Dear colleagues,

As the Scaling Community of Practice (SCoP) enters its 10th year, we are pleased to present Newsletter 30, marking two significant milestones at the same time.

Once again, we are delighted to offer you, our 4,200+ members, the latest news about SCoP activities and other exciting scaling news you have shared with us. This cover letter also provides an update on some recent developments regarding the SCoP and on progress with our flagship action-research initiative on Mainstreaming Scaling in Funder Organizations.

Institutional Transition of the SCoP

As we previously informed you, we have been pursuing options – with the guidance of our Executive Committee – for establishing the SCoP on a more formal and sustainable organizational footing than is currently the case. After careful review, we decided against establishing an independent nonprofit. Instead, we have focused our attention on finding a suitable host organization. We considered four alternative hosting organizations and concluded that Results for Development (R4D) offered by far the most exciting opportunities for sustaining and amplifying the SCoP’s activities and impact. For those of you who don’t already know them, R4D is a well-known and highly respected global nonprofit organization with staff in 10 countries. Their mission is to support change agents who are building strong systems in a variety of sectors of interest to SCoP members. R4D is known for designing and leading collaborative learning networks, and has a long-standing interest in scaling.

Our goal is to agree with R4D management by the end of 2024 on a suitable governance structure, strategy, business model, and financing arrangement that preserves and grows the SCoP as a largely volunteer-based, member-driven learning network and as a platform for promoting systematic approaches to scaling for development and climate action. Many details remain to be worked out over the coming six months, but we have agreed to start from our Strategy 2024-2033 in co-creating a path forward that meets the SCoP’s interests and needs as well as those of R4D. R4D’s leadership is very excited to collaborate with SCoP members.

We, Larry and Johannes, expect to wind down our executive role in managing the SCoP as the transition of a new hosting arrangement is completed, but look forward to continuing to engage with the SCoP and its members in a substantive and advisory capacity. As this transition proceeds, we appeal to all members to let us know if you have any suggestions or preferences for how the work of the SCoP should evolve. We also note that, under the new hosting and management arrangement, the SCoP will need additional financial support, and any ideas will be much appreciated on how we can best raise critical core resources needed to continue providing the public good of an effective scaling knowledge and advocacy network. We intend to send you a survey during the next few weeks to solicit your views and suggestions on the issues involved in managing the organizational transition of the SCoP.

Mainstreaming Scaling in Funder Organizations

In June 2024 we posted the Interim Synthesis Report for the Mainstreaming Initiative. It compiles and analyzes the experience from 12 collaborative case studies for a wide range of funder partners, including bilateral and multilateral funders, foundations, challenge funds, and large international operating NGOs. In addition, we issued a Policy Brief that summarizes the key lessons for funders wishing to mainstream scaling into their operating practices. We also produced a companion document on Scaling Fundamentals, which brings together different strands of the scaling literature – scaling innovations, scaling projects, and scaling through systems change – in a holistic approach to scaling that funders and their development partners can draw upon.

As many of you will recall, the SCoP launched its flagship Initiative on Mainstreaming Scaling in Funder Organizations early last year as a two-year action-research project designed to gather the experience of development and climate funders in integrating scaling systematically into their operational practice. This Initiative is based on the presumption that funders have an important role to play in supporting the pursuit of sustainable development and climate impact at scale, but often have not effectively done so or even hindered scaling by the recipients of their financial resources. The objective of this initiative is to share best practice and promote more effective support for scaling among funder organization with the ultimate goal of helping countries achieve sustainable impact at scale.

Work under the Mainstreaming Initiative will continue for another twelve months. We expect to carry out additional funder case studies, with a special focus on private foundations and on funders supporting health sector interventions. We will complement this work with an analysis of the recipient experience, with a review of evaluation approaches of official funders, and with the preparation of a “mainstreaming tracker” tool that will allow funders to assess their mainstreaming progress and approach. We will pull together the final conclusions of the Mainstreaming Initiative by June 2025.

We welcome any comments, critiques and suggestions from SCoP members on the results so far since this will inform our continuing work and will ensure that this effort is as helpful as possible to all scaling stakeholders.

