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General

Study Overview

Title:

The Good Schools Toolkit to prevent violence against children in Ugandan primary schools: study protocol for a cluster randomised controlled trial

Study is 3ie funded:

No

Study ID:

RIDIE-STUDY-ID-531f29842589e

Initial Registration Date:

03/11/2014

Last Update Date:

03/10/2014

Study Status:

Ongoing

Location(s):

Uganda

Abstract:

We aim to evaluate the effectiveness of the Good School Toolkit, developed by Raising Voices, in preventing violence against children attending school and in improving child mental health and educational outcomes. We are conducting a two-arm cluster randomised controlled trial in Luwero District, Uganda. We will also conduct a qualitative study, a process evaluation and an economic evaluation. A total of 42 schools, representative of Luwero District, Uganda, were allocated to receive the Toolkit plus implementation support, or were allocated to a wait-list control condition. At least 60 children per school and all school staff members will be interviewed at follow-up. To our knowledge, this is the first study to rigorously investigate the effects of any intervention to prevent violence from school staff to children in primary school in a low-income setting.

Registration Citation:

Devries, K., 2014. The Good Schools Toolkit to prevent violence against children in Ugandan primary schools: study protocol for a cluster randomised controlled trial. Registry for International Development for Impact Evaluations (RIDIE). Available at: 10.23846/ridie021

Categories:

Education
Health, Nutrition, and Population
Social Protection

Additional Keywords:

Corporal punishment, Primary school, Violence, Uganda, Mental health, Education

Secondary ID Number(s):

clinicaltrials.gov NCT01678846

Principal Investigator(s)

Name of First PI:

Karen Devries

Affiliation:

London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine

Name of Second PI:

Affiliation:

Study Sponsor

Name:

Medical Research Council/Department for International Development/Wellcome Trust

Study Sponsor Location:

United Kingdom

Research Partner

Name of Partner Institution:

Raising Voices

Type of Organization:

NGO (local) or other civil society organization

Location:

Uganda

Intervention

Intervention Overview

Intervention:

The experimental group is receiving the Good School Toolkit (http://raisingvoices.org/download-good-school-toolkit/) and implementation support over an 18-month period. The toolkit consists of booklets, posters, and facilitation guides describing roughly 60 activities structured into 6 steps. Activities are related to creating a better learning environment, to respecting each other, to understanding power relationships, to using non-violent discipline, and to improving teaching techniques. The intervention is delivered by school-based protagonists, usually two motivated members of staff and two students in each school, to engage other staff, students, and the administration to set school-wide goals and to develop action plans.

Theory of Change:

Multiple Treatment Arms Evaluated?

No

Implementing Agency

Name of Organization:

Raising Voices

Type of Organization:

NGO (local)/Community Based Organization/Other civil society organization

Program Funder

Name of Organization:

Hewlett Foundation

Type of Organization:

Other

Intervention Timing

Intervention or Program Started at time of Registration?

Yes

Start Date:

09/01/2012

End Date:

05/01/2014

Evaluation Method

Evaluation Method Overview

Primary (or First) Evaluation Method:

Randomized control trial

Other (not Listed) Method:

Additional Evaluation Method (If Any):

Other (specify)

Other (not Listed) Method:

Process evaluation, qualitative study, economic costing

Method Details

Details of Evaluation Approach:

The Good Schools Study consists of a two-arm cluster randomised controlled trial, an embedded qualitative study, a process evaluation and an economic evaluation. The study is a partnership between the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Raising Voices, Makerere University, and the Institute of Education. The trial component will measure the impact of the Good School Toolkit intervention. The trial will involve two cross-sectional surveys, one at baseline and one at endline. Our main analysis will involve a cross-sectional comparison of end line data; here we report procedures for our end line survey. The same procedures were used at baseline. Schools were chosen to minimise selection bias as far as possible and to represent larger schools in Luwero. Using the official 2010 list of all 276 primary schools in Luwero as our sampling frame, we excluded 105 very small schools (with fewer than 40 registered Primary 5 students) and 20 schools with existing governance interventions, and then stratified the remaining 151 schools by the gender ratio of their pupils, into >60% girls, mixed, or >60% boys. From these 151 schools, we selected a random sample of 42.

Outcomes (Endpoints):

1. children’s self-reported experience of past week physical violence by school staff, in schools that receive the intervention versus those that do not (primary outcome); 2. children’s educational achievement (word recognition and reading comprehension in Luganda and English, spelling, and written numeracy), and children’s mental health (symptoms of common mental disorders and self-reported feelings of safety and well-being in school) (secondary outcomes).

Unit of Analysis:

Children in schools (allowing for clustering by school)

Hypotheses:

1. Intervention schools will have reduced levels of past week violence compared to control schools 2. Intervention schools will have reduced levels of symptoms of common mental disorders compared to control schools 3. Intervention schools will have increased educational performance compared to control schools

Unit of Intervention or Assignment:

schools

Number of Clusters in Sample:

42

Number of Individuals in Sample:

3700

Size of Treatment, Control, or Comparison Subsamples:

21 schools and up to 130 students per school in each arm

Supplementary Files

Analysis Plan:

Other Documents:

Data

Outcomes Data

Description:

Interviewer administered individual survey of children in schools.

Data Already Collected?

No

Data Previously Used?

Data Access:

Data Obtained by the Study Researchers?

Data Approval Process:

Approval Status:

Treatment Assignment Data

Participation or Assignment Information:

Yes

Description:

Data Obtained by the Study Researchers?

Data Previously Used?

Data Access:

Data Obtained by the Study Researchers?

Data Approval Process:

Approval Status:

Data Analysis

Data Analysis Status:

Study Materials

Upload Study Materials:

Registration Category

Registration Category:

Prospective, Category 1: Data for measuring impacts have not been collected

Completion

Completion Overview

Intervention Completion Date:

Data Collection Completion Date:

Unit of Analysis:

Clusters in Final Sample:

Total Observations in Final Sample:

Size of Treatment, Control, or Comparison Subsamples:

Findings

Preliminary Report:

Preliminary Report URL:

Summary of Findings:

Paper:

Paper Summary:

Paper Citation:

Data Availability

Data Availability (Primary Data):

Date of Data Availability:

Data URL or Contact:

Access procedure:

Other Materials

Survey:

Survey Instrument Links or Contact:

Program Files:

Program Files Links or Contact:

External Link:

External Link Description:

Description of Changes:

Study Stopped

Date:

Reason: