Activity Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning Plan (AMELP) revised as of October 2023 Uzbekistan Youth Employment Skills (YES) Activity

The activity aims to increase youth work readiness and employability by equipping youth in Grades 8-11 with necessary skills to enter Uzbekistan's economy as competent employees or entrepreneurs. The activity addresses both school-based and after-school programs to ensure a successful school-to-work transition, while giving special attention to women, girls, and youth with disabilities. The work focuses on three objectives: improving the quality of school-based economics and entrepreneurship programs, improving the quality of after-school entrepreneurship, soft skills, and work readiness programs, and strengthening the enabling environment to support and engage youth. To achieve these objectives, the activity will partner with MoPSE agencies, the private sector, and local government and community groups in the target pilot region. Private sector perspectives will be integrated into the development of curricula and programming, and the activity will cultivate and leverage private sector partnerships to create opportunities for hands-on training of youth through job shadowing and mentorship opportunities. The activity will focus on building attitudes and corresponding behaviors conducive to youth, women and girls, and people with disabilities entering the workforce. All activities under Objective 3 will target and support behavior change in four groups in the target pilot region: youth participants (Grades 8-11), parents, teachers/mentors, and employers. The activity will actively engage the private sector, from a diverse group of businesses, with a key focus on forging sustainable relationships and mechanisms for communication between MoPSE and private sector actors, and on enacting policy or procedural-level change through targeted involvement with government. The YES Activity is implemented by a consortium of partners including American Councils for International Education as the lead organization, World Learning, Startup Factory, Sharoit Plus, and Ergo Analytics. The Activity began on January 3, 2022, and the period of performance is scheduled for five years, ending on December 31, 2026. The YES Activity Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning Plan (AMELP) was initially approved by USAID on November 11, 2022, and edited in June 2023. The AMELP outlines the monitoring, evaluation, and learning framework for the YES Activity. The plan sets targets for performance indicators, including the quality of school-based economics and entrepreneurship programs, the quality of after-school entrepreneurship, soft skills, and work readiness programs, and the enabling environment to support and engage youth. The plan also outlines the roles and responsibilities of staff, including the Chief of Party, the Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (MEL) Specialist, and the Data Management Specialist. The AMELP includes a data management plan, which outlines the data collection, quality assurance, storage, and analysis procedures. The plan also includes a performance indicator summary table, which provides a summary of the performance indicators and their targets. The plan is revised as of October 2023, and it is intended to guide the monitoring, evaluation, and learning efforts of the YES Activity. The YES Activity aims to improve the quality of school-based economics and entrepreneurship programs by partnering with MoPSE agencies and the private sector to update the curricula and teaching and learning materials used for Grades 8-11 entrepreneurship and economics instruction. The revised curricula will be tested in schools in the target pilot region in a randomized control trial (RCT). The activity will also improve the quality of after-school entrepreneurship, soft skills, and work readiness programs by continuing to strengthen its partnership with the MoPSE and private sector stakeholders, while also partnering with local government and community groups in the target pilot region.