Research Study #1 - Development of a Monitoring Toolkit and Review of Good Practices for the Sustainable Reintegration of Child Returnees

This study was commissioned in the framework of the EU–IOM Knowledge Management Hub under the “Pilot Action on Voluntary Return and Sustainable, Community-Based Reintegration” project, funded by the European Union and implemented by IOM. The two recognized that while understanding of and evidence around the sustainable reintegration of adults has been growing, the same is not true for children – despite the fact that children are returning, alone or with families, to the very same reintegration contexts. Building on a monitoring approach for adult returnees developed in a 2017 Samuel Hall – IOM research project, this study addresses the information gap around children’s reintegration experiences.

It has three key objectives, to:
 

1. Set standards, with a review of existing practice on supporting and monitoring child reintegration;
2. Operationalize standards by developing, testing and finalizing a child-focused monitoring toolkit;
3. Implement standards, with a new orientation for reintegration policies and programmes for children.

The full report reviews the current state of child reintegration programming and frameworks underpinning it. It presents the Child Reintegration Monitoring Toolkit developed through this study and findings from its piloting.

In a first phase, the research team explored frameworks and information on children’s rights, evidence on existing monitoring approaches, and findings from secondary data analysis and literature on the topic. A draft Toolkit was developed, tested and refined during a second research phase. It was piloted in Ethiopia, Georgia, Honduras, Iraq, and Nigeria, with 176child returnees interviewed (through 30 case studies and 146 quantitative surveys), along with 86 community members and stakeholders through FGDs and KIIs.

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