Revisiting the content and structure of the Newsletter

Over the next few months, we intend to take stock of the experience with our newsletter with a view to adapting it to the evolving needs of our membership. The above-mentioned member survey will solicit your views and suggestions, and we look forward to your response.

With many thanks for your participation in the CoP,

Larry Cooley, MSI, and Johannes Linn, Brookings

BRAC

South-South exchange: Philippine delegation learns from Bihar’s inclusive livelihood programme – In February 2024, Philippine officials visited Bihar to learn from the Satat Jeevikoparjan Yojana (SJY) program, which has helped nearly 200,000 households. This exchange aimed to share knowledge and strategies for inclusive livelihoods and poverty reduction. Key aspects included the role of coaching in supporting participants and the success of the Graduation Approach. This initiative is an example of cross-country collaboration in scaling poverty alleviation programs.

Courtney Calardo [email protected]

CGIAR, ILRI, IWMI

Dutch social scientist Marc Schut appointed Senior Innovation Portfolio Management Advisor for the CGIAR System Organization – Schut works within CGIAR’s Portfolio Performance Unit and is hosted by the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), a CGIAR centre, in Nairobi, Kenya. At the same time, Schut maintains a part-time role as a senior scientist at Wageningen University & Research, in the Netherlands. Over the past decade, Schut has been instrumental in developing science-based tools and frameworks to enhance innovation in agricultural development in the Global South. He co-led the redevelopment of CGIAR’s innovation and scaling framework, which included creating new management systems for CGIAR’s innovation portfolio. This evidence-based approach significantly improved CGIAR’s investment strategies and decision-making processes along with the 2030 Research and Innovation Strategy.

Susan MacMillan [email protected]

CIMMYT

Update to Scaling Scan, an assessment tool to examine requirements for scale – The first edition of the Scaling Scan was produced in 2017 to integrate the five basic scaling lessons. The Scaling Scan helps individuals and groups explore what is required to scale an innovation in a specific context, the implications this has for project management and collaboration, and potential trade-offs on the environment and social dynamics. It is freely available in English, French and Spanish and designed in a user-friendly way so a broad range of local and international stakeholders can make sense of scaling in their context. This 3rd edition better integrates key considerations for social inclusion (to “leave no one behind”) and for environmental protection (to “do no harm”) and provides better guidance on using the outputs to develop a scaling strategy.

“Supporting a Systems Approach to Scaling for All; Insights from Using the Scaling Scan Tool” – This study draws on almost six years of experience using and adapting the Scaling Scan tool to deepen the theoretical and empirical understanding of what a systems approach to scaling is and what challenges project teams and organizations face in embracing this. It uses data retrieved between 2017 and 2023 from 54 workshops where the Scaling Scan was used to scale innovations for sustainable development. Data were complemented with a literature study and strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) analysis to understand the use, users, and user adaptations of the Scaling Scan tool. The review finds that the common focus on “the” innovation to scale and the intrinsic assumption that this innovation addresses a key root cause or leverage point in the system risks perpetuating a linear approach to scaling. The scoring of the scaling ingredients shows a tendency to focus on familiar disciplines (mostly technical), limiting progression beyond a “bigger pilot” and engaging with what or who is required for innovations to contribute to large scale change, such as market and public support. Transitioning from a linear to a systems approach to scaling is challenging because the business models of research organizations depend on high adoption of “their” innovations. The experience with the Scaling Scan contributes to a deeper understanding of the role of tools to facilitate the integration of systems thinking in innovation and scaling initiatives aimed at sustainable development.

Lennart Woltering [email protected]

Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Horticulture

GenderUp: a method to support responsible scaling – Highlighted in a recent article in Agricultural Systems – “Anticipating Social Differentiation and Unintended Consequences in Scaling Initiatives Using GenderUp, a Method to Support Responsible Scaling” – GenderUp addresses the critical need to understand how gender and other forms of social differentiation and intersectionalities affect the distribution of benefits and risks associated with scaling processes, and how unintentional negative consequences can be mitigated through an intentional scaling strategy. This discussion-based tool equips innovation teams with the insights and strategies needed to ensure inclusive and empowering outcomes. With over 100 facilitators trained globally, including recent sessions in Guatemala and online, GenderUp is empowering diverse stakeholders – students, researchers, and implementers – around the globe to engage meaningfully in scaling agricultural innovations.

