INTEGRATED SAFEGUARDS DATA SHEET CONCEPT STAGE Public Disclosure Copy Report No.: ISDSC433 Date ISDS Prepared/Updated: 26-Mar-2012 Date ISDS Approved/Disclosed: 27-Jun-2013 I. BASIC INFORMATION A. Basic Project Data Country: Kazakhstan Project ID: P127966 Project Name: Kazakhstan - Youth Corps program (P127966) Task Team Keiko Inoue Leader: Estimated 16-Jul-2013 Estimated 31-Oct-2013 Appraisal Date: Board Date: Managing Unit: ECSH2 Lending Investment Project Financing Instrument: Sector(s): Adult literacy/non-formal education (100%) Theme(s): Education for the knowledge economy (100%) Financing (In USD Million) Total Project Cost: 21.76 Total Bank Financing: 0.00 Total Cofinancing: Financing Gap: 0.00 Public Disclosure Copy Financing Source Amount Borrower 0.00 Trust Funds 21.76 Total 21.76 Environmental C - Not Required Category: Is this a No Repeater project? B. Project Objectives The proposed project development objective would be to promote positive youth development in Kazakhstan through service learning opportunities that serve the community while helping youth develop important life skills. The project is expected to also bring about wider recognition amongst the public that youth can be both an asset and part and parcel of the building blocks of a just society and nation. C. Project Description This concept note describes a proposed youth Project for a total duration of five years, focused on service learning for youth in Kazakhstan. Service learning is an approach whereby students learn and contribute at the same time, through active participation in organized service experiences that Public Disclosure Copy actually meet community needs. Service learning provides students opportunities to use their acquired skills and knowledge in real life situations in their communities; thus enhancing youth’s formative experience by extending student learning into the community and helping foster a sense of caring for others. Through this experience, society at large also learns to perceive youth as an asset that can contribute to larger national development goals instead of the frequent stereotyped perception of youth as trouble-makers going through a difficult period of the life cycle. This is the concept of Positive Youth Development, very much at the heart of this proposed service- learning experience. Positive Youth Development may not be widely known outside of the youth and education arena but it is an increasingly popular policy, curricular, and programmatic approach that allows schools and youth organizations to infuse youth development principles throughout their programs, while supporting their community and national development goals. The proposed project will take lessons learned from Bank projects on youth both in the Europe and Central Asia region and in other regions such as Latin America and the Caribbean. Moreover, best practice from three examples of widely known programs that support service learning of the kind described above the American Americorps, the Peace Corps, and Teach for America will also be taken into account. A longitudinal impact evaluation of the AmeriCorps, program, which assessed alumni who participated in AmeriCorps between 1992-2000 and followed them for eight years, found that the program created a positive impact in generating interest in public service, exposing youth to different careers, and improving the civil attitudes and behaviors of program alumni. The proposed Project would be fully financed through a US $20 million trust fund financed by the Swiss Government. The proposed Project is organized around three components, as described below. Public Disclosure Copy Component 1. Supporting internships in public and private sector institutions that deliver social services. The component would have two distinct parts. The first part would finance the subsistence stipends of the youth participants. The preliminary step in this would be the identification and enrollment of a core group of youth participants . Then, these participants would be provided a six to eight weeks life skills training course. Only after the successful completion of this training course would the youth be placed in communities/place of work. Youth between the ages of 15-24 would be eligible to receive a stipend while working full or part time for the community for a maximum of one year. A sample of activities to be streamlined during preparation, would include tutoring and mentoring, working at local schools or health centers, working on environmental projects, caring for the elderly and children with special needs. The second part would finance grants to eligible organizations that would sponsor service programs where the youth would participate, to assist them in training and supporting youth to meet critical community needs. The Youth Corps project would identify CSOs which could be private and semi public organizations interested in offering the service learning opportunities to Youth Project members. The criteria and procedures for the identification of the “hiring� offices or CSOs would be based on specific and transparent criteria agreed to with the Kazakh Government during preparation and outlined in the Project Grants Manual. These “hiring� offices would also provide participants with mentoring and hands-on training while they are placed in their service program. These two parts of Component 1 put together are at the heart of the project design: while the youth would be given a stipend for the duration of their service, the “hiring� offices would also be eligible to apply for small grants to finance work-related training to the youth. The hiring organization