ACTIVITY DESCRIPTION:

This is an ongoing SUN Project activity and will focus on scaling up support to OVC and caregivers, and on

ensuring the saturation of services, in the project sites. CRS is presently implementing programs in 10

project sites located in 8 States namely Abuja, Edo, Kogi, Niger, Nassarawa, Benue, Kaduna and Plateau.

During the first quarter of COP08, CRS will initiate partnerships with three new project sites - two in Benue

and one in Plateau State. This is not a geographic expansion of the project, but rather an administrative

division of our largest existing partners to ensure better saturation of services. This will bring the total of

CRS OVC sites to 13.

The SUN Project will focus on improving the quality of services provided to enhance the quality of life for

OVC and caregivers through direct service provision and capacity building for providers, OVC households,

community support structures, and partner institutional capacity. All OVC within a household shall be

enrolled into the program and provided with comprehensive services including at least three of the following:

education/vocational support, health care, psychosocial support, OVC protection and economic

strengthening. In COP08, linkages will be sought for nutritional and educational support with USG

supported wrap-around activities in sites where these co-exist with CRS-SUN.

Education will be supported through teachers' training, and through operational partnerships with schools

which support a more conducive environment for learning for all students, including OVC, as well as the

provision of teaching materials. OVC completing vocational training will be linked to economic strengthening

opportunities including NDE, NAPEP and other viable government initiatives.

Healthcare will be promoted through partnerships with USG IPs, GON, FBOs and AIDSRelief healthcare

centres for growth monitoring and treatment of OIs; and through health education at support group meetings

and home visits. Other services include immunization, provision of preventive care packages comprising

insecticide treated nets and water guard/containers and the treatment of minor ailments during home visits.

Home visitors also refer clients they cannot treat to health facilities. In addition, all HIV positive OVC and

caregivers seeking health care support will be linked to local health facilities for palliative care and to the

nearest ART Treatment sites of their choice, which may include CRS-AIDSRelief sites.

Also with regard to health, a Peer Health Educators strategy will be initiated in schools and communities to

create demand for HCT among OVC, Caregivers and the general population. This will be facilitated through

the integration of services with the CRS 7D project care and support activities, since both projects support

are domiciled in the same households and communities. The two-way referral system between these

programs and with AIDSRelief will be strengthened. Psychosocial support will be provided through group

counseling, the formation of school HIV/AIDS prevention clubs, the reinforcement of established youth-

friendly centres, home visitation, and through the integration of OVC into community recreational facilities.

OVC protection support will be anchored by the Justice Peace and Development Commissions JPDC's in

each diocese. The specific focus areas of each partner within the domain of protection will vary in

accordance with the local priorities identified in the situation analysis, but will include birth registration for all

under fives enrolled in the CRS-SUN project, the strengthening of the effectiveness of the community justice

system for dealing with inheritance issues, the creation of awareness on child abuse and child rights, and

the linking of OVC to their siblings and/or extended families. Income generation activities for OVC and

Caregivers, volunteers and youth will be sustained and scaled up.

Partner capacity to serve OVC will also be strengthened as CRS supports the Catholic Secretariat of

Nigeria (CSN) to provide leadership, technical support and national coordination. CRS will also provide

mentoring and capacity building in project management, monitoring and evaluation, finance, administration,

and the management of small grants. This support is provided at all levels: for CSN directors, the CSN

Health Unit and provincial structures, including the Diocesan and Parish Action Committees on AIDS

(PACA) in all the project dioceses.

The M&E strategy will be participatory, community driven and aligned to the national Plan of Action on OVC

within the context of the ‘three-ones' initiative. Referral systems will be established with other IPs and with

the relevant GON supervisory agencies to track the quality of each component of the services that the OVC

receive, in accordance with Child status Index and GoN approved tools. In addition, a more intense and well

-structured monitoring and supervisory strategy will be adopted to further assure the quality of the services

provided. Effort will also be made to saturate services within reasonable and limited geographical areas by

mopping up all OVC in HIV/AIDS affected households within projects sites before expanding to other

communities.