Kristen Becker [email protected]

Innovating and scaling for social transformation in international food systems – This course, led by Dr. Erin McGuire of the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Horticulture at University of California, Davis, engaged 30 global participants from April 3rd to June 5th. This ten-week remote course provided agriculture research for development (AR4D) researchers with a robust understanding of scaling agricultural innovations while emphasizing social differentiation and transformation. Participants critically analysed diverse methodologies, integrated social theory with practical tools like GenderUp, and applied theoretical concepts through group projects. The course fostered a sense of community and equipped participants with actionable strategies to scale socially inclusive agricultural innovations, supported by expert feedback and continuous engagement opportunities.

Katheryn Gregerson [email protected]

Early Child Development

FHI 360

Playful Parenting Community: scale up research & experiences – The Playful Parenting Community is a LEGO Foundation-supported consortium of partners implementing and researching parenting, for parents of children 0 to 36 months, at scale in several low- and middle- income countries. The consortium includes FHI 360, Save the Children, ChildFund/Guatemala, the Boston College Research Program on Children & Adversity, FXB/Rwanda, and UNICEF/Serbia and Zambia.  As a research and learning partner, FHI 360 conducts implementation research on programs as they transition to or reach scale, in order to generate evidence on caregiver beliefs and practices, workforce training, and delivery quality, and on the enablers and barriers to both horizontal and vertical scale that programs encounter. Findings from the research have been used by partners to improve delivery quality through strategies such as revising their delivery manual and offering refresher trainings and better supervision. Some programs are expanding reach by testing group sessions over home visits as a delivery modality. Case studies on how this was done in Zambia and Bhutan, and findings from the workforce contributions to scale in Bhutan and Rwanda are published. A recent webinar offers reflections on workforce selection, retention, and training; delivery modalities used to reach caregivers; program curricula; and other ingredients for scale up.

Tanya Smith-Sreen [email protected]

Education

Cambridge Education

Scaling remedial education across sub-Saharan Africa – Education systems globally face a significant learning crisis, with millions of children attending school but failing to learn basic literacy and numeracy skills. Two-thirds of all ten-year-olds globally are unable to read, hindering their ability to learn, thrive, and contribute to society. In the face of this global learning crisis, remedial education has emerged as one evidence-based solution to put countries back on track to achieving their Sustainable Development Goals and addressing the learning crisis. UNICEF, with support from the Gates Foundation, and in collaboration with Cambridge Education, has been supporting governments to scale remedial education across sub-Saharan Africa, providing additional targeted support to children already in school but performing below the expected learning levels. Evidence of the effectiveness of this approach on learning outcomes using experiences from Ghana, Zambia and South Africa has been developed into a Remedial Education Scaling Framework to support countries with step-by-step processes to scale remedial education in their countries, which will be publicly available on UNICEF’s website in the next month.

Daniel Waistell [email protected]

Global Schools Forum

GSF launches the Impact at Scale Toolkit – Global Schools Forum (GSF) is thrilled to launch the Impact at Scale Toolkit, which supports education innovators scale their solutions. The Impact at Scale Toolkit was built using learnings and insights from GSF’s first Impact at Scale programme. At the heart of the toolkit lies the Desirability, Viability, Feasibility (DVF) tool, serving as the foundational framework for assessing the key elements propelling solution readiness for scaling. Each tool within the toolkit is intricately linked to the pillars of DVF, providing actionable methodologies to scrutinize and enhance priorities, thereby ensuring a holistic approach to scaling initiatives. The toolkit also presents real-world cases designed to inspire and inform scaling strategies. These practical instances spotlight the application of the tools and the DVF methodology across diverse settings. Watch the toolkit launch webinar here.

