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2.5 Research Ethics on Vulnerable Populations and Children
All of the respondents’ rights in this survey were strictly protected. As this survey involved
children and adults living in rural areas with a relatively low level of education and low socio- economic conditions, ethics on vulnerable populations and children were applied.
For child respondents in this survey, their participation was protected according to the UNICEF
’s Guidelines 2002. The convention on the rights of the children’s participation in this research is:
1. All rights must be available to all children without discrimination of any kind. Equity and
non-discrimination should be emphasized. 2.
The best interests of the child must be a major factor in all actions concerning children. 3.
Children’s views must be considered and taken into account in all matters that affect them. They should not be used merely as data subjects of an investigation.
In addition, the children and other vulnerable populations in this survey were fully informed and had to understand the consequences and impact of expressing their opinions. They were
free to not participate and were not pressured. Their participation was a right, not an obligation.
Based on the guidelines, the followings were implemented during the data collection to ensure the respondents’ rights:
1. Ensured the confidentiality of the respondents: their names were not included in the
information to be collected. 2.
Informed the respondents: the respondents were informed about the purpose of the interviews and the general steps of the interviews. They could feel free to answer or to
express their opinions, they did not have to answer the questions if they did not want to, etc.
3. Consent was sought by asking for their oral agreement to participate in the study.
4. Equity and non-discrimination were strictly applied through the random selection of the
students, parents, and teachers. More specifically, the socio-economic conditions of the students and their parents were not barriers in selecting them.
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5. Respect of respondents and their views was applied through the questionnaire design.
For the child respondents, a participatory and friendly questionnaire was designed.
2.6 Recruitment and Training of Assessors
For the quantitative survey, the data was collected by local assessors, while the in-depth interviews of the qualitative research were conducted by Myriad’s researchers. Myriad
recruited and trained the assessors to collect the data at the school level.
The assessors were recruited from local universities located in Papua and Papua Barat. Based on Myriad’s experiences in conducting the EGRA survey under RTI International -funded by
USAID, college students from local universities provided optimal results as they spoke local languages and they were accustomed to the local culture. Therefore, university students
enrolled in local higher education institutions located in each district were recruited.
The assessors were grouped into 4 persons per team. They collected the data from children, parents, teachers, and head teachers in a 3-day assessment period per school. One of the
team members was assigned as the team leader with certain roles such as acting as the spokesperson of the team in the school visit, checking the quality of his team members in the
data collection process, and leading and motivating the team members during data collection.
The total number of teams and assessors was 18 teams with 72 assessors.
After the selection had been completed, the assessors were trained by Myriad Team on how to implement the research instruments in the field. Five days of training were carried out to
cover all research instruments, sampling methods, research areas, and logistical aspects. Six trainers were assigned to train assessors of each district, so that the training was conducted
in a parallel manner across 6 districts.
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2.7 Piloting the Research Instruments
Piloting the research instruments was conducted prior to the data collection. The main objective of the piloting was to implement research instruments in a real situation so that
challenges could be identified and overcome, and adjustments could be made. Piloting was carried out after the assessor training workshop in 6 targeted districts. Each assessor team
carried out a pilot in 1 school, which resulted in a total of 18 schools. The activity was completed in 3 days, with details as explained in Table 2.5.
Table 2.5: Piloting the Research Instruments
After the pilot program, no major adjustments were made on the research instruments except for a few minor changes in the flow of the SSME questions to make the interviews flow
smoothly.
2.8 Data Collection
A Computer Assisted Personal Interview CAPI was applied using Nexus Tablet. Research instruments were loaded into the electronic device. The main reason for applying the CAPI
technique was two-fold. First, it was more efficient as the data was automatically punched and stored in the Myriad server. In other words, no data entry was required. Second, quality
Children Parents
Teacher Head
Teacher Papua
Biak Numfor 3
3 60
60 6
3 Jayawijaya
3 3
60 60
6 3
Jayapura 3
3 60
60 6
3 Mimika
3 3
60 60
6 3
Papua Barat Manokwari
3 3
60 60
6 3
Sorong 3
3 60
60 6
3 Total
18 18
360 360
36 18
Number of Respondents in the Pilot Province
District Number
of Assessor
Team Number
of School in the
Pilot
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