reported changes in average income, as shown in Table 3. Overall, 60 percent of youth reported at least some increase in average monthly income, with a little more than half of these reporting an increase of more than KES 3,000 per month. Comparing youth who received business training, vocational training, or both, it appears that the business training yields better results than vocational training, and the combined business and vocational training has the greatest impact by far — 85 percent of youth who received both types of training reported improved income. There was no notable difference between genders. TABLE 3: HAS THE AVERAGE AMOUNT OF MONEY YOU MAKE EACH MONTH CHANGED IN THE LAST 12 MONTHS? Change in monthly income Type of Training Received Business only Vocational only Business & vocational Overall f fi (%) f fi (%) f fi (%) f fi (%) Decreased > KES 3,000 2 0 1 1 1 1 4 0 Decreased < KES 3,000 23 3 10 6 8 4 41 4 No change 135 20 66 37 20 10 221 21 Increased < KES 3,000 154 23 55 31 80 41 289 28 Increased > KES 3,000 196 30 46 26 85 44 327 32 Totals 664 142 178 100 194 100 1,036 100 Note: f = frequency; fi = Relative frequency Examining the reasons reported for improved income, most respondents (68 percent) said it was because of expansions in their business or increased business profitability. Even for youth who had received only vocational training, 63 percent attributed their increased income to business expansion, whereas 19 percent of those with vocational training reported their income increased because they had a new job (compared with 5 percent of those who received only business training and 10 percent who received both). Although some of these differences might be due to the initial targeting and recruitment of youth, the clear takeaway from this is that most opportunities for increasing income are being realized through the expansion of existing self-employment strategies. Although these gains are impressive, most youth (both male and female) report that they are not fully satisfied with their current incomes (Table 4), and about half are struggling to meet their current expenses. Many of the youth also reported that follow-up after training was not done, but they say they would have needed it. The lack of follow-up has potential to undermine the gains demonstrated by the eagerness of the youth to implement the skills learned and has an effect on how sustainable these enterprises can be in the future. TABLE 4: FINDINGS FROM YOUTH SURVEY: HOW SATISFIED ARE YOU WITH YOUR CURRENT WORK SITUATION? Reported satisfaction Type of Training Received Gender Business Vocational Business and vocational female male N % N % N % N % N % Not at all satisfied 57 11 19 11 18 9 44 9 51 12 Somewhat satisfied 196 38 79 45 70 36 181 39 172 41 Satisfied 236 46 76 43 78 40 208 45 175 42 Very satisfied 21 4 3 2 28 14 33 7 18 4 Totals 510 100 177 100 194 100 466 100 416 100 This evaluation also gathered a breadth and depth of qualitative data through 21 individual youth profile interviews and 11 group interviews with K-YES beneficiaries representing youth who had vocational training, business training, or both, and youth who had reported either positive impacts or no impacts. The findings are consistent with and corroborate the survey, and add some depth and nuance to the factors that allow youth to positively draw on K-YES training and the factors that limit them from fully leveraging this training into increased earnings. “I have a small hotel business I’ve been running for four years. The money I get isn’t much but I divide it and reduce expenditure so that I can meet my needs. Through the K-YES training I learnt about recordkeeping which has really helped me save money and be able to pay fees for my child, something that I wasn’t able to do previously. When K-YES taught us the skills, they told us how important it is to ensure that whatever you do can be done to the best, to ensure that we strive to ensure that we make money and always save. They taught us to aim for something. Now I look at the kind of business my friends do, I was like that before…just doing something to ensure there was money. Not looking at what I was making, not saving…just ‘living’. But now I do the business because I know the importance of the hotel. This has really made the hotel grow. As a result of the training, my hotel business has expanded; I now get more clients than I used to get previously. Even the profit has gone up.” — Young woman, K-YES beneficiary (business skills training) On the positive side, youth were able to draw many lessons from the business skills training sessions that they could apply in their businesses or income-generating activities. Most youth were already engaging in some form of income generation, and some were already members of VSLA groups, whereas others had been inspired to form VSLA groups on the advice of K-YES trainers. While the evaluation team does not have quantitative data on the number of young men in VSLA groups (although K-YES itself does track this), qualitative sources showed both genders were actively participating and reporting similar experiences. For existing groups, members generally reported positively that the K-YES training had further increased their understanding of savings, loans, and group management, and had particularly made them more strategic savers. They often cited the idea that they could leverage even small savings and loans into improvements in their businesses and could often give concrete examples of how they had translated their business training into better practices that yielded greater profits. Again, one repeated theme was that of a changed or expanded mindset that helped them to see and seize opportunities. Some youth seemed more predisposed to take on and apply these insights about modest growth, whereas others were less enthusiastic. Some of this appeared to be associated with individual personality, whereas some of it seemed cultural. Youth beneficiaries in Kwale (both male and female) and young men in Garissa were less enthusiastic about making modest increases and tended to argue more strongly that they needed access to substantially larger loans. This appeared to be due primarily to differences in expectations because there apparently were no higher-cost barriers to entry into business in these areas. Some K-YES staff, trainers and government officials noted that in general, women were more patient and willing to leverage small amounts than men. In all cases, even when youth were quite enthusiastic about what they had gained, they still aspired to do more, and still often reported that their gains were precarious and could easily be undone by an illness in the family. Across the board, they saw their biggest challenge to increasing their income as limited access to better credit options. Although youth operating their own businesses typically cited limited access to credit as their greatest limitation, other limits and risk factors mentioned included saturated markets, changes in levels of customer demand because of factors such as weather, and their inability to maintain the business if it was robbed or if they needed to take business capital to meet an emergency need at home, such as a sick baby. These were mentioned by both genders about equally. However, vocational training appeared to have the potential to lead to greater income increases, but there were also greater barriers to completing vocational training and internships, including the associated financial costs, plus the time required that might otherwise be used to earn income (especially for those with dependents). A major limitation is that none of the youth interviewed had managed to get certification for their courses. Some reported being promised, but did not receive, certificates of completion, which would at least have been something to show employers. Before K-YES, I was working as a casual worker in construction. Then I heard about K-YES and joined a course on catering. I love this course. Even before I came to know about K-YES, I wanted to join a course on this topic but I didn’t have the money. I was supposed to take 3 months for the internship, but unfortunately, I dropped out after one and a half months. Beforehand, K-YES told us they would cater some things for the internship, including transport. But K-YES never reimbursed my transport costs, and I was paying for my transport and living in a rental house. I found it a bit hard as I have a family. Now I’m a casual employee in a bakery. I’m in the slicing department, I’m just slicing the bread. I wanted to be in production, but I could not convince the employer I have the skills. The VTC was supposed to give us a certificate or some sort of document so when we go out, when I meet an employer - to show I underwent training and I have skills, but we weren’t given that. At the bakery, they didn’t trust that I really had training, because I couldn’t show them a certificate. If I had been able to finish the internship, that could have also helped. In production, the pay is better. In the slicing department, there are no skills required. And there is no employment contract - it is just on a casual basis. — Young man, K-YES beneficiary (vocational training - catering) Although there appear to be more challenges for youth in translating vocational training to increased earnings, it is still of interest and potential value to many, including those running their own businesses who would like to improve their skill levels. Many youth have never had any formal training in their chosen vocation and note this as a limitation. Many youth who had taken vocational training stated that they would like to work for an employer in the short term to gain more experience, but in the long term, they preferred the idea of having their own business (opening a salon or bakery, for example). Some respondents in this evaluation saw great potential in increasing mentorship roles, by which skilled tradespeople who were self-employed or in the informal economy could take on the responsibility of guiding youth entering their profession. Similarly, some employers commented that they valued being able to play a positive social role, and some of them found their interactions with youth were positive. There appears to be great potential in nurturing these relationships to provide guidance and training while reducing the impact on income-generating potential. Many youth, both men and women, in the K￾YES target group have an immediate economic imperative to earn income because they are parents. As such, future benefits are always balanced against immediate necessities. At the same time, this particular segment of the youth population appears particularly motivated to seize opportunities to improve their earning potential. CONCLUSION: WHAT TYPES OF JOBS HAVE YOUTH BENEFICIARIES GAINED AND WHAT ARE THEIR PERCEPTIONS OF THESE NEW OPPORTUNITIES? Sixty percent of youth who received training through K-YES reported some increase in income, with similar gains reported by both genders. These results are impressive, especially given than most of the training received consisted of the equivalent of three full training days. Youth conveyed a huge need for this sort of intervention, and many are highly motivated to leverage any learning they receive. For many of them, K-YES training has been easy to translate to practical application. Despite this, most youth reported their incomes are barely sufficient to meet their needs, and about half of surveyed youth were satisfied with their current means of earning a livelihood. When comparing the two main streams — vocational and business — in the short term, business training appears to provide larger dividends to youth, most likely because of its ease of entry compared with formal job markets. Clearly, however, the true winner is both in combination. The qualitative data suggests that there is potential to leverage much stronger outcomes with improved linkages to youth-friendly financial services and improvements on the various program elements, as noted throughout this evaluation. SUPPLEMENTARY: CVE AND OTHER OUTCOMES Although K-YES was not originally designed to explicitly address aims of CVE, it was always designed to target a population that includes those considered vulnerable to radicalization (especially in Kwale and Garissa), and its target intervention of increasing employability is, by definition, an intervention considered effective in reducing the risk factors that are associated with it. As such, K-YES is an effective CVE intervention to the degree that it is able to effectively target youth at risk and succeed in its stated purpose. Furthermore, implementers and key informants across the counties could point to other key aspects of K-YES that make it useful in CVE efforts. Specifically, its gender trainings were believed to have a positive influence in reducing gender-based and domestic violence (which are also aggravating factors linked to violent extremism), particularly noted in Bungoma. The YBFs are an effective mobilization tool to which other