Habeeb Kolade [email protected]

International Rescue Committee

Scaling early childhood development: insights and practical guidance from the Ahlan Simsim Initiative – Ahlan Simsim (“Welcome Sesame” in Arabic) is an initiative from the International Rescue Committee (IRC) and Sesame Workshop to bring early childhood development and playful learning to children affected by conflict and crisis in the Middle East. Launched in 2018, it combines early child development services and programs with educational media, including an Arabic-language TV show, also titled Ahlan Simsim. The Ahlan Simsim initiative has reached over 3.5 million children and caregivers with services and programs for children and families, with about 90% of this reach achieved through partnerships with local non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and government ministries. Ahlan Simsim’s work to scale outcomes for children in partnership with local system-level actors, including Ministries of Health, Education, and Social Development, is highlighted in IRC’s “Insights from the Ahlan Simsim Scaling Journey” report. Insights identifies six essential and interlinked scaling themes: understanding the system, ownership, collaborative partnership, adaptive management, co-design for scale, and investment for scale. These insights offer a way to think differently about not only big projects, but all projects working towards scale and long-term impact. They can be applied as much to early child development as they can to other critical sectors. Ahlan Simsim also offers a practical guide to support teams who want to embark on a scaling journey by providing frameworks, guidance and tools, and a brief on monitoring, evaluation, and learning (MEL) for effective scaling.

Chantale Kallas [email protected]

Heidi Rosbe [email protected]

MSI

USAID Scaling Up for Sustainability Training – USAID is updating its course on Scaling Up for Sustainability, which adapts MSI’s suite of scaling and sustainability tools to the special requirements and context of the Education sector, centered around the MSI Scaling Up Framework and Toolkit. MSI is working with USAID’s Education Center to update the training which is expected to be finalized in August 2024.

Presentation at the USAID Global Education Conference – In April 2024, the support MSI provided to the Senegalese Ministry of National Education to scale up bilingual curriculum was profiled as part of a ten-year retrospective USAID Global Education Conference panel in Washington, DC. The panel, entitled “Navigating Political Will: Thinking and Working Politically in Education”, began with the strategic planning work done by MSI in 2014 to support the scaling of bilingual curriculum and followed the evolution of this work over the last ten years. Currently, the Ministry has scaled bilingual curriculum to all six formally recognized mother tongue languages, across all regions of the country.

Lisa Slifer-Mbacke [email protected]

Results for Development (R4)

“Strategies for Scaling Education Innovations” – Innovations have the potential to help kids get back on track in the midst of a learning crisis — but questions remain about how to scale them up and reach millions of kids. Results for Development (R4D) recently convened a diverse group of innovators and social entrepreneurs to discuss the barriers they face in adapting and expanding innovative ideas across contexts and to explore strategies to overcome those challenges. They share key takeaways from the conversation in a recent blog.

RTI International

“Diseconomies of Scale: Does Scaling Educational Interventions Cost More than We Think?” – A recent analysis by RTI International highlights the potential increase in costs when scaling educational interventions. Contrary to the expectation of economies of scale, several factors—such as administrative complexity, staffing constraints, and diverse challenges across larger populations — can lead to higher unit costs. Often, scaled interventions are less intensive, and therefore less effective. Addressing these challenges requires substantial resources to ensure quality and equity in education at scale.

Joe DeStefano [email protected]

Spring Impact

Business as usual is not enough – Problems are big, time is short, and resources are limited. To truly solve the world’s biggest issues, business as usual will not cut it — we need to think differently. Spring Impact has launched Scaling Mindsets, a video series in which six brilliant social leaders share the mindset shifts that can unlock huge impact. The series features Kevin Starr, CEO of Mulago Foundation, Ann Mei Chang, CEO of Candid, Dr. Faith Mwangi-Powell, CEO of Girls Not Brides, and more.

