An Innovative, Online Catalogue Highlights Innovations and Adaptations During COVID-19

When COVID-19 hit, programming teams across the world faced an imperative to devise new ways of ensuring reliable, continued delivery of essential child protection interventions, on time, and with quality, in contexts that had often become practically inaccessible almost overnight. These adaptations were often innovative, responding to a situation of unprecedented complexity.

From the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic, Save the Children staff were encouraged to capture lessons learned on a rolling basis in an internal Global COVID-19 Learning Log. To maximise learning for the Child Protection sector, Save the Children’s global child protection team leveraged this log and worked with the technical community to highlight innovations and adaptations in an online catalogue: Adapt. Imagine. Innovate. Child Protection during COVID-19: a Catalogue of Innovations and Adaptations. Interventions were classified according to five pre-defined common areas of innovation, based on the most common themes noted in country office COVID-19 response plans:

• remote/adapted case management
• remote/adapted Parenting without Violence programming (Save the Children’s positive parenting approach)
• remote/adapted MHPSS programming
• cash and voucher assistance for child protection outcomes
• digital child protection innovations and adaptations

Once examples were identified, the team explored additional questions, including enablers and challenges of the adaptation, its appropriateness and effectiveness in addressing child protection issues and risks and the evidence of positive outcomes/impact of the intervention. The responses formed the catalogue entry for each adaptation or innovation.

This catalogue showcases interventions that show, time and time again, how staff and partners all over the world worked to adapt, imagine and innovate approaches to ensure children’s safety and wellbeing. It is intended as an easy-to-use operational inventory of:

• new and creative methodologies to promote child protection programme quality in restricted operational contexts; and
• promising adaptations in ensuring continuity of essential child protection services, when children and communities are hard to reach.

In order to ensure that the learning captured in the catalogue be accessible to as many child protection practitioners as possible, it has been made available in two formats:

• A PDF version available to all to download from Save the Children’s Resource Centre
• An interactive version, on the Kaya global learning platform, which is free to all. The platform can be accessed on web browser or via the mobile app, which includes the option to download onto a mobile phone or tablet for offline use.

We will continue to update the catalogue with new examples of promising practice, and with additional information and evidence of impact for the entries already included. Our aim is that sharing learning in this way will support further innovations and adaptations and showcase the importance of documenting and learning from what works to keep children safe and protected during this pandemic and beyond.

If you are interested in knowing more, please do explore via the links above. If you have questions about the Catalogue, please contact Lauren Stephens. We hope that this catalogue will inspire colleagues around the globe to keep finding new ways to ensure that every child is protected from violence, exploitation, abuse and neglect.

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Lauren Stephens is Research & Evidence Advisor - Child Protection at Save the Children. Her work focuses on improving and systematizing high quality measurement of child protection outcomes, building and sharing evidence of the impact of child protection programmes, and promoting learning from good practice within and outside Save the Children.

Clare Feinstein is Head of Programmes Child Protection at Save the Children. Her work focuses on coordinating, facilitating and supporting child protection work across Save the Children, with a focus on technical excellence and leadership.

Amanda Brydon is the Head of Child Protection Advocacy and Policy at Save the Children. Her work focuses on influencing policy and legislative change to better protect children, often working to amplify the evidence and positive impact of interventions as part of these efforts.