How collaboration, early engagement and collective ownership increase research impact: Strengthening community-based child protection mechanisms in Sierra Leone
Published: 2017
Author: Michael Wessells, David Lamin, Marie Manyeh, Dora King, Lindsay Stark, Sarah Lilley and Kathleen Kostelny
Chapter 5 of the publication “The Social Realities of Knowledge for Development: Sharing Lessons of Improving Development Processes with Evidence” published by the International Development Institute, 2017. Using Interagency Learning Initiative (ILI) action research in Sierra Leone, this chapter from a DfiD provides a case study on how a highly collaborative approach can enable child protection research to achieve a significant national impact. The chapter describes how the inter-agency research facilitated a community-driven approach to addressing teenage pregnancy.
Child Rights and Practitioner Wrongs: Lessons from Interagency Research in Sierra Leone and Kenya
Published: 2017
Author: Michael Wessells, Columbia University and Kathleen Kostelny, Columbia Group for Children in Adversity
Child rights are fundamental for ending violence and injustice against children and promoting children’s wellbeing. However, the top-down manner of introducing child rights is frequently problematic. Ethnographic research in Sierra Leone and Kenya indicates that top-down, impositional approaches to teaching child rights can lead local people to view child rights as a harm to children or to prefer traditional practices that can clash with human rights standards. To implement child rights, the use of a slow, respectful process of internally guided social change is recommended. To appear in M. Ruck, M. Peterson-Badali, and M. Freeman (Eds.) Handbook of Children’s Rights: Global and Multidisciplinary Perspectives. Taylor and Francis.
Presentation by Mike Wessells – Kampala workshop, 17-18 August 2016
Published: 2016
Author: Mike Wessells
Mike Wessells’ presentation at the Kampala workshop 17-18 August 2016 where he discusses questions about community driven child protection which keep him awake at night.
Presentation by Patrick Onyango – Kampala workshop, 17-18 August, 2016
Published: 2016
Author: Patrick Onyango
A presentation on girl mothers in armed forces and groups and their children in Northern Uganda, Liberia and Sierra Leone – Participatory Action Research to assess and improve their situations.
Worse than the war’: An ethnographic study of the impact of the Ebola crisis on life, sex, teenage pregnancy, and a community-driven Intervention in rural Sierra Leone
Published: 2016
Author: Kostelny, K., Lamin, D., Manyeh, M., Ondoro, K., Stark, L., Lilley, S., & Wessells, M.
The Ebola crisis in Sierra Leone disrupted the Interagency Learning Initiative’s action research on strengthening community-based child protection mechanisms. In response, ethnographic research was conducted to investigate the wider effects of the Ebola crisis as well as the specific effects on the community led intervention and problems related to teenage pregnancy.
Mbinu za kuimarisha mifumo ya ulinzi wa mtoto kuanzia chini kwenda juu mbinu na: Kuangazia watoto, familia na jamii
Published: 2015
Author: Mike Wessells
KiSwahili version of “Bottom-up approaches to strengthening child protection systems: Placing children, families, and communities at the center.” This article examines an alternative approach of community-driven, bottom-up work that enables non formal–formal collaboration and alignment, greater use of formal services, internally driven social change, and high levels of community ownership. From the journal: Child Abuse & Neglect
Bottom-up approaches to strengthening child protection systems: Placing children, families, and communities at the center
Published: 2015
Author: Mike Wessells
This article examines an alternative approach of community-driven, bottom-up work that enables non formal–formal collaboration and alignment, greater use of formal services, internally driven social change, and high levels of community ownership. From the journal: Child Abuse & Neglect
An Overview of the Community Driven Intervention To Reduce Teenage Pregnancy in Sierra Leone
Published: 2014
Author: Mike Wessells, David Lamin, & Marie Manyeh
An overview of the Interagency Learning Initiative process of supporting community-driven action that addresses needs of vulnerable children in Bombali and Moyamba Districts of Sierra Leone.
Research Brief: An Ethnographic Study of Community-Based Child Protection Mechanisms and their Linkages with the National Child Protection System of Sierra Leone
Published: 2012
Author: Inter-Agency Learning Initiative on Community-Based Child Protection Mechanisms and Child Protection Systems
This document serves as a seven-page summary of the longer report included among these research documents, “An Ethnographic Study of Community-Based Child Protection Mechanisms and their Linkages with the National Child Protection System of Sierra Leone.”
What are the most effective early response strategies and interventions to assess and address the immediate needs of children outside of family care?
Published: 2012
Author: Neil Boothby, Mike Wessells, John Williamson,, Gillian Huebner, Kelly Canter, Eduardo Garcia Rolland, Vesna Kutlesic, Farah Bader, Lena Diaw, Maya Levine, Anita Malley, Kathleen Michels, Sonali Patel, Tanya Rasa, Fred Ssewamala, Vicki Walker
A systematic review of evidence of effective early response strategies for children outside of family care.
Handbook on Participatory Methods for Community-Based Projects
Published: 2010
Author: Grace Onyango & Miranda Worthen
A guide for programmers and implementers based on the Participatory Action Research project with young mothers and their children in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Northern Uganda.