Seriti Institute

Mission: To collaborate with communities and social partners in developing resilient communities and helping vulnerable people build meaningful lives for themselves and their families.

Vision (specific to ECD): A society with equal opportunities, reducing poverty and inequality, where parents and caregivers of children aged 0-8 are strengthened with skills, knowledge and learning resources.

Core Values:

• People-Centered Approach: Prioritising the wellbeing, dignity and interests of the individuals and communities we serve through human-centred design.
• Community Empowerment: Believing in people's ability to drive change and progress by building their capabilities and socioeconomic opportunities.
• Collaborative Partnerships: Fostering multi-stakeholder collaboration between communities, government, private sector and civil society to catalyse positive social impact.
• Sustainable Solutions: Delivering innovative, evidence-based solutions that create long-lasting socioeconomic impact in marginalised areas.
• Integrity and Accountability: Maintaining robust governance, financial oversight and a commitment to monitoring, evaluation and continuous learning.
• Diversity and Inclusion: Embracing diversity by including underrepresented and marginalised groups as active partners and beneficiaries.

Seriti Institute is a non-profit organisation established in 2009 with the core purpose of developing resilient communities across South Africa. We aim to help uplift vulnerable populations out of poverty, create socioeconomic opportunities, strengthen vulnerable caregivers and families, and promote several other SDGs across other projects and programmes.

We serve marginalised communities through various innovative programmes focused on early childhood development, sustainable agriculture, community empowerment, social partnering, public employment programmes, skills development and much more. Our solutions provide technical assistance and skills training, facilitate community-driven change and connect people to networks of support, all executed through experienced project and programme implementation and participatory techniques and methodologies.

Seriti's approach is fundamentally collaborative in that we work hand-in-hand with communities themselves as well as partner with other NGOs, CBOs, CSOs, government bodies and private sector organisations. Through this multi-stakeholder approach combined with our core values, we aim to deliver a sustainable impact that empowers and enables people to build meaningful lives.

As the Programme Manager Lead for Seriti's early childhood development and parental support programme, Rebotile Matoane serves as the Team Lead within our organisation. In this critical role, she provides strategic leadership and oversight for the effective implementation of the programme across all provinces.

Rebotile's responsibilities include developing and managing the programme delivery plan, meeting objectives and deadlines, and evaluating training needs to address gaps. She spearheads stakeholder engagement, identifying strategic partnerships and managing collaborations with key stakeholders at various levels.

Furthermore, as part of the Executive Management Team, Rebotile plays a crucial role in project management, overseeing risk management, financial management, and quality assurance processes. She also contributes to organisational policy development, strategic planning, and income generation efforts.

With her extensive experience in education, social work, and project management, Rebotile brings invaluable expertise to lead our EDC and parental support programme and drive its impact in supporting early childhood development in marginalised communities.

Our Team Lead, Rebotile Matoane, and her supporting team members are exceptionally well-positioned to effectively support the LEAP Project while managing other organisational priorities.

Here's how:

• Rebotile's Background and Expertise: With over 9 years of experience in education, social work, and project management, Rebotile brings relevant knowledge and skills to the LEAP Project. Her work with UNICEF, supporting the Department of Basic Education on early childhood development initiatives, has equipped her with valuable insights into the sector's challenges and best practices. Rebotile's qualifications, including MA degrees in Education and Social Development, further strengthen her ability to provide strategic guidance and ensure the project's success.
• Dedicated Programme Team: Rebotile will be supported by a dedicated team of five (5) programme coordinators and facilitators. This team has extensive experience in early childhood development, programme implementation, facilitation, data collection for monitoring and evaluation, and stakeholder engagement. Their complementary skills and deep understanding of the programme are invaluable in supporting the LEAP Project's objectives.
• Organisational Commitment and Resource Allocation: Seriti recognises the critical importance of this LEAP Project in strengthening the evidence base for our ECD and parental support programme. We are committed to allocating dedicated time and resources to ensure the project's success. Rebotile and her team will have the necessary support and flexibility to prioritise the LEAP Project alongside their other responsibilities without compromising the quality of their contributions.
• Collaborative Approach and Stakeholder Engagement: Rebotile and her team are seasoned practitioners in fostering collaborative partnerships and engaging with diverse stakeholders and community representatives. Their ability to effectively communicate, coordinate, and involve key stakeholders, such as community leaders, implementing partners, and ECD experts, will be instrumental in gathering valuable insights and ensuring the project's outputs are contextualised and actionable.
• Continuous Learning and Improvement Culture: Seriti fosters a culture of continuous learning and improvement, which aligns perfectly with the objectives of the LEAP Project. Rebotile and her team are committed to embracing the LEAP Fellows' research findings, recommendations, and guidance. They will actively participate in capacity-building efforts and drive the implementation of the suggested improvements across our programme sites and stakeholder networks.