The primary direct targets for this project will be 11,000 OVC receiving at least three components of

services. To this end, 510 PACA volunteers, teachers and key representatives of government will be trained

on OVC care and support. The new 510 target is in addition to COP07 commitments. CRS will also provide

services to 12,000 indirect beneficiaries by building the capacity of the OVC services providers at the local

government level. In each diocese, two government representatives will be trained in service delivery and

program monitoring. Each pair will be responsible for training 10 LGA-level service providers from identified

LGAs that are most in need as evidenced by the OVC situation analysis conducted. These 100 LGA service

providers will each reach 120 OVC with public services of increased quality.

CONTRIBUTIONS TO OVERALL PROGRAM AREA:

Activities in the program area are focused on strengthening the capacity of families and communities to

provide care and support for OVC. These activities contribute to the USG's PEPFAR five year strategy of

providing care and support to 400,000 OVC. This is also consistent with the Strategic Framework on OVC

by the provision of services to 11,000 OVC and training 510 service providers within faith based institutions.

In addition, specific policy and community mobilization capacity initiatives aimed at leveraging national

guidelines and procedures around the critical needs of OVC including school fees will be provided for CSN

leadership, Parish structure and other affiliated institutions.

LINKS TO OTHER ACTIVITIES:

This links to 3.3.11 (HIV treatment), 3.3.10 (HIV drugs), 3.3.06 (basic palliative care) and 3.3.07 (TB/HIV)

and 3.3.09 (VCT). CRS ‘7D' care and support projects is implemented in CRS OVC project States. All OVC

families receive community based care and support from the 7Diocese project. SUN/7D dual referral

Activity Narrative: strategy will be explored where OVC and their caregivers that are positive will be referred appropriately to

CRS AIDS Relief or other IP 3.3.11 sites for treatment while positive OVC from AIDSRelief sites will be

referred to SUN sites for appropriate and comprehensive OVC services. Infants born to PMTCT clients will

be followed up through the growth monitoring component of the OVC support services while children of

support group members in the 7D project will benefit from the OVC services. Through collaboration and

referral networks with organizations like Christian Aid and Aids relief, OVC's will access other services and

opportunities that are not provided directly by CRS SUN project.

POPULATIONS BEING TARGETED:

OVC, care givers of OVC, and other children/siblings living in OVC households are the direct project target

while FBOs, religious/community leaders, representatives of government supervisory agencies as well as

community volunteers constitute indirect beneficiary of CRS SUN project activities. The general population

of youth will benefit as a result of the life skills training that will be conducted in schools. AIDSRelief will also

refer their positive OVC on ART to the CRS OVC project to ensure they receive comprehensive package of

care for OVC on ART.

EMPHASIS AREAS:

An emphasis area is the development of local partner's capacity to better organize itself and support OVC

services. Other emphasis areas are: community mobilization/participation; development of

network/linkages/referral system; information, education and communication and linkages with other sectors

and initiatives.

This program will strive to address gender issues: specifically increasing women's legal rights through the

provision of support for legal fees and advice. Linkages with community efforts to provide assistance in

protecting women and children's legal rights will also be strengthened. Also, effort will be made to address

issues related to stigma and discrimination that hamper care and support activities as well as prevention

activities.

ACTIVITY DESCRIPTION:

CRS SUN/OVC (SUN) will collaborate with the CRS 7 Dioceses (7D) project to provide SI activities to

strengthen M&E in 13 sites in eight project states in Nigeria; Edo, Benue, Niger, Nasarrawa, FCT, Plateau,

Kaduna and Kogi States. Activities will focus on program level reporting, Health Management Information

System (HMIS), and quality assurance, and will be aligned with the USG strategic information (SI) data

quality assessment/improvement (DQA/I) and capacity building plan to enhance reporting, monitoring, and

management of the 7D project.