agencies can link during emergency situations or during peace-building campaigns. Some of the K-YES program’s specific efforts to link with organizations targeting youth at risk for radicalization were noted, particularly in Kwale and Garissa. Youth, trainers and other stakeholders across all counties noted the positive effect that K-YES had in improving youth self-esteem and sense of hopefulness, positive outlook, and overall morale, which are all important in helping youth forge positions as citizens in a healthy, peaceful society. Some unintended consequences of K-YES were occasionally noted to increase community tensions and conflicts, which were already noted in the findings under Evaluation Question Two and relate to payment delays, failure to pay, and poorly communicated changes in plans or policies that negatively impact youth and their families. When these are not remedied or appropriately communicated, they can lead to suspicion and distrust, especially against the unfortunate front-line representatives of K-YES (often trainers and mobilizers who are often suspected of misleading people and misusing funds). Similarly, K-YES could do more to systematically support, track and follow up on vulnerable youth who might fall through the cracks of the program intervention because of vulnerabilities and risk factors, including poverty, addiction and poor social skills. “In the recent past, youth were known to be troublemakers. If you needed chaos you would call on the youth. But now, most of the youth who have gone through these trainings…you will find that they are the peacemakers. If it’s politics, we do peaceful politics.” — K-YES youth beneficiary, Bungoma RECOMMENDATIONS The evaluation offers the following recommendations: Overall/Strategic 1. The K-YES theory of change should be developed further to reflect K-YES experience to date and to differentiate between the specific types of barriers that youth may be facing, and therefore the different interventions that they might need. Presently, county coordinators recognize this and sometimes attempt to respond on a personal level, but this has not been integrated into the design. 2. The K-YES program design needs to be revised to more explicitly recognize and address the differing capacities and needs of youth entering the program in education, learning capacity and aspirations. 3. The K-YES program design needs to more explicitly recognize and address the genuine financial barriers to full participation/benefit in the program that many youth face. 4. Strengthen ways to link K-YES components so that youth can be assessed and receive multiple services as needed. Presently, many components appear strong and effective, but they are not reaching their proper potential through linkages/coordination — this emerges very strongly when talking with youth about their end experience. 5. Adapt the M&E system to track measures on soft and strategic elements, such as building partnerships and the capacity for sustainability, and put more emphasis on quality measures, which could include, for example, tests of youth knowledge following training units. 6. USAID should consider revising target numbers downward if there is a clear argument that the program cannot meet them without sacrificing quality and increasing the risk of negative outcomes because of poor follow-through (recognizing that K-YES has had to make trade-offs between meeting numeric targets and the quality of interventions). 7. K-YES should consider organizing study visits for key officials of the four new counties to counties already in the K-YES program that a demonstrated, visible government commitment. The government officials can see the value of such commitment for themselves and hopefully be inspired to follow and exceed what other counties have done. Kericho stands out as a worthy example for such visits. Operational 8. The M&E system needs to adopt more rigorous and consistent use of terminology for courses, services and outcomes, and use a management information system. Presently, data are entered in Excel manually and have duplications and inconsistent terminology, which greatly weakens the data quality. 9. K-YES needs to improve its communication to partners, including government, employers, financial institutions and VTCs. 10. K-YES needs to improve two-way communication with youth beneficiaries. The interface with the YBF is insufficient for this because many youth do not feel the program hears them, and they find the various M&E follow-ups through SMS and phone calls can feel extractive. 11. K-YES needs to clarify all and clearly communicate all policies regarding financial compensation to youth, partners and trainers throughout the program. Avoid changing such policies because doing so results in conflict caused by misunderstandings, and youth forced to drop out because of unforeseen expenses. 12. The system for compensating trainers and beneficiaries needs improvement and monitoring. Define and commit to a minimum repayment period to avoid creating unnecessary difficulties for vulnerable youth (some of whom have taken on debt to attend courses, with the expectation of fast repayment). 13. The concept of “do no harm” should prevail when designing improvements to communication policies, payment policies and processes, and revising target numbers. The system should take on only what it can responsibly and responsively handle. Vocational Skills and Internships 14. Ensure that all youth entering vocational training receive life skills and career counseling training because it is appreciated and judged to be useful. Assess youth at the end of the training and provide further modules where needed. Feedback from VTC instructors and employers suggest that this training is not sufficient for all youth. 15. K-YES needs to develop a clear and consistent strategy and structure to support youth in internships that will help them become work-ready. Internships are often inadequately defined and supported, with varying reports of youth dropping out, youth unable to complete internships because of transportation costs (which K-YES sometimes promised and failed to compensate), and poor communication. One solution could be to have K-YES, the employer hosting the intern, and the youth sign a commitment agreement that defines their roles and commitment. 16. K-YES needs to be more systematic in tracking non-completion and dropouts, and adapting its processes based on noted reasons. This can be particularly valuable in helping K-YES to be more responsive to particularly vulnerable groups of youths. 17. K-YES should define criteria and protocols so that funding resources target youth based on need and merit. Funds allocated to sponsorships for target youth increase the accessibility of vocational training for those who cannot otherwise afford to attend. Presently, these are short term and are not targeted specifically based on the assessed needs of youth. 18. K-YES should develop a strategy for assisting youth with the costs of attending vocational training. This could include lobbying county governments to target bursaries to vocational students based on need and merit.15 In such a case, the program’s own protocols (developed in response to the previous recommendation) could be a model and point of leverage. 19. The K-YES program needs to find an intermediate solution to lack of certification while undergoing the process of gaining CDAC certification for its CBET course. It also needs to find a certification option for shortened courses that are unlikely to meet CDAC criteria in the near future. Lack of certification severely hampers youth’s ability to leverage the training they receive in the job market, and paying for NITA certification is prohibitive for many, if not most. Business Skills and Financial Access 20. Increase the length of business training or add follow-up modules. Find other ways to add continued follow-up or support to youth who are trying to put their learning into practice in businesses. A community-level mentorship or short sessions for sharing experiences might be helpful. 15 As noted by the Kwale county coordinator in reviewing this report, county budget allocations are based on public demand, so such a strategy should include community lobbying/awareness as well. 21. Continue with devolved business training with flexible scheduling (i.e., trainers schedule based on the attendees’ preferences). The flexible schedules are appreciated and help more youth to access trainings. 22. Increase training for VSLAs and establish a clear endpoint for where the VSLAs should be by the end of training. Much of this is already set up in the IRC VSLA training manual and just needs to be implemented. 23. K-YES needs to devote further attention to issues associated with youth-friendly loans, especially in helping youth reduce their risk of default. This includes more education on loan management and factors related to defaults, recognizing that youth have valid concerns that they might not be able to repay their loans, and finding ways to help youth accurately assess and manage borrowing risks. 24. Consider how to reduce the distance between YBF and target K-YES youth. One suggestion is to organize K-YES trainers through the YBF and help them organize in a group for an income￾generating activity. Increasing their investment and engagement in K-YES activities strengthens their advocacy (on youth compacts) and is a potential way to maintain a cadre of community-level business skills trainers. Sustainability 25. The sustainability plan should be revised to consider what sustainability looks like for the business skills stream, given the current model of implementation. Similarly, set out clearer sustainability goals for the VSLA intervention. This might be defined in relation to youth outcomes rather than ongoing service provision, but it should be more clearly defined and planned in either case. Gender Integration Recommendations about scholarships, improving responses to individual youth, and tracking dropouts also address gender concerns. Additional gender-related recommendations are: 26. Other counties should consider holding gender forums with community leaders, following the example of Kwale and Garissa in this regard. These should also address issues facing youth with disabilities. 27. Young women choose to enter traditionally male vocations or succeed in business on their own terms should be highlighted as examples, mentors and role models for other women. K-YES is already doing this to some degree, and it appears to be highly motivating. ANNEX I: EVALUATION STATEMENT OF WORK ANNEX 2. WORK PLAN ANNEX 3. DATA COLLECTION INSTRUMENTS K-YES EMPLOYERS SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE – LONG VERSION INTERVIEW: Enumerator Name _______ Date (- -/- -/----) Data Clerk No. ________Date (- -/- -/----) Supervisor Name_______ Date (- -/- -/----) Start Time__________ End Time __________ Validated?  (check after validation) COUNTY: Name: _____________________ RESPONDENT: Name: _______________________ Phone: _______________________ INTERVIEWER/SUPERVISOR COMMENTS: INTRODUCTION AND CONSENT Hello and thank you for talking to me. I am from Research Solutions Africa, a survey research firm in Kenya. I am calling today to conduct a survey to better understand the role of employers who are participating in K-YES, implemented by RTI. This information is important to establish the progress K￾YES (RTI) has made in the past 18 months. First, I would like to confirm that you have heard of RTI and/or the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills Program (K-YES)? The interview will take about 20 minutes and I will ask questions to you about your experiences with K￾YES (RTI). Your participation is completely voluntary. You are free to not answer any question with which you are not comfortable, and you may stop the interview at any time, in which case we will only use the data up to the point you withdrew from the interview. Your responses will be aggregated with other participants' responses and your name will not appear on any of our reports. If you have any questions about the survey, you may contact XXX at XXX. Response to consent (1-Yes 2-No) Basic background information on employer characteristics: # Question Response options A1 What is the name of your business? Open A2 In what county or counties is your business located? [select all that apply] Bungoma Garissa Kericho Kwale Nairobi National International Other (please specify) A3 How many employees do you currently have? Open [Number] A4 When was your business established? Open: specify a year (e.g. 2010) A5 Is your business formally registered? Yes No Unsure A6 In what sector(s) does your business operate? Construction Sales and retail Hospitality Agribusiness Other (please specify) Interactions with K-YES (RTI) B1 Have you or others in your business been consulted by K-YES (RTI) about your human resource needs? Yes No B2 To what degree has K-YES (RTI) responded to your needs as an employer? 