By leveraging Rebotile's leadership, the dedicated programme team's expertise, organisational commitment, collaborative approach, and continuous improvement mindset, we are confident in our ability to effectively support the LEAP Project while maintaining excellence in our other programmatic priorities.

This early childhood development, parental support and early learning programme empowers parents/caregivers to provide nurturing care for early childhood development.

Early childhood is a critical period that lays the foundation for a child's future health, learning, and wellbeing. However, in many marginalised communities in South Africa, young children face multiple risks that can impair their development such as poverty, malnutrition, lack of early learning opportunities, unresponsive caregiving, and unsafe environments. Parents and caregivers in these communities often lack awareness, resources and support to provide nurturing care that meets all aspects of a child's needs during this crucial first 1000 days.

Without access to quality early childhood development (ECD) services and capacitated caregivers, these children miss out on achieving their full developmental potential. This has long-lasting effects on their ability to learn, earn, grow and thrive in the future. Breaking this cycle of disadvantage requires a comprehensive approach that empowers and equips parents/caregivers to become their child's first and most important provider of nurturing care.

Seriti has an innovative early childhood development, parental support and early learning programme that adopts the nurturing care framework to holistically support early childhood development in marginalised communities. The core solution is a series of interactive blended learning workshops that build awareness and practical skills among parents/caregivers on:

• Good health and nutrition for young children.
• Providing responsive caregiving and psychosocial support.
• Creating opportunities for early learning through play.
• Ensuring security and safety.

These fun, play-based workshops use low-cost materials and facilitators fluent in local languages to make the content accessible and relatable. They also provide a supportive network for parents/caregivers to share experiences.

A key aspect is activating a network of ECD community champions who are parents/caregivers who completed the programme training to become ambassadors for quality ECD and nurturing care in their communities. They conduct workshops, home visits, and awareness campaigns while receiving mentoring and tools from the programme.

The programme partners with community organisations, NGOs, CBOs, CSOs, government and businesses to strengthen the entire ECD ecosystem in an integrated manner. This includes support for food gardens, psychosocial support, making toys from recyclables, literacy initiatives and much more.

Through this approach, the programme empowers whole communities to have more excellent knowledge, awareness, skills and resources to provide the comprehensive nurturing care children need to develop their full potential during the critical early years.

To date, Seriti's ECD and parental support programme has conducted research to help demonstrate the effectiveness of our solution in supporting early childhood development. Our research efforts have spanned foundational research, formative research, and summative assessments, providing a comprehensive evidence base for our approach. Here are some key areas undertaken:

Foundational Research:

• Conducted an extensive literature review on global best practices and theoretical frameworks for nurturing care and parenting programmes, drawing from WHO, UNICEF, academic research, and leading ECD organisations.
• Reviewed national policies like the National Development Plan and Integrated ECD Policy to ensure alignment with South African priorities.
• Analysed baseline survey data on ECD challenges, parenting knowledge/practices, and available community resources in our target areas.

Formative Research:

• Implemented human-centred design research through focus groups, household visits, and interviews to understand the specific needs, contexts and constraints of caregivers in marginalised communities we serve.
• Conducted usability testing of the workshop curriculum and materials with pilot groups of parents/caregivers to refine content and delivery.
• Carried out process monitoring and documentation during early implementation to assess social impact, identify success factors and make programme adjustments.
• Engaged in continuous feedback loops with local implementing partners, community leaders and ECD experts within the sector through the annual Partner Networking Event.

Summative Research:

• Conducted pre/post evaluations with parents/caregivers to assess changes in knowledge, attitudes, practices and confidence levels related to nurturing care before and after the training workshops.
• Analysed monitoring data to track outputs and participation rates and assess relationships between the level of engagement and observed outcomes.

While we continue to build our evidence base, the research undertaken so far has validated the underlying nurturing care framework, confirmed the relevance and effectiveness of our interactive parenting workshop model, and demonstrated positive changes in parental capabilities and child development indicators. We remain committed to further research to optimise our solution's design and implementation strategies.

The various research and data collected on the programme have provided valuable insights that have informed how we continue to evolve and strengthen our solution.

