Program Evaluation Expert – Mexico At American Bar Association

Evaluation of the New Advocates for Mexican Justice Program

The American Bar Association Rule of Law Initiative (ABA ROLI) is a non-profit organization that implements legal reform programs in roughly 50 countries around the world. ABA ROLI has nearly 500 professional staff working abroad, and in its Washington, D.C. office. ABA ROLI’s host country partners include judges, lawyers, bar associations, law schools, court administrators, legislatures, ministries of justice and a wide array of civil society organizations, including human rights groups.

Project Background

The New Advocates for Mexican Justice Program is a 9-year program funded by the United States Department of State Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (State/INL) and implemented by the American Bar Association Rule of Law Initiatives (ABA ROLI), aims to support, and strengthen Mexico’s consolidation of an oral, adversarial, and accusatorial criminal justice system. Specifically, the Program has four objectives:

• Objective 1: Mexican law schools have capacity to properly train in litigation skills for the New Criminal Justice System (NCJS). Under this objective, ABA ROLI provided training for students and law professors in oral advocacy and advanced oral advocacy; conducted “training of trainers” workshops to include law professors and students; designed, promoted and conducted a nationwide mock trial competition; updates the Evaluation System for Oral Litigation (Sistema de Evaluación para Litigación Oral, or “SELO”); conducted a fellowship and study tour for the winners of the competition; and developed an on-line investigation skills training course for law students and professors.
• Objective 2: Mexican law schools have capacity to properly train in mediation for the accusatorial system. Under this objective, ABA ROLI provided training for law students and professors in criminal mediation; conducted “training of trainers” workshops to include law professors and students; designed, promoted and conducted a nationwide mediation competition; and implemented a Mediators Evaluation System (Sistema de Evaluación de Mediadores, or “SIEM”); conducted a study tour for the winners of the competition; and trained law students and professors on restorative practices in the criminal justice system in accordance with the Law on Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR).
• Objective 3: Law schools have a mechanism for continual improvement of teaching practices for the Mexican accusatorial system. Under this objective, ABA ROLI supported local and state level mock trial and mediation competitions; provided technical assistance to strengthen the National Alliance for Oral Litigation Competitions1 (Alianza Nacional para los Concursos de Litigación Oral, or “ANCLO”) and develop standards and identify best practices for conducting law schools competitions; reviewed the nationwide standards and best practices; documented good practices and advocacy skills standards; and created new and innovative standards for the evaluation and organization of ADR (mediation and restorative practices) competitions.
• Objective 4: Trained law school graduates have an opportunity for placement in government agencies that are involved with the criminal justice system. Under this objective, ABA ROLI conducted job fairs to connect students who participated in the Program with key government agencies that are involved with the criminal justice system; conducted surveys to assess and improve the job fairs; develop alliances with government agencies; arranged introductions for program participants to government agency representatives; conducted public awareness raising campaigns on the Program, its benefits and competition opportunities.

Consultant Responsibilities

The consultant will be responsible for conducting a final evaluation of the program’s effectiveness in 1) improving capacities of training/legal education institutions across three main learning focal areas (alternative dispute resolution mechanisms, oral litigations, and institutionalization of these practices in curricula); and 2) increasing law students’ capacity to effectively provide legal services as future lawyers, with a focus on governmental agencies.

The evaluation will cover five years of program implementation, from September 28, 2017 to March 30, 2021, and will adopt an outcome evaluation approach using mixed methods to assess outcomes of trainings and other capacity building efforts. Specifically, the evaluation will utilize an online survey tool, key informant interviews, digital videos solicitation and review to assess outcomes at the individual and institutional levels.

Key Deliverables:

All deliverables must be written and presented in English. Deliverables include the following:

1. An inception report / work plan prepared in consultation with the Monitoring & Evaluation Officer that includes design and methodology, data collection activities and analysis.
2. Relevant tools for data collection and collation of data
3. Draft evaluation report that includes preliminary findings, conclusions and recommendations. ABA ROLI will review and submit comments and suggested revisions.
4. A final evaluation report, including an executive summary, an explanation of the evaluation methodology with its limitations, the findings, conclusions and recommendations, appendices that contain the data analysis collection and analysis tools used.
5. PowerPoint presentation and Q&A session with ABA ROLI team. The presentation must include findings, conclusions and recommendations of the evaluation.
6. Databases with machine-readable information that have the quantitative data collected in the evaluation, mostly created from surveys carried out during the evaluation.

Qualifications

• An advanced degree masters or PhD) in public policy or administration, social or political science, or other related field with no less than seven years of experience conducting program evaluations OR a bachelor’s degree with over ten years of experience conducting program evaluations
• Must have previous experience conducting evaluations in Mexico or other Latin American countries; experience conducting evaluations with public sector; experience working with the legal sector is a plus
• Must have excellent English and Spanish communications and writing skills
• Must demonstrate proficiency in the use of MS Office and other applications for online surveys and data analysis.
• Must have the ability to mobilize quantitative and qualitative analysts where needed.

Contract Length: 3 months starting in August 2021.

How to Apply:

To apply, please send your CV and a cover letter (2 pages max) to lac-recruitment@abaroli.org by August 10, 2021. Please include the name of the position and country (Program Evaluation Expert – Mexico) in the subject line you are applying for.