00-Don’t know/Not applicable 01-Not at all 02-Somewhat 03-Very B2a Please explain why you gave the rating that you did. Open B3 Did you participate (have any input) in the development of the CBET curriculum? [EQ 1.2.2] 01-Yes 02-No B4 If so, how would you rate the usefulness of the curriculum? [EQ 1.2.2] 00-Not applicable 01-Not at all useful 02-Somewhat useful 03-Useful 04-Very useful B4a Please explain why you gave this rating. Open B5 Do you have a signed agreement with K-YES (RTI) to hire interns? Yes No B6 If yes, when was this signed? Month and year B7 If yes, how many internships have you committed to offer? Number B8 Have you hired/hosted any interns/apprentices based on this agreement? 01-Yes 02-No B9 If yes, how many interns have you hired? Male￾Female￾B10 If yes, how satisfied are you with the quality of interns you have hired? 01-Very dissatisfied 02-Dissatisfied 03-Satisfied 04-Very satisfied B10a Can you please explain your rating? i.e. why you are satisfied or dissatisfied with the quality of interns? Open B11 If yes, have you kept any intern as a full time employee? 01-Yes 02-No B12 If yes, have you hired any CBET graduates as interns/apprentices? 01-Yes 02-No B13 If yes, how many? Male￾Female- B14 If yes, how satisfied are you with the quality of CBET graduates? [EQ 1.2.2] 01-Very dissatisfied 02-Dissatisfied 03-Satisfied 04-Very satisfied B14a Can you please explain your rating? i.e. what you like or don’t like about CBET graduates? Open B15 If yes, how does the quality of CBET graduates compare with other VTC graduates? 00-Don’t know/not applicable 01-Worse 02-Same 03-Better B16 How likely are you to continue hiring CBET graduates after the end of your partnership with K-YES (RTI)? [EQ 1.1.5] 01-Not likely 02-Somewhat likely 03-Very likely B17 When you need to hire new employees, how do you find them? Open B18 In the last 12 months, has your business invested any time or money into developing your employees’ skills? 01-Yes 02-No B18a If yes, please explain. Open B19 Are you a member of this County’s youth employment compact? 01-Yes 02-No B20 If yes, and if it is not too early to say, how useful has the Compact mechanism been to-date in achieving youth employment? 00-Too early to say 01-Not at all useful 02-Somewhat useful 03-Useful 04-Very Useful B21 How useful do you think the Compact is likely to be in the future? 01-Not at all useful 02-Somewhat useful 03-Useful 04-Very Useful B21a Please explain your rating. i.e. Why you think the Compact is likely to be useful or not Open B22 How likely are you to continue participating in the Youth Compact after the end of K-YES (RTI) support? 01-Not likely 02-Somewhat likely 03-Likely 04-Very likely B23 To what extent do you agree or disagree with the following statement: Vocational training graduates make good employees 01-Strongly disagree 02-Disagree 03-Agree 04-Strongly agree B24 Has your opinion on vocational training graduates improved in the last 12 months? 01-Yes 02-No B24a If yes, why? Open B25 Overall, what aspects of K-YES (RTI) have been most valuable to you? Open B26 Do you have any recommendations for changing or further improving K-YES (RTI) as it expands to other counties? Open Thank you very much for your time! GROUP DISCUSSION GUIDE: Youth Beneficiaries Name of Interviewer Name of Note Taker Interview start time Interview end time Duration of interview (Mins) Date of Interview Location of Interview # Participant Name Gender Age 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 A. Introductions Get people seated in a circle, or in a way so that everyone is facing each other, and it would be easy for people to speak (i.e. not have someone off in a corner, or behind other people). Do your best to create a positive friendly, environment where people can feel relaxed. Hello and thank you for agreeing to talk with me. My name is [name of interviewer] and I am with the MSI evaluation team. With me is [name], also a member of the evaluation team who will be taking notes for this meeting. We are visiting here today conducting interviews to better understand the lives of youths participating in the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills program, also known as K-YES. This program is implemented by RTI and funded by USAID. The program works with youth in this county trying to improve their ability to find work, whether their own business or a job. My role here is to ask questions and listen, since I want to hear your opinions and experience. I also want to mention that there are no right or wrong answers, so I want to encourage all of you to be very honest and share with us any ideas that you might have. We are interested in both positive and negative experiences. With your consent, we will be recording this interview so that we can focus on what you are telling us, review the tapes later, and not forget anything that was said. These tapes will not be released to anyone outside of the evaluation team. Your identity will be kept confidential and we will ensure that it will not be possible for you to be identified by any information provided in our reporting. So please feel free to speak your mind and be audible enough for the recorder. Your participation is completely voluntary and you can choose to not answer any question or stop participating at any time. However, I want to remind you that your participation is very important. This discussion will last approximately one hour. If you have any questions, you may contact XXX, on this phone number: XXX. __________________________________________________________________________ 1. To begin, can each person introduce yourself with your name and a bit about your experience with K-YES/RTI? (Note each response individually for this question). a. How did you find out about K-YES/RTI? b. How long have you been involved with K-YES/RTI? 2. What do you do for a living? Do you have a job, or do you do anything to make money? PROBE [EQ1.1, EQ3] a) Why do you do this? b) For how long have you been doing this to make money? PROBE each individual. c) Are you happy with your current way of making money? Why or why not? 3. What, for you, would be the ideal way of making a living? Why? [EQ3] 4. What are the main challenges that you and other youth in this area face when it comes to making a living? [EQ1.1, EQ3] a) How do you think these challenges can be overcome? PROBE? b) Do you think that your involvement with K-YES/RTI has helped you to overcome these challenges? Why or why not? [EQ3] 6. For those of you who have received technical training that was supported by K-YES/RTI: [question to be modified per county to specify K-YES/RTI supported institutions/courses] [EQ1.2] a. Can you describe the course(s) you took – how long was it, when did you take it? What topics did it cover? b. What, if anything, did you have to pay toward this? (was this manageable) c. What did you think of the training course you took? d. What, if anything, do you think needs to be done to make the technical training more effective? Did the course help you in finding employment or improving your way of making income (in the formal or in the informal sector, increased profits; reducing costs; business expansion)? Why or why not? 7. Have any of you received training to help you improve your knowledge or skills in running your own business, managing money, or accessing loans? [Again, will need to modify this question based on implementation details at county level – to be sure youth can identify K-YES/RTI supported business skills training] [EQ1.2] a. If so, can you describe the training – how long was it, when did you take it? What topics did it cover? b. What did you think of the training course you took? c. Did the training help you in finding a job or improving your way of making income? Why or why not? d. What, if anything, do you think needs to be done to make the business skill training more effective? 8. How do youth in this county receive: [EQ1.2] a. Information about finding markets or buyers for their products? b. Information on where to find jobs or other income-making opportunities? c. How would you rate the quality and usefulness of the information you are able to access? d. What are some of the challenges that you experience in accessing this kind of business and job information? e. What if anything, has K-YES/RTI done to facilitate your access to market and job information? f. What, if anything, do you think K-YES/RTI could have done differently to improve your access to this kind of information? 9. Have you received any; i. Career counselling, either from K-YES or from a VTC supported by K-YES/RTI? ii. Visits from a working person or business person to give you career advice? iii. Help in accessing an internship or apprenticeship, either from K-YES/RTI or from a VTC supported by K-YES/RTI? iv. Job placement services, either from K-YES/RTI or from a VTC supported by K-YES/RTI? [change wording at county level to make it more specific and clear to youth – i.e. specify which VTCs] [EQ1.2] a. If yes, how would you describe the services you received? Were they useful and in what ways? If no, why? b. What recommendations do you have to make these services more useful to youth? 10. Do you know of any financial services available for youth who want to start or expand businesses? [EQ1.2] a. If so, can you name some? b. Would you be able to get a loan from one of these services if you needed? Why or why not? c. Have you received any information or support for getting a loan over the last year? If so, from whom? How helpful was it? 11. In general, do you think that vocational training centers provide useful or good quality training? Why or why not? [EQ1.2] a. Have your ideas about vocational training centres changed at all in the last year? If so, how? Why? b. As young women/young men (ask according to the group), do you face any particular challenges or difficulties in finding, creating, or keeping jobs or ways of making income that might be different from those faced by young men/women? If so, what are these? 12. Do you think the services supported by K-YES/RTI were suited to your particular needs as young women/men? Please explain why or why not. [EQ1.1.6] 13. Did you, or other youth, have any input or influence over how K-YES/RTI worked? If so, please describe. [EQ2.2] a. Are you happy with the outcome? b. Overall, are you happy with the way K-YES/RTI engaged and responding to youth concerns? Why or why not? 16 In your view, has K-YES/RTI been successful in expanding work opportunities available to youth? Why or why not? [EQ3] 14. Is there anything else you think K-YES/RTI, or other efforts to support youth’s ability to making a living, could do to meet your needs and interests? [EQ1.1.6] 14. Overall going forward, what needs to be done to make a program like K-YES more effective? 15. Besides improving opportunities for making an income, has your involvement with K-YES/RTI or receipt of K-YES/RTI supported services had any other effect on your life or your relationships? Can you please describe? [SI1] GROUP DISCUSSION GUIDE [Youth Bunge Forums and Other Youth Groups] Name of Interviewer Name of Note Taker Name of Bunge/Youth Group: Interview start time Interview end time Duration: Date of Interview Location of Interview # Participant Name Role in Org. Gender Age 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 A. Introductions Get people seated in a circle, or in a way so that everyone is facing each other, and it would be easy for people to speak (i.e. not have someone off in a corner, or behind other people). Do your best to create a positive friendly, environment where people can feel relaxed. Hello and thank you for agreeing to talk with me. My name is [name of interviewer] and I am with the MSI evaluation team. With me is [name], also a member of the evaluation team who will be taking notes for this meeting. We are visiting here today conducting interviews to better understand the lives of youths participating in the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills program, also known as K-YES. This program is implemented by RTI and funded by USAID. The program works with youth in this county trying to improve their ability to find work, whether their own business or a job. My role here is to ask questions and listen, since I want to hear your opinions and experience. I also want to mention that there are no right or wrong answers, so I want to encourage all of you to be very honest and share with us any ideas that you might have. We are interested in both positive and negative experiences. With your consent, we will be recording this interview so that we can focus on what you are telling us, review the tapes later, and not forget anything that was said. These tapes will not be released to anyone outside of the evaluation team. Your identity will be kept confidential and we will ensure that it will not be possible for you to be identified by any information provided in our reporting. So please feel free to speak your mind and be audible enough for the recorder. Your participation is completely voluntary and you can choose to not answer any question or stop participating at any time. However, I want to remind you that your participation is very important. This discussion will last approximately one hour. If you have any questions, you may contact XXX, on this phone number: XXX. __________________________________________________________________________ Basic Background and Link to K-YES (RTI) 1. To begin, can each person introduce yourself, your name, your age, what you do and your connection to this youth group? (Note each response individually for this question). 