Here are some key takeaways:

• Foundational research validated our core approach given that from the initial literature reviews and policy analysis reinforced that our holistic nurturing care framework aligned with global best practices and national ECD priorities. This gave us confidence to proceed with the programme's comprehensive model addressing health, nutrition, responsive caregiving, early learning opportunities and safety.
• Formative research enabled contextualisation through the human-centred design approach, usability testing and continuous feedback loops were critical in adapting the programme's content and delivery mechanisms to resonate with the specific socio-cultural contexts, needs and constraints faced by caregivers in our target communities. For example, we revised workshop materials to incorporate more holistic aspects of ECD, and relatable examples.
• Monitoring data revealed engagement drivers by closely tracking participation rates, dropout levels and feedback across different communities, we identified key factors influencing sustained engagement, such as leveraging existing community structures, providing transport/meal support, and involving respected community influencers as programme champions. This shaped our community entry and mobilisation strategies.
• Promising outcomes from summative assessments, while still early-stage, the results from the pre/post evaluations also showed improvements in parenting knowledge, confidence and self-reported practices related to nurturing care among participants. The findings also highlighted the importance of ensuring an adequate level of engagement for caregivers to translate learning into behavioural change.

Some of the data pointed to the need to strengthen components like hands-on practice opportunities during workshops, providing refresher training for caregivers, and directly observing/coaching caregivers to ensure knowledge translates into the real application of positive parenting behaviours at home. We have incorporated these elements in our updated implementation model.

Overall, this monitoring and evaluation research has been invaluable for validating our approach, identifying success factors, making iterative improvements, and building an evidence base to improve early childhood development outcomes through the programme. We continue to prioritise data-driven adaptation and remain committed to further research to optimise our solution's effectiveness.

Seriti's early childhood development and parental support programme has made significant strides in addressing the critical gap in supporting early childhood development in marginalised communities across several South African provinces. Through our holistic approach of empowering parents and caregivers as the primary providers of nurturing care, we have reached thousands of families and positively impacted the lives of young children.

However, as we continue to scale and refine our solution, we need to strengthen our evidence base further. While our initial research studies have validated our underlying theory of change and demonstrated promising outcomes, we recognise the importance of building a more robust and rigorous evidence foundation.

Engaging in a LEAP Project at this juncture would be immensely valuable for several reasons:

• To optimise our implementation model and maximise impact, we must identify the most effective strategies for sustained behaviour change among caregivers and translate learnings into long-term positive outcomes for children.
• As we expand our reach, we must ensure our solution is adaptable and context-appropriate across diverse communities, each with unique socio-cultural dynamics.
• With limited resources, we must prioritise the most impactful programme components and delivery mechanisms to allocate our efforts strategically.
• To influence policy and attract broader support, we require a stronger evidence base that meets the highest standards of rigour and credibility.

The insights and recommendations from a LEAP Project could significantly strengthen our research design, measurement strategies, and overall approach to delivering impactful support for parents and caregivers.

1. What are the most effective strategies for facilitating sustained behaviour change among parents and caregivers related to nurturing care practices promoted through ELPs, ECD and parental support programmes?
2. How can programme implementation models be optimised and contextualised to ensure relevance and impact across different socio-cultural settings within marginalised communities?
3. What are the essential programme components and delivery mechanisms that will drive the most significant changes in early childhood development outcomes, and how can these be prioritised for maximum impact and scalability?

Over the 12-week sprint, we would greatly value the LEAP Fellows conducting formative research to inform and strengthen our approach to better inform monitoring and evaluation of overall implementation of our ECD, parental support and early learning programme. Specifically, we would appreciate the following outputs:

• Detailed formative research plan: This would include recommended study designs, data collection methods (e.g., surveys, interviews, focus groups, observations), sampling strategies, and systematic approaches to gather insights from key stakeholders, namely, caregivers, community leaders and members, implementing partners, and ECD experts. The plan should outline how to assess factors influencing behaviour change, contextual adaptations needed, and essential programme components across different community settings.
• Data collection tools and protocols: Based on the research plan, the LEAP Fellows could develop tailored data collection instruments (e.g., survey questionnaires, interview guides, observation checklists) and protocols to ensure high-quality, consistent data is captured. Robust tools aligning with established early childhood development frameworks and indicators would be invaluable.
• Enhanced monitoring and evaluation framework: Leveraging insights from the formative research, the Fellows could propose an updated monitoring and evaluation framework for our programme. This could include refined indicators, measurement strategies, data collection/analysis plans, and approaches to track implementation fidelity, behaviour change among parents and caregivers, and longer-term child development outcomes.
• Implementation guidance: Finally, based on the research findings, the Fellows could provide actionable recommendations on optimising our implementation model, including strategies for sustained engagement, contextual adaptations, prioritising high-impact components, and approaches to facilitate behaviour change. Guidance on change management and capacity building for our network of community facilitators would also be valuable.