Mario Bolivar [email protected]

SWABO Program

Increasing access to health information by engaging youth in Diani, Kenya – Scientific Animations Without Borders (SAWBO) is a program currently at Purdue University that transforms extension information on topics such as agriculture, youth and women’s empowerment, health, and climate change into video animations. These are then voice overlaid into a diversity of languages from around the world. The newly formed SAWBO Diani network group is made up of youth who are community health workers, community development workers, and volunteers interested in learning how to use video animations and practice scaling up. Through partnership with Kataru Concepts, SAWBO program organizes capacity building and video animation dissemination to scale up content for better health outcomes. Specifically, SAWBO has a video library on increasing good hygiene practice and disease prevention. As a community of practice, the youth learn using the video animations and work with a local coach. Additionally, as a community of practice, SAWBO Diani will focus on sharing and disseminating video animations in person and via WhatsApp.

Anne Lutomia [email protected]

Gender and economic empowerment

International Development Research Center

IDRC launches Scaling Care Innovations in Africa Initiative – The International Development Research Centre (IDRC), in partnership with Global Affairs Canada (GAC), is funding a five-year initiative called Scaling Care Innovations in Africa (SCIA), which includes 18 action research projects based in 11 countries in Africa addressing solutions to reduce the disproportionate share of responsibility for unpaid care work that falls on women and girls. Each project is led by a coalition of locally-based researchers, implementors, and women’s rights organizations who are using research to scale tested interventions that reduce unpaid care work, from childcare solutions to time and labour-saving technology, and more. Guided by IDRC’s Scaling Science approach, the focus will be on scaling positive impacts that have been identified as priorities by the research teams across the different socio-economic contexts in which the projects take place and ensuring that women and girls voices  and perspectives shape the scaling process. This approach demonstrates that scaling is not necessarily about pushing up or out; bigger outputs or more actions do not always lead to better impact.

Amar Nijhawan [email protected]

Health

Evidence Action

New research on malaria, deworming, and WASH – Evidence action shares their experience conducting research on scaling interventions. Their research on the potential of intermittent preventative treatment of malaria in school-aged children (IPTsc) as a promising school-based solution for malaria provides a behind-the-scenes look at how they evaluate interventions in their Accelerator, focusing on evidence, cost-effectiveness, and potential for scale. In addition, this blog post explores how Evidence Action evolved their school-based Deworm the World program to address low treatment coverage rates in two urban communities – Karachi, Pakistan and Lagos, Nigeria. Finally, this piece shows how Evidence Action manages the monitoring and evaluation challenges that their unique approach to Safe Water Now presents – including how they implement meaningful data collection cost-effectively for a program with such massive scale across various geographies.

Jessica Souza [email protected]

ExpandNet/Partners in Expanding Health Quality and Access

Scaling up orientation with the Federation of Midwifery Associations of Francophone Africa – In December 2023, ExpandNet Advisory Council members, Dr. Ginette Hounkanrin (Pathfinder, Burkina Faso) and Cheikh Seck (Horizon Santé, Senegal) led a three-day scaling up capacity building workshop in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire with members of the Federation of Midwifery Associations of Francophone Africa (FASFAF) and allies from eight countries. The Federation requested the workshop, recognizing a need for their representatives to build their skillset around scaling to more effectively contribute to country-level access to, and quality of, maternal, child, and reproductive health care. Workshop participants came from Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Côte d’Ivoire, Madagascar, Mali, Niger, and Senegal. Dr. Hounkanrin and Seck presented the ExpandNet/WHO framework, guidance tools, and systematic approach to scale up and facilitated strategic planning exercises and discussions for the participants. The Federation expressed interest in becoming the first cohort to use the Team Track of the French version of the Scale-up Learning Center, ExpandNet’s forthcoming open-source, online learning platform, expected to be publicly launched during 2025.

ExpandNet partners with SZABIST University’s Department of Public Health in Pakistan – ExpandNet Secretariat member Dr. Haris Ahmed has been working for the last year with Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Institute of Science and Technology (SZABIST) University’s Department of Public Health (DPH) to build the institutional capacity needed to share scale up learning across the faculty and student body. In September of 2023, Dr. Haris conducted a mini-course on scale up for students in SZABIST’s Master’s in Public Health program. The course was well-received and there is growing interest in scaling among the SZABIST administration and faculty. Therefore, in May of 2024, SZABIST DPH, ExpandNet, and The Scaling Accelerators – Pakistan (an in-country ExpandNet affiliate organization led by Dr. Ahmed) signed a Letter of Collaboration. The 2024-2025 collaboration seeks to equip SZABIST DPH with the technical capacity and limited seed resources to establish a scaling community of practice in Pakistan as well as to prepare the SZABIST team to implement scaling up capacity-building work with academic, development sector, and government institutions.