2. Can you please tell me what you know about K-YES (RTI)? a. Has this organization had any connection or partnership with K-YES (RTI)? (Probe for since when) b. How would you describe your partnership with K-YES? (Probe for contribution, challenges,) c. What sorts of services or activities has K-YES (RTI) supported in your county? Specific Evaluation Questions 3. What do youth (i.e. those 35 years of age and younger) in this county do to make a living? Especially those with less than secondary school completion? PROBE [EQ1.1, EQ3] d) Are these activities generally a satisfactory way of making a living, in your opinion? Why or why not? 4. What are the main challenges that local youth, especially those without secondary school completion, face in making a living? [EQ1.1, EQ3] c) Are these challenges the same for young men and young women? Or are there any gender￾specific challenges? If so, what are these? (PROBE for young women first, then young men.) [EQ1.1.6] d) How do you think these challenges can be overcome? 5. Have the services K-YES (RTI) provided helped youth overcome these challenges? (If so why and how. If not, why not) (Probe for specific examples) In your view, has K-YES (RTI) been successful in helping youth to increase their opportunities to make a living? Why or why not? [EQ3]. 6. Does your institution have any capacity challenges? If yes, which ones? a. What, if anything, has K-YES done to address these institutional challenges? 7. For young people with their own businesses, where do they get information about the market for their goods and services? [EQ1.2] a. How would you rate the quality and usefulness of the information youth are able to access? b. What are some of the challenges that youth experience in accessing this kind of information? c. What if anything, has K-YES (RTI) done to facilitate youth access to market information? 8. For young people who are looking for a job, from where do they get information about employment opportunities? [EQ1.2] a. How would you rate the quality and usefulness of the information youth are able to access? b. What are some of the challenges that youth experience in accessing this kind of information? c. What if anything, has K-YES (RTI) done to facilitate youth access to job information? 9. Do you know of any financial services available for youth who want to start or expand businesses? [EQ1.2] a. If so, can you name some? b. How accessible are these services for youth? Please describe any barriers to access. Which youth are most affected by these barriers? c. Are you aware of any K-YES (RTI) activities or support to improve access to financial services? If so, please describe these. In your opinion, how effective were these? 10. What do youths in this area think about vocational training centers? Why? [EQ1.2], a. Have your ideas about vocational training centres changed at all in the last year? If so, how? Why? 11. Do you think the services supported by K-YES (RTI) were suited to the particular needs of young women? Please explain why or why not. [EQ1.1.6] a. What about young men? Please explain why or why not. [EQ1.1.6] 12. Is there anything else you think K-YES (RTI), or other efforts to support youth efforts to making a living, could do to meet youth needs and interests? [EQ1.1.6] 13. Did your association, or other youth groups you know, have any input or influence over how K-YES (RTI) worked? If so, please describe. [EQ2.2] a. Are you happy with the outcome? b. Overall, are you happy with the way K-YES (RTI) engaged and responding to youth concerns? c. Do you have any recommendations for improving the way K-YES (RTI) and similar programs engage youth? 14. Are you involved with the K-YES (RTI) Youth Employment Compact in your county? [EQ1.1.5] a. Please describe what has happened so far?? b. Who is involved? c. Do you think this is a good idea for your county? d. How effectively is the Youth Employment Compact improving youth employment opportunities in your county? 15. When the K-YES program stops in this county, what effect, if any, will this have on your services and operations? [EQ 1.1.5] 16. Besides access to new or better ways of making a living, do you think involvement with K-YES (RTI) or receipt of K-YES (RTI) supported services has had any other effect on youth – in their lives, or their relationships? Can you please describe? [SI1] K-YES Key Informant Interview Guide IP (RTI, IRC) staff at national and county levels INTRODUCTION AND CONSENT Hello and thank you for talking to us. We are from Management Systems International, a company that carries out research and evaluation studies. We are visiting here today to interview you about your experiences with the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills project (K-YES). This information is important to establish the progress K-YES has made in the past 18 months, and to inform future K-YES activities. The interview will take about 45 minutes and we will ask questions to you about particular topics related to your experiences and perceptions of K-YES. Your participation is completely voluntary. You are free to not answer any question with which you are not comfortable, and you may stop the interview at any time, in which case we will only use the data up to the point you withdrew from the interview. Your responses will be aggregated with other participants' responses and your name will not appear on any of our reports. Response to consent (1-Yes 2-No) KI Group: 01- IP County: (select one) 01- Bungoma 02- Garissa 03- Kericho 04- Kwale KI #: INTERVIEW: Interviewer name(s): Date: Start time: Finish time: RESPONDENT: Name: Organization Name: Position in Organization: Email address (if available): Phone contact (if available): INTERVIEWER COMMENTS: Basic Background and Link to K-YES 1. How long have you been in your current position? 2. Can you please describe your role in implementing K-YES? 3. Can you please describe the K-YES theory of change? Do you know whether it has been modified and clarified over the course of the project? To what degree has it shaped project strategy and activities? (i.e. relevance) [EQ 1.1.2] a. If the theory of change was not driving the project design/activities, what was? b. If you are not familiar with the K-YES theory of change, can you please describe in your own words the overall K-YES strategy for improving positive employment outcomes for youth. c. [For county coordinators] In what ways has this strategy been adapted or made more relevant to your specific county needs? Please describe. d. In your opinion has the strategy been flexible? If yes, how? 4. When providing employment support/services to youth, how does K-YES reach out or target youth in this county? (Probe: Challenges/issues?) [EQ1.1, EQ 3.4] 5. Does K-YES have any means of supporting or assessing youth needs to see what combination of services they might benefit from most, or is this something that youth determine for themselves? [EQ 3.4] 6. How has K-YES identified potential partners and developed partnerships in this county, with: [EQ 2.5] a. County-level government? a. Initial capacity and willingness to engage? b. Does the government prioritize VTCs and youth programming sufficiently and put sufficient resources toward them? If not, why not? [EQ1.1.3] b. Employers? c. Vocational and business training centres? a. How was their initial capacity to enter into partnership? d. Youth bunge associations? a. How is the capacity of the county bunge forums and village bunge associations? Has their capacity increased since K-YES started working with them? If so, can you describe how? [EQ 1.2.2 and EQ 1.1.5] e. Other youth associations? f. Financial institutions (formal and informal)? 7. How easy or difficult was it to convince actors from these different groups to enter into partnership? What lessons have you learnt from this experience? (EQ 2.5) 8. When K-YES pulls out, what do you think will happen to these partners? Do you think they will be able to continue the K-YES supported activities after the support stops? Why or why not? [also EQ1.1.5] a. If not, what else would need to happen to improve the likelihood of sustained services after K-YES stops activities in this county? [also EQ1.1.5] 9. To what degree is K-YES is playing a clear and complementary role among other existing youth and employment services? i.e. fills a recognized need/niche [EQ 1.1.4] 10. What gender issues (i.e. issues facing female and/or male youth), if any, were identified as relevant to youth in this county? [1.1.6] a. What steps, if any, has K-YES taken to address these issues in its programming? [1.1.6] b. Has this been effective in your view? Why or why not? [1.1.6] c. If not, what else would need to happen for gender issues to be adequately addressed? 11. For each of the 4 programmatic objectives, can you please describe what has been achieved in your county? Is this about where you expected to be? Why or why not? [EQ 1.2.1] a. Objective 1: Improved technical and vocational skills of youth participants i. Vocational skills of youth? ii. Related to objective one: Has K-YES undertaken any programming to reduce the stigma of YP (VTC)-based learning in Kenya? If so, what effect, if any, has this had on youth mindsets? On employer mindsets? Based on what evidence/observations? [EQ 1.1.3] iii. Related to objective one: What has been done on CBET in this county? How many VTCs are implementing CBET curricula? How is that going? Who has been involved and how? iv. VTC capacity improvement? b. Objective 2: Increased business skills i. Adaptation of learn to earn curriculum? ii. Anything else? c. Objective 4: Youth awareness and utilization of financial services i. Training/informing youth on financial services? ii. Supporting VSLAs? iii. Making linkages between different financial institutes? d. Objective 3: Improved effectiveness of market and employment information, career counseling, mentoring, and job placement for youth participants in target areas/sector i. Market and employment information? ii. Career counseling? iii. Mentoring? iv. Internships/apprenticeships? v. Job placement? vi. Follow through and linkages? 12. What challenges has K-YES faced in implementing its activities in this county? [EQ 2.1] a. External? b. Internal? c. How did K-YES adapt to these challenges? In your opinion, was this adequate? Was there something else K-YES could or should have done? 13. K-YES programming is based on the principle of ‘continuous youth engagement.’ Can you please explain in your own words what this principle means? How has this principle been applied in practice? What influence has this had on K-YES programming? [EQ 2.2] 14. How did the findings of the county-level employment ecosystem assessment influence programming in this county [or generally, for national-level]? [EQ 2.3] 15. Have findings from the K-YES monitoring and evaluation system led to adjustments in the programming? If so, explain how and be specific. [EQ 2.4] 16. When K-YES beneficiaries report new or improved employment prospects: [within this county] [EQ 3.1] a. Can you comment on the quality of the new or improved employment gained by youth? b. To what degree can the new or improved employment be attributed to K-YES intervention? What other factors were involved? [Q 3.3] 17. Are there any K-YES partner organizations in this county that work on issues related to CVE, peace-building/conflict resolution? a. If so, please name the organizations. [EQ 4.1] b. If so, do you know if these organizations have been able to make any links between K-YES programming and the aim of countering CVE? [EQ 4.1] 18. Are you aware of any other, non-employment related outcomes reported among youth, whether positive or negative, as a result of K-YES? [EQ 4.2] 19. In your opinion, what specific project activities appear to be the most effective/appreciated? [EQ 1.2.3] 20. Are there any K-YES activities that have not worked as intended and could be stopped in the future? [EQ 1.2.3] 21. Based on what you have seen, are there specific combinations of services that appear more effective in improving youth employment outcomes? [EQ 3.4] 22. Any other suggestions you have in regards to K-YES activities going forward, and especially while introducing K-YES to other counties? [EQ 1.2.3] K-YES/RTI Key Informant Interview Guide (Government Actors—National level and County level) KI Group: (select one) 02- Gov’t County: (select one) 05- Bungoma 06- Garissa 07- Kericho 08- Kwale 09- Nairobi 10- National-level KI #: INTERVIEW: Interviewer name(s): Date: Start time: Finish time: RESPONDENT: Name: Organization Name: Position in Organization: Email address (if available): Phone contact (if available): INTERVIEWER COMMENTS: INTRODUCTION AND CONSENT Hello and thank you for talking to us. We are from Management Systems International, a company that carries out research and evaluation studies. We are visiting here today to interview you about your experiences with the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills project (K-YES/RTI). This information is important to establish the progress K-YES/RTI has made in the past 18 months, and to inform future K￾YES/RTI activities. The interview will take about 45 minutes and we will ask questions to you about particular topics related to your experiences and perceptions of K-YES/RTI. Your participation is completely voluntary. You are free to not answer any question with which you are not comfortable, and you may stop the interview at any time, in which case we will only use the data up to the point you withdrew from the interview. Your responses will be aggregated with other participants' responses and your name will not appear on any of our reports. Response to consent (1-Yes 2-No) Basic Background and Link to K-YES/RTI 23. Have you heard of K-YES/RTI? If no, will need to probe more to see if there is an indirect relationship, and if not...terminate the interview. 