would Public Disclosure Copy have to agree to keep the youth participant on the job for an agreed upon period of time (between three to nine months). The value of the grant for each CSO (“hiring office�) is expected to vary based on criteria such as type of service, location of such service, and number of youth served. The eligibility criteria and the mechanism to determine the grant amount will be developed in detail during project preparation. Component 2. Developing an institutional framework. This would be the project’s a policy and social marketing component . The policy sub-component would further support the work of the Youth Policy unit in the Ministry of Education and Science (MES) and specifically, the coordination of policy and programs for youth with the government’s “Road Map� and the Kazakh Employment Strategy 2020. The social marketing sub-component would support an intensive communications campaign to engage both youth and society on: (i) the efficacy of the project itself and, (ii) once the Youth Corps is up and running, the positive impact youth can have on society and the development process of a nation. Through clever marketing on the benefits and impact of the Youth Corps project, it is expected that this sub-component will help energize the up-take from youth and CSOs, and could also potentially have an impact through the public dissemination of successes of the Project, on the sustainability of the Youth Corps program in Kazakhstan as an established structure and a viable option for youth as well as society. Overall, it is envisaged that this component through both, the policy work and the social marketing, would contribute to solidifying the government’s policy direction in the area of youth. The structures for national youth policy in the Europe and Central Asia region are often centralized and lack connections to non-governmental youth organizations. Additionally, youth ministries and sub- departments also need support to build adequate statistical capacity for collecting disaggregated data Public Disclosure Copy on youth trends, as well as to monitor and evaluate the impact of government interventions for young people. Ultimately, the outcome of the Project with the support of this component would be a more sustainable youth strategy for the country and possibly, through the demonstration effect of the successes of the Project, a Youth Corps Program owned and implemented by the GoK. Component 3. Monitoring and Evaluation and Project Management. This component would consist of monitoring and evaluation (M&E), and project management. The Monitoring and Evaluation component of the Project would consist of two parts: (1) the regular monitoring of project’s implementation and outcomes based on the agreed performance indicators developed during preparation, and, (2) the project’s evaluation that would entail the design and implementation of a rigorous evaluation which would assess the effectiveness of the Youth Corps program. The evaluation component of the Project would be implemented by the World BankHaving evaluation as a Bank executed activity has merit and is based on the Bank’s extensive and rich experiences with impact evaluations. An impact evaluation of this nature would be technically complicated and could greatly benefit from the international expertise that Bank staff possesses and the Youth Policy Department does not have the capacity to implement. Furthermore, this impact evaluation and its findings would be critical to the future sustainability of the Youth Corps Project. It is important to note that monitoring of the Project would remain the primary responsibility of the Youth Policy Department and the Project Management Unit. The component would also finance Project Management and Capacity Building to support the implementation of the Youth Corps project. Public Disclosure Copy D. Project location and salient physical characteristics relevant to the safeguard analysis (if known) Environmental and social safeguards are not triggered by this Project as it would only finance stipends, grants to NGOs and technical assistance. E. Borrowers Institutional Capacity for Safeguard Policies Not applicable. F. Environmental and Social Safeguards Specialists on the Team Johnson Appavoo (ECSOQ) II. SAFEGUARD POLICIES THAT MIGHT APPLY Safeguard Policies Triggered? Explanation (Optional) Environmental Assessment OP/ No BP 4.01 Natural Habitats OP/BP 4.04 No Forests OP/BP 4.36 No Pest Management OP 4.09 No Physical Cultural Resources OP/ No BP 4.11 Indigenous Peoples OP/BP 4.10 No Public Disclosure Copy Involuntary Resettlement OP/BP No 4.12 Safety of Dams OP/BP 4.37 No Projects on International No Waterways OP/BP 7.50 Projects in Disputed Areas OP/BP No 7.60 III. SAFEGUARD PREPARATION PLAN A. Tentative target date for preparing the PAD Stage ISDS: 26-Oct-2012 B. Time frame for launching and completing the safeguard-related studies that may be needed. The specific studies and their timing1 should be specified in the PAD-stage ISDS: The project is not triggering any Safeguards. However, the team will consult with Bank specialists on the necessity of carrying out a social assessment. IV. APPROVALS Task Team Leader: Name: Keiko Inoue 1 Reminder: The Bank's Disclosure Policy requires that safeguard-related documents be disclosed before appraisal (i) at the InfoShop and (ii) in country, at publicly accessible locations and in a form and language that are accessible to potentially affected persons. Approved By: Regional Safeguards Name: Date: Coordinator: Public Disclosure Copy Sector Manager: Name: Andrea C. Guedes (SM) Date: 27-Jun-2013 Public Disclosure Copy