Laura Ghiron [email protected]

Global Alliance for Chronic Diseases

GACD Implementation Science Masterclass on Scale Up – The Global Alliance for Chronic Diseases (GACD) is thrilled to announce that the GACD Masterclass on Scale Up will return for 2025. The Masterclass is a blended programme of online and in-person teaching sessions taking place in February and April 2025. The aim of the GACD Masterclass is to develop capacity among mid-career implementation scientists and programme implementers in the methodology and science of scaling up NCD programmes. The Masterclass will use experiential learning through the development and refinement of a project concept. The content level is appropriate for mid-career researchers with at least a foundational understanding of implementation science. Participation in the full programme is offered at no cost to successful applicants, including food and accommodation for the in-person sessions taking place in Goa, India. However, trainees must cover their own costs for travel, travel insurance, additional nights of accommodation, and any other expenses. Applications for the Masterclass 2025 are open until Wednesday 31 July 2024 at 07:00 UTC.

Izzy Bandurek [email protected]

Université Laval

Strategies for involving patients and the public in scaling initiatives in health and social services – Patient and public involvement in scaling health and social services is expected to ensure that beneficiaries’ best interests are served. Among 110 articles identified, this review finds that patients were often involved in the entire scaling process and throughout the continuum of collaboration. Education and consultation were the most common patient and public involvement strategies used. However, patient and public involvement was less common in the recruitment process or incentives used. The consequentialist-utilitarian ethical lens was often employed.

Roberta de Carvalho Corôa [email protected]

World Health Organization

Bottleneck analysis on factors inhibiting scale up of evidence-based family planning interventions – Despite their effectiveness, the impact of evidence-based programmatic interventions (such as post-pregnancy family planning, post-abortion family planning, task sharing and expansion, and social behavior change) has been limited due to a lack of scaling up of these interventions, especially at the sub-national and district levels. The Department of Sexual and Reproductive Health and Research at the World Health Organization curated a generic protocol to systematically identify the health systems “bottlenecks” in adopting and scaling up a range of evidence-based practices on these interventions.

Rita Kabra [email protected]

Mainstreaming

Catholic Relief Services

Vision 2030: in their own hands – Catholic Relief Services (CRS) uses a two-pronged approach to scaling: working with local actors for systems change (scale sensitive) while supporting key initiatives to work at the scale of the problem (scale specific). CRS continues to reinforce the institutionalization of scale within the organization. Examples of recent activities to support this effort include:

• CRS recently updated its internal Change Agent Community of Practice scope of work to increase activities and promote learning around mainstreaming scale.
• CRS supports region and country programs by incorporating guidance to achieve a minimum of systems-aware programming that builds a foundation for scale-sensitive project design and is developing MEAL resources.
• CRS updated a cross-cutting capability model for program staff using evidence of what staff skills and characteristics enable scale.
• Alongside Michael Quinn Patton and Charmagne Campbell-Patton of Utilization-Focused Evaluation, CRS developed Scaling Principles as the first step towards carrying out a principles-based evaluation of CRS’ progress toward institutionalizing scale.

Rudy Blackwell [email protected]

World Health Organization

Bottleneck analysis on factors inhibiting scale up of evidence-based family planning interventions – Despite their effectiveness, the impact of evidence-based programmatic interventions (such as post-pregnancy family planning, post-abortion family planning, task sharing and expansion, and social behavior change) has been limited due to a lack of scaling up of these interventions, especially at the sub-national and district levels. The Department of Sexual and Reproductive Health and Research at the World Health Organization curated a generic protocol to systematically identify the health systems “bottlenecks” in adopting and scaling up a range of evidence-based practices on these interventions.