24. Can you please briefly describe your involvement with K-YES/RTI? (Probe for specific year and month respondent started working with K-YES/RTI, activities involved with) Specific Questions on Experience with K-YES/RTI 25. Do you have a County government strategy for youth vocational education and employment (wage/self)? If so a. Can you briefly describe it? b. Is your office able to effectively carry out this strategy? Why or why not? [EQ1.1.3] c. Is K-YES complimenting the government’s strategy on youth? If so how? 26. Before K-YES/RTI began in your county, what were the range and quality of employment services available for youth? 27. Does K-YES/RTI have a distinct and useful role? Is it filling a specific need, or is it duplicating existing activities? Please explain how you came to your point of view. [EQ1.1.2] 28. Overall, how relevant do you feel K-YES/RTI activities have been in addressing the employment needs of youth in your county? [EQ1.1] a. Does it fit with the GOK’s youth development policy? If yes, how? b. Does it fit with the county government strategic plan? If yes, how? 29. I will now ask you about some different aspects of K-YES/RTI: [EQ 1.1.2] a. To your knowledge, what has K-YES/RTI done to increase the vocational skills of youth? How effective has this been? b. Has K-YES/RTI done anything to improve the capacity of Vocational Training Centres? How effective has this been? c. Are you familiar with the K-YES/RTI CBET curricula? If so, do you feel it is relevant to preparing youth for the local labour market? d. To your knowledge, what has K-YES/RTI done to increase youth business skills? How effective has this been? e. What, if anything, has K-YES/RTI done to provide information to youth about markets for goods, etc.? (for entrepreneurs) f. What, if anything, has K-YES/RTI done to provide information to youth about available jobs and where to find them? g. What, if anything, has K-YES/RTI done to provide career counselling to youth? h. What, if anything, has K-YES/RTI done to link youth to mentors from the private sector? i. What, if anything, has K-YES/RTI done to create internships for youth? j. What, if anything, has K-YES/RTI done to help place youth in jobs? k. To your knowledge, has K-YES/RTI improved youth’s access to financial services? If so, how? 30. Are there any gender specific barriers to employment opportunities that face male youth in the county? What about female youth? Please describe.[EQ 1.1.6] a. To your knowledge, does K-YES/RTI help youth to overcome or reduce these barriers? How? (Probe for stakeholders’ capacity building, gender forums, youth engagement approaches) 31. Have the youth in this county been able to access the youth specific government funds? [EQ 1.1.2] a. Why, or why not? b. Has K-YES/RTI played any role in facilitating greater youth access to these funds? If so, please describe. c. Any recommendations to further enhance access? 32. In your opinion, has K-YES/RTI’s efforts to incorporate youth perspectives been adequate? [EQ 1.1.2] 33. Can you please describe the county government’s relationship to K-YES/RTI? How useful has this relationship been to you?[EQ2.5] a. Has this relationship seen any challenges or difficulties? If so, what were these? Were you able to overcome them? How? b. Has K-YES/RTI helped to link your office to others working in this sector, or strengthen relationships in this sector? How? c. What do you think will happen to these linkages once K-YES/RTI support ends? [EQ2.5, EQ1.1.5] 34. Are you involved with the K-YES/RTI Youth Employment Compact in your county? [EQ 1.1.5] e. If so, can you please describe its current status. f. Who is involved? g. How effective do you think this is as a strategy for improving youth employment opportunities? h. How likely do you think it is that it will continue once K-YES/RTI support stops? 35. To your knowledge, has engaging in K-YES/RTI activities helped youth to gain new or improved employment in the county to-date? Describe how, giving specific examples. [1.2.1] 36. Overall, what have been the most effective elements of K-YES/RTI in your opinion? Why? [EQ 1.2.3] 37. Which elements of K-YES/RTI have been least effective? Why? [EQ 1.2.3] 38. What recommendations do you have for improving K-YES/RTI as it moves forward to other counties? [Open] 39. To your knowledge, are K-YES/RTI activities contributing to other outcomes among youth in the county? [EQ 4.2] (Probes: These might be positive or negative, and could include for example, changes in youth self-esteem, social behavior, citizenship, civic engagement, health, peace etc.) K-YES Key Informant Interview Guide: (Vocational Training Centers) KI Group: (select one) 03- IP 04- Gov’t 05- VTC/educational centre 06- Private sector 07- Financial service provider 08- Trainer 09- Gender facilitator 10- Mentor County: (select one) 11- Bungoma 12- Garissa 13- Kericho 14- Kwale 15- Nairobi 16- National-level KI #: INTERVIEW: Interviewer name(s): Date: Start time :Finish time: RESPONDENT: Name: Organization Name: Position in Organization: Email address (if available): Phone contact (if available): INTERVIEWER COMMENTS: INTRODUCTION AND CONSENT Hello and thank you for talking to us. We are from Management Systems International, a company that carries out research and evaluation studies. We are visiting here today to interview you about your experiences with the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills Program (K-YES) implemented by RTI and funded by USAID. This information is important to establish the progress K-YES has made in the past 18 months, and to inform future K-YES activities. The interview will take about 45 minutes and we will ask questions to you about particular topics related to your experiences and perceptions of K-YES. Your participation is completely voluntary. You are free to not answer any question with which you are not comfortable, and you may stop the interview at any time, in which case we will only use the data up to the point you withdrew from the interview. Your responses will be aggregated with other participants' responses and your name will not appear on any of our reports. Response to consent (1-Yes 2-No) Basic Background and Link to K-YES 1. Have you heard of K-YES? (If no, will need to probe more to see if there is an indirect relationship, and if not...terminate the interview) 2. Since when (year and month) have you/your institution been working with K-YES? 3. Can you please briefly describe your involvement with K-YES? Specific Questions on Experience with K-YES 4. Background information about your institution? a. Are you a government-run or private institution? b. What courses do you offer? c. How long are the regular courses? d. Is there certification for the regular courses? What level? Which body examines? e. How much are the regular fees? f. What other support or services do you offer? g. About how many students do you have? i. About how many of these are male? ii. About how many are female? iii. What level of education must they have to enroll in the courses? 5. Before K-YES how would you describe the capacity of your VTC? How would you describe it now? What role, if any, did K-YES play in influencing these changes?[EQ1.2,] 6. Can you describe the role K-YES has played in supporting your institution’s work? [EQ1.1.4] a. Has K-YES conducted PLOCA with your institution? Was it useful? if so, how? b. Was there a follow up from the findings of the PLOCA? Please explain 7. What funds, staff time, or other resources, if any, has your institution contributed in support of K-YES related activities? [EQ1.1.3] 8. Do you expect that you will be able to sustain/maintain/continue with these efforts once K-YES support stops? Why or why not? [EQ1.1.3; EQ1.1.5] 9. Has your institute received support from any other project or agency, either now or in the past? If so, please describe. [EQ1.1.4] If yes, Please mention which a. How does K-YES support compare? Is it similar, different? More or less relevant? [EQ1.1.4] 10. Does K-YES support link to or complement government policy/activities? Please explain. [EQ1.1.4]. 11. Has your institute received any support on addressing gender issues into your program design from K-YES? If so, please describe what was done. In your opinion, was this relevant? [EQ1.1.6] a. What specific challenges or obstacles face young women who seek to enter the workforce? [EQ1.1.6] b. What specific challenges or obstacles face young men who seek to enter the workforce? [EQ1.1.6] c. Was K-YES able to identify and address these challenges in its programming and support? If so, please explain how with examples. [EQ1.1.6] 12. What, if anything, has K-YES done to support your institution’s ability to deliver relevant, high quality vocational training to students? [EQ1.2.1] a. What changes, if any, have resulted from the support of vocational training and attachments you have received? b. How satisfied are you with K-YES support of vocational training and attachments? Why? [EQ1.2.2] c. Is there certification for the courses that are offered under K-YES? By who? d. Do you think you will be able to sustain these changes once K-YES support stops? [EQ1.1.5] If yes, how? If no, why? 13. What, if anything, has K-YES done to support your institution’s ability to deliver relevant, high quality business skills training to students? [EQ1.2.1] a. What changes, if any, have resulted from the support of business skills you have received?[EQ1.2.2] b. How satisfied are you with K-YES support of business skills training? Why? [EQ1.2.2] c. Do you think you will be able to sustain these efforts once K-YES support stops? [EQ1.1.5] If yes, how? If no, why? 14. What, if anything, has K-YES done to support your institution’s ability to deliver relevant, high quality career counseling, mentoring, attachments/internships and job placement to students? [EQ1.2.1] a. How satisfied are you with K-YES support of career counselling and related activities? [EQ 1.2.2] b. Has K-YES done anything to help link your institution’s students with mentors or role models who are already working in relevant fields? If so, what? How satisfied are you with this? [EQ 1.2.2] c. Has K-YES done anything to help your institution place recent graduates into internships or apprenticeships? If so, what? How satisfied are you with this? [EQ 1.2.2] d. Has K-YES done anything to help your institute provide relevant career and job market information to youth? If so, how. [EQ1.2.1] e. Do you think you will be able to sustain these efforts once K-YES support stops? [EQ1.1.5] If yes, how? If no, why? 15. Has K-YES done anything in collaboration with your institution to support youth awareness of and access to financial services? If so, please describe. [EQ1.2.1] a. How satisfied are you with K-YES’s efforts to improve youth awareness of financial services? Why? [EQ1.2.2] b. How satisfied are you with K-YES’s efforts to improve youth access to financial services? Why? [EQ1.2.2] c. Do you think you will be able to sustain these efforts once K-YES support stops? [EQ1.1.5] If yes, how? If no, why? 16. Did K-YES consult with your institution and/or other local stakeholders in designing and implementing its activities? If so, please explain how and with which stakeholders. How effective was this? [EQ2, EQ2.5] 17. Did K-YES do anything to link your institution to other actors working on youth employment issues? If so, please explain how. How effective was this? [EQ2.5] 18. If you compare youth who benefitted with K-YES supported training with youth in non￾supported training, or prior to K-YES, what differences have you observed, if any? Please give specific examples. [EQ 3.5] a. Have they improved? Please describe what you have observed on this point. b. Are they more able to gain wage employment or self-employment? Please explain the evidence for your opinion. (Probe for gender differences). [EQ 1.1.6] 19. How would you describe the perceptions of youths about vocational education and technical training? (probe for whether negative perceptions have changed in the last one year) [EQ 3.5] a. What effect, if any, has K-YES had in changing negative perceptions about vocational education and technical training? [EQ 3.5] 20. Are you involved with the K-YES Youth Employment Compact in your county? [EQ1.1.5] a. When was it established? b. Who is involved? c. How is it working? d. Do you think this is an effective strategy for improving youth employment opportunities? e. How likely do you think it is that it will continue once K-YES support stops? 