The Humanitarian Education Accelerator (HEA) has launched a new Call for Applications for Phase II of the programme, to identify and support a further cohort of education innovations in five countries: Chad, Ethiopia, Jordan, Lebanon and Uganda.

Now funded by Education Cannot Wait and led by UNHCR, the HEA is continuing its support for promising humanitarian education innovations to transition from successful pilots to programmes that can operate at scale, in order to reach more children with quality education.

The HEA provides a unique model of support for grantees, blending mentorship by experts, peer-to-peer learning and capacity building support to strengthen internal monitoring, evaluation and learning (MEL) and scaling processes, with a long-term approach to evaluation and evidence building.

Programme Approach

Through this unique approach, the HEA seeks to:

• Build the evidence base on how to effectively scale education innovations in humanitarian settings, through investing in rigorous research;
• Strengthen internal monitoring, evaluation and learning (MEL) processes and provide targeted support for selected organisations to navigate scale;
• Assist organisations to build strong, supportive partnerships with governments, humanitarian and development actors, donors and other practitioners for sustainable scale;
• Develop a community of practice, capturing knowledge and sharing lessons learned on scaling humanitarian education innovations, including the development of global public goods for the wider education sector.

Programme Stages

• Stage One of the HEA:
  • Stage One will bring together a shortlist of up to 10 successful innovations for a Scaling Bootcamp which will take place on first week of March 2021. During the 5-day bootcamp, shortlisted innovations will receive:
    • Detailed information about the HEA’s support and what it could achieve for organisations;
    • Engagement with HEA mentors, M&E advisors and members from the HEA Technical Team to undertake a scaling assessment framework of each innovation, and start defining key scaling challenges - in programming, monitoring and evaluating the impact of the innovation as it scales;
    • The opportunity to engage in peer learning with a cohort of humanitarian education innovators, to exchange ideas, build connections and expand your network of potential partners.
• Stage Two of the HEA:
  • Following the Scaling Bootcamp, up to 5 innovations will be selected to receive in depth support over the course of three months, starting from April 2021.
  • The 5 innovation teams will receive support from the HEA’s scaling and M&E experts to further develop their scaling strategy and research plans, while building their internal M&E capacity. This will entail webinars, online calls as well as individual mentoring sessions and workshops by the HEA Mentors.
• Stage Three of the HEA:
  • Up to 3 final innovations will then be selected by July/August 2021 and awarded up to USD 200,000, which they can spend up until December 2022. These funds can be used to assist in scaling efforts, particularly building internal research, monitoring and evaluation capacity to implement the programme and programme activities that are part of the overall scaling plan.

Eligibility Criteria

• The HEA will not be funding new, untested innovations in this funding cycle. They are instead looking to support innovations that have already been rolled out, have a Proof of Concept and are looking to scale beyond the pilot phase.
• The following criteria will be used to identify an initial shortlist of successful interventions for support under the HEA:
  • Geographic focus: is your innovation being implemented in one or more of the following focus countries: Chad, Ethiopia, Jordan, Lebanon and Uganda?
  • Proof of concept: have you developed a Proof of Concept around your innovation?
  • Readiness to scale: Are you preparing to or currently scaling? What is your readiness to scale?
  • Sustainability: do you have human resources and financial resources to support the scaling process?

For more information, visit UNHCR.