Safeguarding Project (Changing the Story)

What is safeguarding in international development?

Safeguarding means protecting vulnerable people from harm, whether malicious or unintended, by believing and responding to concerns through a systematic approach.

An understanding of safeguarding is crucial to interpreting international development objectives such as Sustainable Development Goal 16 (Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions) and in the United Nation Convention on the Rights of the Child. It is recognised by UNICEF’s Ethical Research Involving Children project in the planning and conduct of research in any geographical, social, cultural or methodological context. We at Changing the Story look to integrate these approaches by building on local knowledge and existing good practice.

Why is safeguarding important at Changing the Story?

Working directly with youth-centred organisations in complex settings, it is vital that we and our partners have a clear understanding of and commitment to international safeguarding standards, and how they can be applied to and shaped by local practices. We must be confident that our work is not putting the children and young people that we work with at further risk. At the same time, research staff need to be equipped with the skills and support to remain safe, and be confident that they are contributing to a social good.

Given our commitment to building capacity among researchers and civil society organisations working in post-conflict settings, Changing the Story is keen to support their strengthening of contextualised safeguarding measures with a particular focus on children and young people that create bespoke solutions to specific needs.

Meet the Changing the Story Safeguarding Team

We aim to arrive collaboratively at proportionate solutions contextualised to each Changing the Story project, help build capacity to evaluate these solutions, and share personal and organisational learning that emerges.

Diligence around safeguarding depends on the expertise and experience of those ‘on the ground’ in each project region. To this aim, in November 2019 we appointed five Regional Safeguarding Lead for each of the five global regions in which Changing the Story operates.

Together with the Safeguarding Project Developer (Tony Cegielka) at the University of Leeds, they will be able to interpret local legislation and partner organisations’ policy on child protection and children’s rights, build relationships within and across projects to develop an understanding of their current needs and opportunities for development, and contribute to the design and delivery of face-to-face workshops to build organisational and research capacity.

We have produced a core resource pack and toolkit to contribute to a knowledge base around young people’s wellbeing, experiences of abuse or neglect, and the risks and opportunities associated with involvement in international development and research programmes. Each project team will be able to adapt and supplement the core to create collective ownership of its own context-specific safeguarding agenda and policy, as well as workshop materials (including child-friendly versions) in a language and using terminology that is familiar to the intended audience.

Why now?

The UK Department for International Development (DfID) and UK Research & Innovation (UKRI) plan enhanced and context-specific standards for UK charities and Non Government Organisations on partners’ policies and processes around safeguarding children and young people from exploitation, abuse and neglect.

The University of Leeds, as a first-tier partner, has responsibility to ensure appropriate safeguarding standards throughout the chain, and is committed to applying best international practice that also appreciates the local knowledge and experience of those working with vulnerable children and young people in local communities.

DfID will apply its enhanced safeguarding standards first to new grants or existing grants which involve new funding. From September 2019, partners with existing agreements who do not meet the new enhanced standards have been required to put in place an improvement plan, or risk suspension of funding. The UK Collaborative on Development Research (UKCDR) released its set of principles and best practice guidance on safeguarding in the international development research context in April 2020.