21. What challenges, if any, have yous experienced while working with the K-YES program. (Probe for internal and external challenges) [EQ2] a. How well did K-YES respond to these challenges? (PROBE for specific examples) 22. What aspects of K-YES would you say have been the most worthwhile? Why?(Overall) [EQ 1.2.3.] a. Which areas have been most effective? [EQ 1.2.3] b. Has there been anything about K-YES that disappointed you? What? c. What, if anything, do you think K-YES could have done differently to be more effective? 23. (For CBET pilot VTC) K-YES helped your institution adopt a Competency-Based Education and Training (CBET) curriculum. a. How was it developed? Probe for involvement of private sector and instructors[EQ 1.1.2] b. How would you describe this CBET curriculum as compared to the regular curricula your institution uses? (Probe for what is unique in the K-YES CBET curriculum) c. To what extent will your institution continue using the CBET curriculum? [EQ 1.1.5] d. Are there any changes you might make in the future to the CBET curriculum? e. Will you want to change the other curriculum to be like CBET or would you rather retain your regular curriculum, why? f. Is your institution able to fully implement CBET curriculum? Why or why not? K-YES Key Informant Interview Guide: Youth Bunge SACCOs KI Group: (select one) Bunge SACCO County: (select one) 17- Bungoma 18- Garissa 19- Kericho 20- Kwale KI #: INTERVIEW: Interviewer name(s): Date: Start time: Finish time: RESPONDENT: Name: Organization Name: Position in Organization: Email address (if available): Phone contact (if available): INTERVIEWER COMMENTS: INTRODUCTION AND CONSENT Hello and thank you for talking to us. We are from Management Systems International, a company that carries out research and evaluation studies. We are visiting here today to interview you about your experiences with the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills program (K-YES). This information is important to establish the progress K-YES has made in the past 18 months, and to inform future K-YES activities. The interview will take about 45 minutes and we will ask questions to you about particular topics related to your experiences and perceptions of K-YES. Your participation is completely voluntary. You are free to not answer any question with which you are not comfortable, and you may stop the interview at any time, in which case we will only use the data up to the point you withdrew from the interview. Your responses will be aggregated with other participants' responses and your name will not appear on any of our reports. Response to consent (1-Yes 2-No) Basic Background and Link to K-YES 40. Have you heard of the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills Program (K-YES) or RTI? If no, will need to probe more to see if there is an indirect relationship, and if not...terminate the interview. 41. Can you please briefly describe your involvement with K-YES? (Probe for specific year and month the respondent and organization have been working with K-YES, activities involved with) Specific Evaluation Questions 42. Can you tell me a bit about this SACCO: a. When did it start, and who started it? b. How many members do you have? c. Who are your members? (Probe for age groups, gender, educational level, type of work) d. Specifically, about how many of your members are youth from the ages of 18-35, with less than secondary school completion? e. What activities do you have? i. Do you do any savings activities? If so, how does this work? ii. Do you provide loans to members? If so how does this work? What are the conditions? iii. Do you provide any other financial services? iv. Do you have any other activities? [EQ1.1.4, EQ1.1.6] 43. Do you notice any differences in the number of young men accessing your financial services, in comparison to young women? What are these differences? Why do you think these are present? [EQ1.1.6] 44. Does your institution do anything particular to reach out to and meet the needs of those with lower levels of education, people with disabilities, women or other potentially underserved groups? If so, please describe. [EQ1.2.1] 45. Does your institution do anything particular to meet the needs of those starting or running small businesses, including those in the informal sector? If so, please describe. [EQ1.2.1] 46. Do you think your institution could do more to support youth, especially those starting small businesses? What is it that it could do more? Why is your institution not currently doing this? [EQ2.1, 2.2] 47. Does your institution have any links to other financial institutions or VSLAs? (For example, do any VSLAs use your services?) If so, please explain. If not, why not? [EQ 1.1.4] 48. Over the last 12 months, have you noticed any changes in your clientele? In particular, have you noticed any changes in the number of youth, females, or less served clients? If so, what have you noticed? Why do you think these changes occurred? [EQ1.1.6] 49. Can you describe K-YES’s relationship with your institution? (Probe for the types of support from K-YES e.g. product or service development) What do you think worked well about this? What was challenging or could use improvement? [EQ1.2.1 & EQ2.1] 50. Did K-YES link your institution to any other groups or organizations? Please describe. Was this useful? [EQ 1.1.5, EQ 2.1. EQ2.5] 51. As far as you are aware, has K-YES taken any steps to inform youth or otherwise help them link to your institution’s services? If so, what were these steps? In your opinion, how effective were these? [EQ 1.2.1 & EQ2.2] 52. As far as you are aware, has K-YES taken any other actions or supported any other ventures that could help youth become more able to access and manage financial resources? If so, what were these? In your opinion, how well did these actions achieve the intended result? [EQ1.2.1, EQ1.2..2] 53. When the K-YES program stops in this county, what difference will it make to your services and operations? [EQ 1.1.5] 54. What advice can you offer to K-YES and other programs aimed at supporting youth entrepreneurs? [Overall] 55. Anything else you would like to add? [Overall] K-YES Key Informant Interview Guide: Formal Financial Service Providers KI Group: (select one) 11- Financial service provider County: (select one) 21- Bungoma 22- Garissa 23- Kericho 24- Kwale KI #: INTERVIEW: Interviewer name(s): Date: Start time: Finish time: RESPONDENT: Name: Organization Name: Position in Organization: Email address (if available): Phone contact (if available): INTERVIEWER COMMENTS: INTRODUCTION AND CONSENT Hello and thank you for talking to us. We are from Management Systems International, a company that carries out research and evaluation studies. We are visiting here today to interview you about your experiences with the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills program (K-YES). This information is important to establish the progress K-YES has made in the past 18 months, and to inform future K-YES activities. The interview will take about 45 minutes and we will ask questions to you about particular topics related to your experiences and perceptions of K-YES. Your participation is completely voluntary. You are free to not answer any question with which you are not comfortable, and you may stop the interview at any time, in which case we will only use the data up to the point you withdrew from the interview. Your responses will be aggregated with other participants' responses and your name will not appear on any of our reports. Response to consent (1-Yes 2-No) Questions 1. Have you heard of the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills Program (K-YES) or RTI? If no, will need to probe more to see if there is an indirect relationship, and if not...terminate the interview. 2. Can you please briefly describe your involvement with K-YES? (Probe for specific year and month the respondent and organization have been working with K-YES, activities involved with) 3. Can you tell me a bit about this financial institution: a. How long as it been in operation in this county? b. What financial services do you offer? c. For each of these, what are the criteria for accessing the services? (e.g. to open an account, qualify for a loan, etc.) d. Who are your clients? (Probe for age groups, gender, educational level, type of work, plus any disparities in service uptake)) [EQ1.1.4, EQ1.1.6] 4. Specifically, about how many of your clients are youth from the ages of 18-35, with less than secondary school completion? What percentage of your client base would this be, approximately? [EQ1.2.1] 5. If such youth are a relatively small proportion of your client base, why do you think this is? [EQ1.2.2] 6. Do you notice any differences in the number of young men accessing your financial services, in comparison to young women? What are these differences? Why do you think these are present? [EQ1.1.6] 7. Does your institution do anything particular to reach out to youth, those with lower levels of education, women, or other potentially underserved groups? If so, please describe. [EQ1.2.1] 8. Does your institution do anything particular to suit the needs of small-scale entrepreneurs, including those in the informal sector? If so, please describe. [EQ1.2.1] 9. Do you think your institution could do more to support youth, especially those starting small businesses? What is it that it could do more? Why is your institution not currently doing this? [EQ2.1, 2.2] 10. Does your institution have any links to other financial institutions or VSLAs? (For example, do any VSLAs use your services?) If so, please explain. If not, why not? [EQ 1.1.4] 11. Over the last 12 months, have you noticed any changes in your clientele? In particular, have you noticed any changes in the number of youth, females, or less served clients? If so, what have you noticed? Why do you think these changes occurred? [EQ1.1.6] 12. Can you describe K-YES’s relationship with your institution? (Probe for the types of support from K-YES e.g. product or service development) What do you think worked well about this? What was challenging or could use improvement? [EQ1.2.1 & EQ2.1] 13. Did K-YES link your institution to any other groups or organizations? Please describe. Was this useful? [EQ 1.1.5, EQ 2.1. EQ2.5] 14. As far as you are aware, has K-YES taken any steps to inform youth or otherwise help them link to your institution’s services? If so, what were these steps? In your opinion, how effective were these? [EQ 1.2.1 & EQ2.2] 15. As far as you are aware, has K-YES taken any other actions or supported any other ventures that could help youth become able to access and manage financial resources? If so, what were these? In your opinion, how well did these actions achieve the intended result? [EQ1.2.1, EQ1.2.2] 16. When the K-YES program stops in this county, what difference will it make to your services and operations? [EQ 1.1.5] 17. What advice can you offer to K-YES and other programs aimed at supporting youth entrepreneurs? 18. Anything else you would like to add? K-YES Key Informant Interview Guide: VSLAs KI Group: (select one) VSLA County: (select one) 25- Bungoma 26- Garissa 27- Kericho 28- Kwale KI #: INTERVIEW: Interviewer name(s): Date: Start time: Finish time: RESPONDENT: Name: Organization Name: Position in Organization: Email address (if available): Phone contact (if available): INTERVIEWER COMMENTS: INTRODUCTION AND CONSENT Hello and thank you for talking to us. We are from Management Systems International, a company that carries out research and evaluation studies. We are visiting here today to interview you about your experiences with the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills project (K-YES). This information is important to establish the progress K-YES has made in the past 18 months, and to inform future K-YES activities. The interview will take about 45 minutes and we will ask questions to you about particular topics related to your experiences and perceptions of K-YES. Your participation is completely voluntary. You are free to not answer any question with which you are not comfortable, and you may stop the interview at any time, in which case we will only use the data up to the point you withdrew from the interview. Your responses will be aggregated with other participants' responses and your name will not appear on any of our reports. Response to consent (1-Yes 2-No) Questions: 1. Have you heard of the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills Program (K-YES) or RTI? If no, will need to probe more to see if there is an indirect relationship, and if not...terminate the interview. 