While ambitious for a 12-week timeline, these formative research outputs would provide a solid foundation to refine our solution design, measurement strategies, and implementation processes before conducting future rigorous impact evaluations. This would ultimately enhance the credibility and real-world applicability of our evidence base.

The outputs from the LEAP Project sprint will be invaluable in guiding the refinement and strengthening of our early childhood development and parental support programme. Upon receiving the formative research plan, data collection tools, updated monitoring and evaluation framework, and implementation guidance, we will take the following actions:

1. We will carefully review and validate the recommendations with our core programme team and key stakeholders. This will allow us to discuss the findings, contextualise them within our specific implementation settings, and develop a roadmap for operationalising the suggested improvements.
2. The formative research plan will inform the design of subsequent case studies as part of ongoing monitoring and evaluation to further build our evidence base. We will incorporate the proposed data collection methods, sampling strategies, and systematic approaches across our target communities. This will enhance the robustness and credibility of our research efforts.
3. The updated monitoring and evaluation framework, with its refined indicators, measurement strategies, and data analysis plans, will be integrated into our programme monitoring systems. This will strengthen our ability to track implementation fidelity, measure behaviour change among caregivers, and assess longer-term child development outcomes more effectively.
4. The data collection tools developed, such as survey questionnaires and observation checklists, will be adopted for use by our field teams of facilitators and coordinators. Training will be conducted to ensure consistent and high-quality data capturing, aligning with established ECD frameworks and indicators.
5. The implementation guidance will be instrumental in optimising our programme model. We will carefully review the recommendations on sustained engagement strategies, contextual adaptations, prioritising high-impact components, and facilitating behaviour change. Where necessary, we will update our training materials, refine our delivery mechanisms, and provide capacity-building support to our network of community ECD champions.

Furthermore, the outputs will inform the development of a comprehensive change management plan, which is forward-focused on growth and incorporating technology effectively. This will outline the specific actions, timelines, resources, and responsible parties for implementing the recommended improvements across our programme sites and stakeholder networks.

These outputs will serve as a strategic roadmap for enhancing our ECD and parental support programme's effectiveness, scalability, and real-world impact, ensuring that we continue to empower parents and caregivers and support the holistic development of young children (aged 0-8) in marginalised communities.

The desired long-term outcomes of the 12-week LEAP Project sprint are closely aligned with our organisation's mission of creating sustainable socioeconomic impact in marginalised communities. Specifically, we envision the following outcomes:

For our organisation:

• Strengthened evidence-based approach: The outputs will enhance our ability to design and implement interventions grounded in rigorous research and data-driven strategies. This will further position Seriti as a credible, evidence-based organisation, increasing our influence and attractiveness to potential funders and partners.
• Improved programme effectiveness and impact: By optimising our implementation model, prioritising high-impact components, and facilitating sustained behaviour change among parents and caregivers, we aim to achieve more significant and lasting improvements in early childhood development outcomes across our target communities.
• Increased scalability and replicability: The contextual adaptations and implementation guidance will enable us to adapt our programme more effectively to diverse socio-cultural settings, facilitating broader scale-up and replication in new communities while maintaining impact.
• Enhanced organisational learning and continuous improvement: The research findings and recommendations will contribute to our organisational knowledge base, fostering a culture of continuous learning, adaptation, and innovation in our programmatic approaches.

For our early childhood development and parental support solutions:

• Improved caregiver engagement and behaviour change: By implementing effective strategies for sustained engagement and behaviour change facilitation, we envision parents and caregivers in our target communities becoming more empowered, knowledgeable, and skilled in providing nurturing care for their children's holistic development.
• Stronger positive parenting practices: As a result of improved caregiver capabilities, we anticipate seeing a measurable increase in positive parenting practices, such as responsive caregiving, early learning opportunities, and ensuring child safety and wellbeing.
• Measurable improvements in child development outcomes: Ultimately, our desired long-term outcome is to achieve significant and sustained improvements in various domains of child development, including cognitive, physical, social, and emotional development, for children aged 0-8 in the communities we serve.
• Influencing policy and sector-wide practices: By building a robust evidence base and demonstrating the effectiveness of our approach, we aim to influence national policies and sector-wide practices in early childhood development, contributing to systemic change and increased investment in this critical area.

Overall, the outcomes of the LEAP Project sprint will position Seriti and our ECD and parental support programme as a leading force in promoting the importance of non-centre-based early childhood development early learning programmes, empowering parents and caregivers, and creating a lasting positive impact in marginalised communities across South Africa.