Civic education is a fundamental pre-requisite for any democratic reform relevant to all strata of society. However, an insufficient level of civic education and citizen engagement remains a challenge for Ukrainian society. To build Ukrainians’ sense of ownership and basic understanding of their role in a democratic society, USAID/ENGAGE and IRF focus on raising awareness as well as providing tools and opportunities for active citizen engagement. Equipping citizens with the knowledge, tools and benefits of civic education will increase the likelihood that they will become more responsible for and involved in the success of societal transformation. Pact and IRF will concentrate their joint efforts on both the formal and informal education sectors to highlight the negative impacts of participating

in corruption, foster new generations of civically aware and active youth, and encourage behavior change in older generations. Learning by doing is the best approach to ensure that learning is relevant and practical, not just passive and theoretical. So, it is expected that all educational activities are followed by practical application of received knowledge through various civic engagement or advocacy activities. There is really only one way to learn how to do something and that is to do it.

 

The goal of this RFA is to support initiatives led by civil society organizations (CSOs) which focus on reforms advocacy and on educating citizens about their fundamental roles, rights and responsibilities within a democratic society.

 

The objectives of the RFA are to support initiatives that:

• Strengthen the capacity and participation of citizens in policy dialogue, monitoring and oversight in order to contribute to the implementation of the reform agenda at the regional and local level;

• Strengthen civic engagement mechanisms and improve citizens’ participatory capacity;

• Enhance anti-corruption activism, civic monitoring and oversite;

• Foster networking among CSOs and development of effective subnational and local civic

coalitions;

• Support organizations, networks and coalitions in gender- and inclusion-sensitive programming.

• Address bullying among young people;

• Design and implement extra-curricular civic education programs based on innovative and unconventional approaches and methods.

 

Within this RFA USAID/ENGAGE and IRF intend to support projects by civil society

organizations that fall into either of the two Lots:

 

 

The activities within this lot may include but are not limited to:

• Awareness and engagement campaigns on the health, education and anti-corruption reforms;

• Advocacy campaigns to move forward the reforms agenda;

• Watchdog and monitoring activities to prevent corrupted practices followed by advocacy efforts to bring positive changes;

• Communication on reforms, opportunities to participate in the reforms implementation

 

The activities within this lot may include but are not limited to:

• Out-of-classroom educational activities on civic engagement mechanisms, inclusion, good governance practices, etc.;

• Establishing and development of high school and university students’ fraternities that address bullying and engage students into students’ self-governance,

• Activities aimed at reducing gender stereotypes and inclusion of vulnerable communities such as people with disabilities (PWDs), LGBTQI;

• Activities that foster the inclusion of internally displaced persons (IDPs);

• Engage parents alongside their children

into community activities;

• Adult/youth extracurricular education on citizen rights and responsibilities followed by civic engagement or advocacy activities.

 

• Tangible changes / results to the community in which the project takes place (e.g., local policy change, new instruments in place);

• Increased number of citizens involved in civil society activities and civic activism;

• Increased number of citizens who are willing to step up against corruption and address bullying;

• Increased citizen awareness of civic engagement mechanisms;

• Increased civic literacy in Ukraine;

• Representation of vulnerable constituencies, namely people with disabilities (PWDs) and internally displaced people (IDPs), in decision-making, oversight and community life increased;

• Increased number of CSO coalitions and networks.

 

 

• Officially registered CSOs or consortia of registered CSOs from all regions of Ukraine with established organizational structure and operational capacity;

• Experience to convene and coordinate subnational and local networks and constituency outreach in civic education and engagement;

• Experience in advocating and promoting democratic reforms, including combatting corruption;

• Experience in developing and utilizing diversified tools for civic engagement.

 

 

• Relevance to the stated goals of the RFA;

• Established organizational structure;

• Demonstrated ability to convene and engage non-governmental stakeholders and constituencies;

• Demonstrated experience in reaching out to communities and citizens;

• Clear defining and realistic assessment of the target audiences;

• Commitment to achieve measurable and sustainable results that will last beyond the project period;

• Inclusion of cross-cutting issues, namely gender equality and interests of vulnerable groups into the program design.

 

• Cover South and East of Ukraine (government-controlled areas of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts; Dnipro, Kharkiv, Kherson, Mykolayiv, Odessa, Zaporizhya oblasts);

• Include a variety of stakeholders as partners (including government authorities, student self-government authorities or organizations, media, business, etc.);

• Develop networks and coalitions;

• Demonstrate ability for impact and include a sustainability plan;

• Demonstrate innovative approaches in addressing the objectives of the RFA.

Tentative duration of grants: up to 12 months.

Grant amount: the expected range of grant amounts starts from UAH 200,000 and is up to UAH 1,250,000. Outstanding ideas may receive bigger financial support if they are reasonable and well-justified.

 

The competition will be run in two stages. At Stage 1, only concept notes in Ukrainian (up to 3 pages) should be submitted (see application form here). At Stage 2, winners of Stage 1 will be invited to submit full proposals according to grant making procedures of USAID/ENGAGE or IRF.

 

 

Submit completed application s in Ukrainian by e-mail to [email protected] with the subject: “Response to Civic Education RFA”.

 

Important notices:

• As part of this competition, Pact and IRF cannot award grants to business organizations, political parties, government institutions, religious organizations or individuals.

• Research can be one of the tools but not the only objective of the application.

• Applicants will be notified of the status of their application in writing by e-mail.

• Decisions are final and cannot be subject to reconsideration; no comments to the applications will be provided.

• Submitted applications cannot be returned or reviewed.

• The applicants must complete all sections of the application form to be accepted for application review.

• Late applications will not be considered.

 

 

Questions regarding this RFA may be sent to [email protected] no later than February 23, 2018, indicating clearly the title of the Request for Applications. Pact and IRF have no obligation to provide clarifications to questions received after this date. Replies will be provided March 2, 2018. To ensure fairness and transparency of the application process, Pact and IRF cannot give a prior opinion on the eligibility of applicants, actions or specific activities. No individual replies will be given to questions. Aggregated answers to all questions will be posted on the Facebook page of USAID/ENGAGE.