2. Can you please briefly describe your involvement with K-YES? (Probe for specific year and month the respondent and organization have been working with K-YES, activities involved with) 3. Can you tell me a bit about this savings and loan association: a. When did it start, and who started it? b. How many members do you have? c. Who are your members? (Probe for age groups, gender, educational level, type of work) d. Specifically, about how many of your members are youth from the ages of 18-35, with less than secondary school completion? e. What activities do you have? i. Do you do any savings activities? If so, how does this work? ii. Do you provide loans to members? If so how does this work? What are the conditions? iii. Do you have any other activities, financial or otherwise? [EQ1.1.4, EQ1.1.6] 4. Does your association have any links to SACCOs, banks, or other financial institutions? If so, please describe these. a. How effective are these links in helping your members access banking services? b. Are there any challenges your association and its members face in dealing with financial institutions? If so what? c. Did K-YES help to establish any of these links? [EQ2.5] 5. As far as you are aware, has K-YES taken any steps to inform youth or otherwise help them link to your association, or to form similar associations? If so, what were these steps? In your opinion, how effective were these? [EQ 1.2.1 & EQ 3.1] 6. To your knowledge, has K-YES done anything to increase the financial awareness of your youth members? If so, what? In your opinion, how effective was this? [EQ1.2.1] 7. As far as you are aware, has K-YES taken any other actions or supported any other ventures that could help youth become more able to access and manage financial resources? If so, what were these? In your opinion, how effective were these? [EQ1.2.1] 8. Has K-YES helped your association to link to any other organizations serving youth entrepreneurs? If so, please describe. How effective has this been. [EQ2.5] 9. When the K-YES program stops, what do you think will be the effect, if any, on your VSLA? [EQ1.1.5] 10. What advice can you offer to K-YES and other programs aimed at supporting youth entrepreneurs? [Overall] 11. Anything else you would like to add? [Overall] K-YES Key Informant Interview Guide: (Trainers/Lead Trainers) KI Group: (select one) 12- IP 13- Gov’t 14- VTC/educational centre 15- Private sector 16- Financial service provider 17- Trainer 18- Gender facilitator 19- Mentor County: (select one) 29- Bungoma 30- Garissa 31- Kericho 32- Kwale 33- Nairobi 34- National-level KI #: INTERVIEW: Interviewer name(s): Date: Start time: Finish time: RESPONDENT: Name: Organization Name: Position in Organization: Email address (if available): Phone contact (if available): INTERVIEWER COMMENTS: INTRODUCTION AND CONSENT Hello and thank you for talking to us. We are from Management Systems International, a company that carries out research and evaluation studies. We are visiting here today to interview you about your experiences with the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills project (K-YES). This information is important to establish the progress K-YES has made in the past 18 months, and to inform future K-YES activities. The interview will take about 45 minutes and we will ask questions to you about particular topics related to your experiences and perceptions of K-YES. Your participation is completely voluntary. You are free to not answer any question with which you are not comfortable, and you may stop the interview at any time, in which case we will only use the data up to the point you withdrew from the interview. Your responses will be aggregated with other participants' responses and your name will not appear on any of our reports. Response to consent (1-Yes 2-No) Questions 1. Have you heard of the K-YES program, as implemented by RTI? 2. Is your involvement with K-YES at an individual level, or at an organizational level? 3. What is your organizational affiliation, if any? 4. Since when (year and month) have you/your organization been working with K-YES? 5. Can you please briefly describe your involvement with K-YES? What is your role as a trainer or lead trainer? 6. What specific topics do you provide training on, and to whom? 7. How long have you been conducting training? Were you doing this before K-YES? 8. What technical support have you received from K-YES to do your work? (Probe for materials provided, training received, linkages, etc.) Is this sufficient in your opinion? 9. Have you received any financial support from K-YES to do your work? If so, how much? Is this sufficient in your opinion? 10. Can you comment on the overall quality of the training approach and curricula provided through K￾YES? (PROBE about selection of students, training is appropriate to student needs, curricula is well designed/sufficient to meet learning goals) [EQ 1.2.2] 11. If you were conducting training prior to K-YES, how is the K-YES training different from your previous training curricula and approaches? [EQ 1.2.2] 12. Do you think there is anything particularly unique or important about K-YES’s approach to training? If so, please describe. [EQ1.2.2] 13. For those in organizations, what investment of time, money, or other resources has your organization made toward K-YES related activities? [EQ 1.1.4 ; EQ1.1.5] a) Do you think your organization will be able to continue these activities once K-YES support ends? Why or why not? [EQ 1.1.5] b) Has K-YES done anything to support the longer term ability and capacity to deliver on objectives of the training institute you work for? (PROBE – management training or other?) If so, how effective do you think K-YES’s support was? Was it needed? Was it adequate? [EQ 1.1.4] 14. For topics you provide training on, how would you describe the skills of youths who have participated in K-YES activities? e. Have they improved? If yes, in which ways, if not, why not? [EQ1.2.2] 15. Have young men and young women participated in these trainings to the same extent? If not, why not? [EQ 1.1.6] 16. Do you think these trainings are equally suited to young men and young women? Why or why not? What could be done to make them more suited, if they are not? [EQ1.1.6] 17. Have you experienced any challenges in conducting the K-YES training or getting support for K-YES? If so, what were these? How did you deal with this? Did you get any support from K-YES? [EQ2.1] 18. What is your perception of vocational training and its effectiveness in preparing young men and women for the work (labor) market? Why do you think this is? Have you seen any changes in attitudes toward vocational training centres and graduates? If so, what changes have you observed? Why do you think this happened? [EQ 1.1.2] 19. In addition to training, what other services, if any, to prepare youth for the labor market? 20. Do you know if K-YES is providing these services? Please explain. Have you been involved in any K￾YES monitoring or feedback activities? If so, can you describe? Do you know how these activities were used? Do you think they made any difference to the way K-YES was carried out in this county? [EQ2.4] 21. Are there any other ways you have been able to have input into the way K-YES works? If so, please explain. If not, would you like more input? How would you like to see this happen? [EQ2] 22. To your knowledge, have youth been able to find jobs or improve their own businesses after taking the training? If so, what types? Are there challenges in finding jobs/opportunities after training? a) What role, if any, did the trainings play in helping youth acquire these jobs or improve their businesses? How effectively do you think K-YES supported training has prepared youth for the current labour market? Please explain. [EQ3.1] 23. Besides gaining technical and/or business skills, do you see any other outcomes/changes in youth participating in K-YES activities? If so, what? [SI1] 24. What recommendations, if any, would you make to improve K-YES as it goes forward in other counties? 25. Do you have any other comments? K-YES Key Informant Interview Guide: (Gender Facilitators) KI Group: (select one) 20- Gender facilitator County: (select one) 35- Bungoma 36- Garissa 37- Kericho 38- Kwale KI #: INTERVIEW: Interviewer name(s): Date: Start time: Finish time: RESPONDENT: Name: Organization Name: Position in Organization: Email address (if available): Phone contact (if available): INTERVIEWER COMMENTS: INTRODUCTION AND CONSENT Hello and thank you for talking to us. We are from Management Systems International, a company that carries out research and evaluation studies. We are visiting here today to interview you about your experiences with the Kenya Youth Employment and Skills project (K-YES). This information is important to establish the progress K-YES has made in the past 18 months, and to inform future K-YES activities. The interview will take about 45 minutes and we will ask questions to you about particular topics related to your experiences and perceptions of K-YES. Your participation is completely voluntary. You are free to not answer any question with which you are not comfortable, and you may stop the interview at any time, in which case we will only use the data up to the point you withdrew from the interview. Your responses will be aggregated with other participants' responses and your name will not appear on any of our reports. Response to consent (1-Yes 2-No) Basic Background and Link to K-YES 1. Since when (year and month) have you been working with K-YES programs implemented by RTI? 2. What is your role in relation to K-YES/RTI? (i.e. confirm the person is a gender facilitator) 3. What is your organizational affiliation? Specific experience as a gender facilitator 4. Why did you become a gender facilitator for K-YES/RTI? [1.2.1] 5. What type of training and support did you get from K-YES/RTI as a gender facilitator? [1.2.1] a. How adequate was this training in your opinion? [1.2.1] b. Do you get any form of compensation as a gender facilitator? If so, from where? 6. To whom have you provided gender training? [EQ1.1.6] 7. Can you please describe the topics that you cover in this training? [EQ1.1.6] 8. What have been the outcomes of this training? Do you believe it has had an influence on the attitudes and behavior of participants going forward? Please explain what you have observed. [EQ1.1.6] 9. What, if anything, do you think could have been done to make your role as a gender facilitator more effective? [EQ1.1.6] 10. Overall, what gender specific barriers impede young men’s ability to make an income? What about for young women? Please explain with examples if possible. [1.1.6, 1.2.2] a. In addition to the gender training, what other actions has K-YES/RTI taken to reduce or overcome these barriers? [EQ1.1.6] b. How effective have these been to date? [EQ1.1.6] 11. To your knowledge, has any organization or other group involved in K-YES/RTI changed their policies to provide equal opportunities to both male and female youth? Please give examples. What led them to make these changes? [EQ1.1.6] 12. What are the challenges of integrating gender issues into youth training and employment programs in this county? [EQ1.1.6] a. What has K-YES/RTI done to overcome these challenges? [EQ1.1.6] b. Were these efforts effective in your opinion? [EQ1.1.6] c. Were they sufficient? If not, what more needs to be done? [EQ1.1.6] 13. How long do you expect to continue providing gender training? Why? (PROBE for factors related to stopping or continuing) [1.1.5] 14. What advice do you have for improving K-YES/RTI as it moves forward into other counties? [Overall] 15. Any other comments? [Overall] K-YES (RTI) Key Informant Interview Guide: For Youth KI Group: (select one) 21- Profiled Youth County: (select one) 39- Bungoma 40- Garissa 41- Kericho 42- Kwale KI #: INTERVIEW: Interviewer name(s): Date: Start time: Finish time: RESPONDENT: Name: Email address (if available): Phone contact (if available): INTERVIEWER COMMENTS: INTRODUCTION AND CONSENT Hello and thank you for talking to us. We are from Management Systems International, a company that carries out research and evaluation studies. We are visiting here today to interview you about your experiences with the Kenya Youth Work and Skills Program or K-YES, implemented by RTI. This information is important to establish the progress K-YES (RTI) has made in the past 18 months, and to inform future K-YES (RTI) activities. The interview will take about 45 minutes and we will ask questions to you about particular topics related to your experiences and perceptions of K-YES (RTI). Your participation is completely voluntary. You are free to not answer any question with which you are not comfortable, and you may stop the interview at any time, in which case we will only use the data up to the point you withdrew from the interview. Your responses will be aggregated with other participants' responses and your name will not appear on any of our reports. Response to consent (1-Yes 2-No) B. Basic Background and Link to K-YES (RTI) 1. Have you heard of the Kenya Youth Work and Skills Program (K-YES)? You might also know it as RTI? If no, will need to probe more to see if there is an indirect relationship, and if not...terminate the interview. 