The new monitoring and reporting system established in COP07 will be strengthened in COP08. An M&E

system review workshop will be conducted to assess the data collection tools and reporting structure

through a participatory process involving partners and representatives. Necessary adjustments will correct

any identified gaps or weaknesses of the system during the workshop. The 7D/SUN SI resources will be

used to modify and print existing M&E tools that complement the harmonized Government of Nigeria (GoN)

registers and reporting forms, to better capture program performance.

Due to high attrition rate of Parish AIDS Volunteers (PAVs), a quarterly M&E orientation and training will be

conducted at PACA level for the new volunteers by the diocesan M&E officers and M&E focal person in

each parish. Specifically two volunteers from each of the 13 partner arch/dioceses will be trained in basic

M&E to fully utilize the data collection tools they will use. SUN will support 7D in training 30 PAVs master

trainers who will each mentor 30 people giving a total of 780 trained PAVs. The SI component of the project

will also examine the motivation of volunteers and identify factors affecting attrition and satisfaction.

A refresher course on data management will be conducted for the 10 diocesan M&E officers while the

health coordinators and HIV/AIDS coordinators will be trained on the use of data for programmatic decision

making. Ongoing TA will be provided by the M&E specialist and the program managers to the diocesan

management staff on how to use data generated in each diocese to improve project management.

In order to improve the quality of data being collected at every level of the project, a data quality

assessment workshop will be held to train the diocesan M&E officers and program coordinators on how to

assess and monitor data quality. Internal data quality assessments will be conducted at regular intervals to

ensure the validity, reliability, timeliness, preciseness and integrity of data being collected.

The CRS home office will be working closely with the SUN staff to determine the training needs of our

partner organization and partner staff. The CRS training coordinator will also ensure that trainings follow

current modules, learning methods and curriculum that increase the capacity of participants to learn, retain

and apply new knowledge. The M&E specialist will provide technical support and training to partner staff.

The M&E specialist will collaborate with the training coordinator to enhance both quality and technical depth

of trainings. With technical support, partners will develop the capacity to evaluate their existing data and use

this information to influence programming and improve performance.

SI resources will also be used to support operations research. A "Do No Harm" analysis will be conducted in

five dioceses to assess the effects of our intervention on the rights, privacy and quality of life of the

beneficiaries and their families. An external consultant and or HIV/AIDS Technical Advisor from the CRS

regional office will join the program staff to conduct the study. In addition, the outcome of SI activities will

also help target the most vulnerable OVC in the community for support.

SUN SI activities will also focus on assessing compliance to existing national protocols and guidance for

service provision. The outcome of the assessment will provide updated information on training needs for the

partners' staff.

A total of 13 Arch/dioceses and the CSN will participate in SI activities throughout the COP08. There will be

no geographical expansion in COP08 although three new dioceses are expected to be created from existing

10 dioceses while 65 youth OVC caregivers will be trained to support documentation during service

delivery. Services will be expanded within the same states and sites as COP07.

CONTRIBUTIONS TO OVERALL PROGRAM AREA:

The SI activities will contribute improved quality and reliability of data being reported on project activities

and service provision for OVC. Improvement in SI management capacity of existing and new partners will

ensure effective data use and management and will contribute towards the GON and USG strategy for the

provision of quality and timely information for decision making. This information will serve as a valuable

resource in developing corrective action plans that would enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of

operations and management of the SUN/OVC project. By strengthening the capacity of local partners, SI

activities will further increase the sustainability of HIV/AIDS programs in Nigeria.

LINKS TO OTHER ACTIVITIES:

SI activity relates to PMTCT (3.3.01), Abstinence and Be Faithful Prevention (3.3.02), Palliative Care: Basic

Health Care and Support (3.3.06), and Counseling and Testing (3.3.09). In addition, links with the GON and

other USG IPs will be strengthened.

POPULATIONS BEING TARGETED:

This activity targets faith based organizations and religious leaders.

EMPHASIS AREAS:

Emphasis areas include human capacity development