Terms of Reference
External Baseline Evaluation Consultancy
‘Water and Education for Marginalised Communities Advancement (WEMA) Project’
IRK/WEMA/CONSUL/001/10/2026
ISSUED ON: Thursday, 15th October 2026
CLOSING DATE: Wednesday, 21ST October 2026 at 11:00 AM
October, 2026
Project: Water and Education for Marginalised Communities Advancement (WEMA) Project
Activity: External Base line evaluation for Water and Education for Marginalised Communities Advancement (WEMA) Project
Location: Garissa County
Duration: 35 days
1.0 BACKGROUND
IR Kenya started operations in Kenya in 1993 through a local CBO in Mandera District, Northern Kenya. It opened its fully-fledged office in March in 2006 at the height of drought in the Horn of Africa. Since then, it has been providing humanitarian and development assistance to vulnerable communities. Over these years IRK has remarkably changed the lives of the vulnerable and disadvantaged communities. In January 2010 and October 2011, IRK extended its operation to Wajir county and Garissa County; to serve both the local community and Refugee at Dadaab Camp. Islamic Relief Kenya is currently implementing programmes in the following sectors: Health and Nutrition; WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene); Sustainable Livelihoods and Disaster Risk reduction (DRR); Child Welfare/Protection & Education; and Emergency Response. Over the years, IR Kenya has implemented various development and relief activities which have remarkably changed the lives of vulnerable and disadvantaged communities in Garissa, Wajir, Mandera, Kilifi, Marsabit and Kajiado Counties.
IR Kenya has a commitment to standards which ascribe to program quality and improved programming. This obliges us to conduct a baseline study for the WEMA project in the specific areas of the project interventions. The baseline study will provide the much-needed platform for the project implementation process and re-alignment of interventions to improve project relevance and effectiveness.
2.0 PROJECT SUMMARY
The Water and Education for Marginalized Communities Advancement (WEMA) Project is a 12-month integrated development initiative designed to strengthen access to quality education, reliable water services, and climate resilience among vulnerable communities in Garissa County. The project responds to interconnected challenges including recurrent drought, chronic water insecurity, inadequate education and WASH infrastructure, environmental degradation, and limited community and institutional capacity to sustainably manage essential services.
Recognizing that infrastructure investments alone are insufficient to achieve sustainable development outcomes, the project applies the WEMA Integrated Systems Framework (WISF), which links education, water security, community governance, and environmental resilience. Through this approach, schools will serve as community service hubs around which climate-resilient education facilities, water infrastructure, community management structures, and environmental interventions are integrated.
Over the implementation period, the project will establish two WEMA Intervention Villages, each anchored around a strategically selected public primary school. Key interventions will include the construction of climate-resilient classrooms and provision of learner furniture; gender-responsive sanitation facilities; development of solar-powered boreholes; installation of elevated steel water storage tanks and gravity-fed distribution networks; establishment of community water kiosks and livestock watering troughs; provision of piped water connections to schools; and construction of masonry rainwater harvesting systems.
To strengthen sustainability and local ownership, WEMA will build the capacity of School Boards of Management (BOMs), Water Users Associations (WUAs), and School Environmental Clubs to manage, maintain, and safeguard project investments. The project will also promote ecosystem restoration and environmental stewardship, thereby strengthening community resilience to drought, climate variability, and pressure on natural resources.
The project is expected to directly benefit approximately 6,000 people, representing about 1,500 households, and provide improved water access for an estimated 100,000 livestock through two integrated community water systems. Expected broader outcomes include improved school attendance and retention, enhanced access to safe and reliable water, improved public health and sanitation, strengthened pastoral livelihoods, improved environmental stewardship, stronger local governance, and increased community resilience to climate-related shocks.
A robust Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability and Learning (MEAL) framework will guide performance monitoring, learning, accountability, and adaptive management. An independent baseline evaluation will establish the project's pre-intervention conditions and benchmark values for relevant indicators, providing a credible basis for subsequent measurement of changes and comparison with the end-line evaluation. Findings will also contribute to organizational learning and inform the potential replication and scaling of integrated education, water, and climate-resilience programming in arid and semi-arid areas.
The project will be implemented in collaboration with relevant Garissa County Government departments, particularly Water, Education, and Climate Change, as well as participating schools and community institutions. It is aligned with relevant national and county development and climate priorities and contributes particularly to SDG 4: Quality Education, SDG 6: Clean Water and Sanitation, and SDG 13: Climate Action.
Project goal/impact: Strengthened climate-resilient human capital and improved quality of life for marginalized communities in Garissa County through sustainable access to quality education, reliable water services, effective local governance, and environmental stewardship.
Project outcomes:
Outcome 1: Enhanced access to quality, inclusive, and climate-resilient education services in target schools.
Outcome 2: Reliable and sustainable water services for schools, households, and livestock.
Outcome 3: Strengthened local governance, environmental stewardship, and community resilience to climate variability and drought.
Project outputs:
Output 1.1: Two WEMA Intervention Village schools equipped with climate-resilient, inclusive, and gender-responsive education infrastructure.
Output 1.2: Reliable and sustainable school water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) services established in two WEMA Intervention Village schools.
Output 2.1: Two integrated solar-powered community water supply systems established and operational.
Output 2.2: Community water governance and management systems strengthened for sustainable water service delivery.
Output 3.1: Ecosystem restoration and climate adaptation measures implemented within the two WEMA Intervention Villages.
Output 3.2: Community governance and institutional management structures strengthened to sustainably manage WEMA investments.
3.0 Purpose and Scope of the Endline Evaluation
The Baseline Evaluation Purpose and Objectives
The overall objective of the baseline evaluation is to establish the pre-intervention status, challenges, capacities, and opportunities within the WEMA Project target communities in Garissa County, guided by the project goal, outcomes, outputs, and performance indicators. The baseline will establish credible benchmark values against which project progress and results can be measured throughout implementation and at end-line.
The assessment will provide a comprehensive understanding of the existing education, WASH and water security, climate resilience, environmental, institutional, and socio-economic conditions within the two WEMA Intervention Villages. It will also examine cross-cutting factors, including gender, disability, social inclusion, community participation, accountability, sustainability, and socio-cultural practices that may enable or constrain achievement of the intended project results.
Specifically, the baseline assessment has the following objectives:
1. Establish baseline values for key project indicators across education, WASH/water security, climate resilience, and community-level outcomes to enable measurement of progress and results.
2. Assess existing access to and quality of education and water/WASH services, including school infrastructure, enrolment, attendance and retention, water availability, reliability, functionality, affordability, and barriers affecting equitable access.
3. Assess community and institutional capacities for sustainable service delivery and climate resilience, including the functionality and capacity of School Boards of Management (BOMs), Water Users Associations (WUAs), School Environmental Clubs, and existing practices for managing drought, environmental degradation, and natural resources.
4. Examine cross-cutting factors influencing project outcomes, including gender, disability, age, socio-cultural practices, vulnerability, community participation, accountability, safeguarding, and inclusion in access to services and decision-making.
5. Generate evidence and actionable recommendations to strengthen project implementation and MEAL, including validation or adjustment of indicator targets, identification of key risks and assumptions, sustainability considerations, and priority learning areas for adaptive management and future programming.
4.0 Scope and Methodology
The baseline evaluation will employ an appropriate mixed-methods approach, combining quantitative and qualitative methods to provide a comprehensive understanding of the pre-intervention situation and ensure meaningful participation of different stakeholder groups.
The consultant w...