2. Since when (year and month) were you involved with K-YES (RTI)? 3. How did you come to know about and become involved with K-YES (RTI)? C. Demographics 4. County: 5. Gender: 6. Age: 7. Level of education: D. Current and ideal work situation 8. Can you please describe your current work situation? [Probe: do you have a job? Do you have a business? Do you have any other means of making money? Do you have multiple means of making money? What are these?] [EQ3] 9. How satisfied are you with your current work situation? [EQ3] 10. Can you describe what your ideal work situation would be? [EQ3] E. Support received from K-YES 11. Have you taken any of the following training or received any of the following services from K￾YES/RTI: [tick all that apply and ask follow up questions where relevant] [EQ1.2.2]  i). Vocational training? a. If yes, when? b.From what institution or organization? c. On what topic(s)? d.For how long? e.Was this useful for you? Why or why not?  ii). Business skills training? a. If yes, when? b.From what institution or organization? c. On what topic(s)? d.For how long? e.Was this useful for you? Why or why not?  iii). Career counselling? a. If yes, when? b.From what institution or organization? c. For how long? d.Was this useful for you? Why or why not?  iv). Were you visited by a business person who gave you advice? a. If yes, when? b. Who was the business person, and what kind of business did she or he do? c. How were you connected to this person (or organization)? d. How many times did this happen? e. Was this useful for you? Why or why not?  v). Help in getting an internship or job placement? a. If yes, when? b.From what institution or organization? c. For how long? d.Was this useful for you? Why or why not?  vi). Information about how to improve your work situation or how to get new work? a. If yes, when? b.From what institution or organization? c. For how long? d.Was this useful for you? Why or why not?  vii). Information or support in accessing financial services? a. If yes, when? b.What sort of support did you receive? c. From what institution or organization)? d.Were you able to obtain a loan? e.Was this useful for you? Why or why not?  viii). Help in registering for official ID? [Explain reason for registering for ID – work and services] a. If yes, when? b.From what institution or organization)? c. For how long? d.Was this useful for you? Why or why not?  ix). Any other work-related support? (please specify) a. If yes, please describe b.When did you receive this? c. From what institution or organization? d.For how long? e.Was this useful for you? Why or why not? F. Changes in work status 12. Since you got involved with K-YES/RTI, has anything changed in the way you make a living? [EQ3]  Yes, I have started a new way of making a living (this could be a new job, a new income￾generating activity or business) -> Go to Section F  Yes, I have improved my existing way of making a living (this can include increased income, increased work security, increased profit, or any other improvement you feel is has been important to you and your life. -> Go to Section G  No, there has been no change in the way I make a living. -> Go to Section H G. New work [EQ3] 13. What is your new work? 14. When did you get it? 15. How did you get this new work? 16. Did you have any support in getting this work? If so, who supported you? What was it? How did it help? 17. Can you please describe what your work situation was before this? 18. Do you think that you will change your work situation in the future? a. If so, how do you think it will change? b.Why do you think it will change? c. Is this change something you want, or something you don’t want? 19. How important were the services you received in helping you obtain your new work situation? 20. Do you think you got the right combination of services and support? Why or why not? 21. Is there any service that you did not receive that would have helped you even more? 22. Is there any service you received that did not help you? H. Improved Work [EQ3] 23. What is the improvement in your work situation? 24. What led to the improvement? 25. Do you think there will be further changes to your work situation in the future? a. If so, how do you think it will change? b.Why do you think it will change? c. Is this change something you want, or something you don’t want? 26. How important were the services you received in helping you improve your work situation? 27. Do you think you got the right combination of services and support? Why or why not? 28. Is there any service that you did not receive that would have helped you even more? 29. Is there any service you received that did not help you? I. No change in work situation [EQ3] 30. Are you content with your current work situation? 31. If not, why not? 32. If not, why have you not been able to change it? 33. If not, what have you done to try to change it? 34. Why do you think the services and support you received did not help you to improve your work situation? 35. What kind of support, information, or training do you think you need to improve your work situation? J. Final Comments and Advice (for all respondents) [overall] 36. In addition to the changes you’ve spoken of, were there any other changes you experienced as a result of your involvement in K-YES? Please explain. [SI1] 37. What advice do you have for the people who are introducing K-YES (RTI) to other counties, so that it can be most useful to the youth there? 38. Anything else you would like to add? ANNEX 4: LIST OF INTERVIEWEES PER COUNTY # Interview Type Position/Organizational Affiliation Nairobi 1. Group Interview RTI 2. Key Informant Interview Nairobi County Coordinator 3. Key Informant Interview Nairobi Youth Bunge SACCO 4. Key Informant Interview K-YES Mentor 5. Key Informant Interview Director Youth Training 6. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiaries 7. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiaries 8. Key Informant Interview USAID 9. Key Informant Interview USAID 10. Key Informant Interview CITC Pumwani VTC 11. Key Informant Interview FSP (VLSA) 12. Key Informant Interview K-YES Trainer 13. Key Informant Interview K-YES Trainer 14. Key Informant Interview K-YES Gender Facilitator 15. Key Informant Interview Gender Facilitator 16. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 17. Key Informant Interview Kangemi VTC - Manager 18. Key Informant Interview CDACC 19. Key Informant Interview Director Vocational Training 20. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 21. Key Informant Interview McKinsey 22. Key Informant Interview KAVES 23. Key Informant Interview KCB Foundation 24. Key Informant Interview IRC 25. Group Interview K-YES Beneficiaries 26. Group Interview K-YES Beneficiaries 27. Group Interview K-YES Partners Garissa 28. Key Informant Interview Assistant County Coordinator 29. Key Informant Interview Lead ToT 30. Key Informant Interview ToT 31. Key Informant Interview Director Vocational Training 32. Key Informant Interview YBF SACCO 33. Key Informant Interview Hashash Weavers VTC 34. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary # Interview Type Position/Organizational Affiliation 35. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 36. Key Informant Interview Gender Facilitator 37. Key Informant Interview Gender Facilitator 38. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 39. Key Informant Interview Manager Garissa VTC 40. Group Interview K-YES Beneficiaries 41. Group Interview K-YES Beneficiaries 42. Group Interview K-YES Partners Kwale 43. Key Informant Interview County Coordinator 44. Key Informant Interview ToT 45. Key Informant Interview Director Youth Affairs 46. Key Informant Interview Gender facilitator 47. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 48. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 49. Key Informant Interview Yehu Microfinance Trust 50. Key Informant Interview Matuga VTC 51. Key Informant Interview Maluti School of Beauty VTC 52. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 53. Key Informant Interview Kwale Youth Bunge Sacco 54. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 55. Key Informant Interview Gender facilitator 56. Key Informant Interview Lead Trainer 57. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 58. Key Informant Interview VSLA 59. Group Interview K-YES Beneficiaries 60. Group Interview K-YES Beneficiaries 61. Group Interview Youth Bunge Forum Kericho 62. Key Informant Interview County Coordinator 63. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 64. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 65. Key Informant Interview VSLA 66. Key Informant Interview ToT 67. Key Informant Interview Kericho Youth Bunge Sacco 68. Key Informant Interview Gender facilitator 69. Key Informant Interview Gender facilitator 70. Key Informant Interview County Director # Interview Type Position/Organizational Affiliation 71. Key Informant Interview Kipsamumgut Vocational Education Centre 72. Key Informant Interview Lead Trainer 73. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 74. Key Informant Interview FSP, KCB 75. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 76. Key Informant Interview Deputy Governor 77. Key Informant Interview Ledlet Polytechnic 78. Key Informant Interview Balloon Ventures 79. Group Interview K-YES Beneficiaries 80. Group Interview K-YES Beneficiaries 81. Group Interview K-YES Partners Bungoma 82. Key Informant Interview County Coordinator 83. Key Informant Interview Trainer 84. Key Informant Interview Gender Facilitator 85. Key Informant Interview Lead Trainer 86. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 87. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 88. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 89. Key Informant Interview K-YES beneficiary 90. Key Informant Interview Bungoma County Director 91. Key Informant Interview Deeva Beauty College 92. Key Informant Interview Probation Center VTC 93. Key Informant Interview Bungoma County Youth Enterprise Fund/BUCOYEF 94. Key Informant Interview YBF SACCO, Bungoma Youth Bunge SACCO 95. Key Informant Interview Gender Facilitator 96. Key Informant Interview VSLA 97. Group Interview K-YES Beneficiaries 98. Group Interview K-YES Beneficiaries 99. Group Interview K-YES Partners ANNEX 5. LIST OF DOCUMENTS REVIEWED The evaluation team reviewed K-YES project documents provided by USAID/Kenya and RTI. The main documents consulted are listed below. Award Documents and Modifications 1. K-YES Contract Section C M&E Plans Data 2. K-YES Year 1 M&E Plan 3. K-YES Year 2 M&E Plan Work Plans 4. K-YES Year 1 work-plan 5. K-YES Year 2 work-plan 6. Nairobi County Year 2 work-plan 7. Garissa County Year 2 work-plan 8. Kwale County Year 2 work-plan 9. Kericho County Year 2 work-plan 10. Bungoma County Year 2 work-plan Project Reports (Monthly, Quarterly and Annual) Annual 11. K-YES FY16 Annual Report October 2015‒September 2016 Quarterly 12. K-YES Q 1 Progress Report 13. K-YES Q 2 Progress Report 14. K-YES Q 3 Progress Report 15. K-YES Q 4 Progress Report 16. K-YES Q 5 Progress Report 17. K-YES Q 6 Progress Report Monthly 18. K-YES Nairobi, Monthly Report, December 2016 19. K-YES Kericho, Monthly Report, December 2016 20. K-YES Bungoma, Monthly Report, December 2016 21. K-YES Garissa, Monthly Report, December 2016 22. K-YES Kwale, Monthly Report, December 2016 23. K-YES Nairobi, Monthly Report, April 2017 24. K-YES Kwale, Monthly Report, April 2017 25. K-YES Bungoma, Monthly Report, April 2017 26. K-YES Garissa, Monthly Report, April 2017 27. K-YES Kwale, Monthly Report, April 2017 28. K-YES Nairobi, Monthly Report, January 2017 29. K-YES Kwale, Monthly Report, January 2017 30. K-YES Bungoma, Monthly Report, January 2017 31. K-YES Garissa, Monthly Report, January 2017 32. K-YES Kwale, Monthly Report, January 2017 33. K-YES Nairobi, Monthly Report, February 2017 34. K-YES Kwale, Monthly Report, February 2017 35. K-YES Bungoma, Monthly Report, February 2017 36. K-YES Garissa, Monthly Report, February 2017 37. K-YES Kwale, Monthly Report, February 2017 38. K-YES Nairobi, Monthly Report, March 2017 39. K-YES Kwale, Monthly Report, March 2017 40. K-YES Bungoma, Monthly Report, March 2017 41. K-YES Garissa, Monthly Report, March 2017 42. K-YES Kwale, Monthly Report, March 2017 43. K-YES Nairobi, Monthly Report, May 2017 44. K-YES Kwale, Monthly Report, May 2017 45. K-YES Bungoma, Monthly Report, May 2017 46. K-YES Garissa, Monthly Report, May 2017 47. K-YES Kwale, Monthly Report, May 2017 U.S. Agency for International Development 1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20523