Rita Kabra [email protected]

Grand Challenges Canada

“Sparking System Change: the Role of a Catalyst” – Grand Challenges Canada’s Savings Brains program supports a variety of Systems Catalysts, which implement large public systems interventions with repeatable protocols while working with families as active partners in the change process. Systems catalysts connect within the system and across stakeholders, articulate and work toward shared goals, respect families and communities, upgrade and energize system performance, and innovate with stakeholders for better delivery. The Kangaroo Mother Care program by Community Empowerment Lab in Uttar Pradesh, India provides an example of this approach.

Sanjana Janardhanan [email protected]

Youth Employment

SCoP Youth Employment Working Group

Utilizing IT platforms to enhance youth employment – Larry Cooley (MSI & SCoP) moderated a webinar which was co-presented by Professor Jennifer DeBoer (Purdue University) and Dr. Hisham Kassab (Independent Consultant). Cooley kicked off the webinar, emphasizing the connection between targeted job disciplines, job matching, and mentoring and training. Building on that context, panellists presented three case studies on technology-powered strategies and approaches to enhance youth employment in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. The webinar culminated with several key takeaways. First, the remote-work revolution is here to stay, which is transformative for youth employment as it can remain local. Second, there is a viable business model for training, job-matching, and mentorship programs that consists of three revenue streams: placement fees paid by companies, donations from the alumni of the programs, and local governments benefiting from remotely-employed-locally-working youth. Third, focusing on internship-placements might be the optimal path for matching youth with job opportunities, as internships present a low-risk investment for companies, while providing them with telling trial periods.

Dr. Hisham Kassab [email protected]

General

CASE

CASE’s new webinar series, Innovating to Scale, kicked off recently – The first session explored the question, “What Does Innovating to Scale Mean?” Host Erin Worsham and guest Beth Anderson (CEO, Hill Learning Center, CASE Advisory Council member) discussed strategies that help organizations be clear on why they want to innovate, what innovation looks like, and lessons learned from Hill Learning Center’s scaling journey.

“Case Study: To Scale or Not to Scale?”

By Derrek Xavier, IDR, March 7, 2024

Quality Education Support Trust (QUEST) was set up in Maharashtra in 2007 by a group of individuals concerned about the quality of education in the state, especially in terms of teaching and learning practices. With the aim of improving the existing education system, they began to work on early childhood education, elementary education, and the professional development of teachers in the state. Subsequently, the trust aimed to scale up its operations beyond the limited number of districts that it initially served. This policy brief summarized the results of a detailed case study that addresses the following questions: When is a grassroots nonprofit ready to scale? And how can it effectively build capacities to achieve this?

“A Process Model of Social Enterprise Scaling Using the Legitimacy Lens”

By Prajakta Khare, Amarpreet Singh Ghura, and Anirudh Agrawal. Journal of Social Entrepreneurship, March, 2024.

This research examines the scaling of a social enterprise through legitimacy. Using a qualitative approach grounded in a single case study, that of the Kalgidhar Trust Society from India (TKTS), the study examines the external strategies and internal process used in the scaling of TKTS with a special focus on its chain of schools, the Akal Academies. The authors develop a model where internal and external legitimacies lead to scaling up and scaling wide and build socio-political legitimacy, which in turn spreads the values of the organization and creates a deeper impact in society. This paper introduces the legitimacy lens to scaling, which has not yet been sufficiently explored in literature.

“Identifying Innovations Produced by Primary Health Care Centers and Evaluating Their Scalability: the SPRINT Occitanie Cross-sectional Study in France”

By Alexis Vandeventer, Grégoire Mercier, Christophe Bonnel, Joana Pissarra, Grégory Ninot, François Carbonnel, preprint 2024.

