EME Notice for PIN: Centre of Excellence for Development, Impact and Learning
The UK Department for International Development (DFID) is seeking to appoint a Research
Director to assemble and lead a group of outstanding multi-disciplinary academics to develop
and oversee the intellectual and research agenda of a multi-disciplinary Centre of Excellence
for Development, Impact and Learning (CEDIL) in international development. Once the
Research Director and Intellectual Leadership for the programme are appointed, DFID will
start a separate procurement process for the Programme Directorate, who will be responsible
for delivery of this programme.
The objective is to establish a high quality, multi-disciplinary academic centre to commission
and implement impact evaluations, promote the uptake and use of evidence from impact
evaluations and develop and demonstrate new and innovative methodologies for impact
evaluation and evidence accumulation.
The Research Director and multi-disciplinary Intellectual Leadership Team should be
intellectual visionaries who can really transform development impact evaluation through high
quality research and evidence. They will have overall responsibility for the strategic and
technical direction of the Centre and will lead on developing a vision and a clear agenda for
CEDIL, in consultation with DFID. The Intellectual Leadership Team will also have an
opportunity to undertake some of the deliverables of the Centre.
There are 3 key requirements that the Centre will be expected to deliver against, bringing its
academic and multi-disciplinary intellectual leadership to the forefront in delivery:
I.
II.
III.
Develop and use new and existing evaluation research methods for experimental,
quasi-experimental and other designs for impact evaluations of development
programmes.
Develop a rigorous evidence accumulation and data science programme to combine
and model evidence generated through monitoring and evaluation of development
programmes, using new and existing methods (drawing from social, natural and bio
medical sciences).
Coordinate and deliver technical assistance, research/evaluation, and design support
to international development programmes that use experimental, quasi- and nonexperimental methods for evaluation.
The Centre will achieve these deliverables through a set of individual work programmes. The
Research Directorate will conduct a review of the potential methods and a mapping of gaps in
current methods to inform the number and nature of these programmes.
We have already held one Early Market Engagement meeting on this and received useful
feedback which has shaped and refined our thinking. The video of that session is available on
the portal and we are holding another Early Market Engagement meeting for those who were
unable to attend the previous session and to update interested parties on how are thinking
has evolved on this.
If you would like to hear more about the Research Director and Intellectual Leadership roles
for the Centre of Excellence for Development please register for the Early Market
Engagement meeting which will take place in DFID’s London office (22 Whitehall), on 5th
February 2016 at 14.30-16.30pm. Please book your place by registering on the following
site: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/82CSSVV. by 2nd February. It is anticipated that the
procurement for the Research Director and Intellectual Leadership will start relatively soon
after this second Early Market Engagement exercise in mid-late February, with this part of
CEDIL commencing in September 2016 and operating for a five year period, with the
possibility of an extension. Procurement of the Programme Directorate will start in May/June
2016. DFID expects that the successful bidder will be a consortium of organisations that have
strengths in both intellectual leadership in evaluation techniques and strong programme
management experience, with a track record of managing grants of a similar scale.
Institutions from outside the UK are eligible, and encouraged, to bid for this work, but it is
expected that they will form a consortium with at least one member in the UK.