Practice-based research is one of the levers identified by the World Health Organization (WHO) to strengthen primary health care. The scaling of health and social care innovations has the potential to reduce inequities in health and to expand the benefits of effective innovations. To meet the challenge of declining numbers of primary care physicians in France, Pluri-professional Healthcare Centers (PHC) bring together medical and paramedical professionals. Existing methods for identifying health innovations and assessing their scalability were adapted to the French context by a working group, including end-users and specialists. The University Department of General Practice of Montpellier-Nîmes (France) launched a pilot study in Occitanie, a French region, to identify and evaluate the scalability of innovations produced in Pluri-professional Healthcare Centers in the Occitanie region. The results show that a quarter of the innovations were highly scalable. The study also demonstrated the importance of PHC teams in working on primary care research through the prism of innovations.

“Development and Implementation of a Novel Approach to Scaling the Meeting Centre Intervention for People Living with Dementia and Their Unpaid Care Workers in the Community”

By Nathan Stephens, Shirley Evans, Chris Russell and Dawn Brooker, February, 2024.

In the UK, there is a post-diagnostic support gap experienced by people affected by dementia. Effective post-diagnostic support interventions, therefore, need to be replicated at scale to meet demand. The objective of this study was to systematically report a novel county-wide approach for scaling the Meeting Centre intervention for people living with dementia and their unpaid carers. An adapted version of the Template for Intervention Description and Replication (TIDieR) checklist was used to describe the program. Adaptations were made to consider items specific to complex social interventions and scaling programs. Key program stakeholders contributed to its development. Key findings suggest essential features of the intervention may not be feasible at scale; highlight the critical role of the program leader to drive culture and systems change; and emphasize the use of scaling science frameworks to determine optimal scale. Further research and theory development should test implementation outcomes to understand if the intervention is a scalable solution to the gap in the post-diagnostic support for people affected by dementia.

“Assessing Determinants of Scaling Up Pathways for Adopted CSA Climate Smart Agricultural Practices: Evidence from Climate Smart Villages in Nyando Basin, Kenya”

By Josephine W. Njogu, George Karuku, John Busienei and John Kamau Gathiala. Cogent Food & Agriculture, Vol. 10, 2024.

Africa has recently experienced adverse climate changes and has recognized tremendous advancement in numerous Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA) technologies with the ability to promote resilience and productivity. However, these strategies are largely unknown among poor, rural, small-scale farmers, and their uptake at scale remains a major challenge. There are prevailing barriers that inhibit upscaling of these practices and, so far, actions and policies to remove the challenges remain very limited. The study’s main objective was to assess determinants, barriers and strategies to boost scaling pathways for adopted CSA practices in the Nyando Basin of Kenya. Primary data was collected at baseline, at end-line, and in financial diaries from 122 households. Logistic regression models and descriptive statistics were used to analyse the data. The main findings show that shocks from the emergence of new pests and diseases, and variable rainfall highly affected productivity, resulting in serious constraints to scaling up CSA practices. The study recommends improving multi-faceted approaches that assimilate environmental, agronomic, molecular, and institutional aspects (including improvements in market access and the capacity of cooperatives) as a way to support scaling up of CSA practices.

“Scaling Education Innovations in Tanzania, Kenya, and Zambia: Assessing the Design of School In-service Teacher Training”

By Katherine Fulgence. Chapter in The Sustainability of Higher

Education in Sub-Saharan Africa, Palgrave McMillan Cham. July 2024.

This chapter uses the scale up framework developed by Management Sciences International (Cooley et al, Scaling up–From Vision to Large-Scale Change: Tools for Practitioners, MSI, 2021) to assess the innovation of School In-service Teacher Training (SITT) currently being scaled up and adopted in selected secondary schools in Tanzania, Kenya, and Zambia. SITT has, since 2012, been implemented in selected primary schools in Tanzania with the evaluation showing significant improvements in students’ learning outcomes at the primary level. The design of the secondary SITT intervention did not systematically apply scale frameworks making it relevant to explore how it is in alignment with the MSI framework. Findings show that the design of the innovation aligns with the scaling features of involving key stakeholders, particularly higher

education institutions as researchers, teacher education institutions as mentors; capacity building to teachers and education leaders; structured pedagogy; and engagement of government across the countries. The findings facilitate further large up-scaling of the innovation and policy uptake. Findings also inform the design of the scaling strategy as a subsequent step towards making the innovation more publicly appealing to governments and potential users.