Abdul Badi Sayibu
Accra
Summary
My highest qualifications are an MA in Development Studies and a Master of Philosophy in Statistics. My expertise and experience in advanced statistics, data collection, data analysis, and monitoring and evaluation will be very important to the duties specified under this role.
Cumulatively, I have worked as an M&E, data management, and research professional in areas including education, health, and rural development since September 2013 (10+ years). I have led the development of the M&E systems of programs covering 13 African countries including 12 West African.
I have worked on more than three databases and seven different statistical data analysis tools throughout this period. Salesforce, SAP ERP, and DHIMS are some systems I have used to manage the M&E process of large and complex programs and organizations, including Plan International. I have also worked extensively in using mobile-based applications for data collection, such as ODK, Taroworks, SurveyCTO, KoboCollect, and CommCare.
Overview
11
11
years of professional experience
Work History
Evaluation Specialist
Street Child UK
11.2022 - Current
- I lead the design and implementation of M&E systems to measure the impact of the Education Outcome Fund program in Sierra Leone and Ghana. The World Bank funds the program, and payment is strictly based on achieving specific outcome results.
- In this position, I directly supervise 2 M&E Coordinators and give technical support to over 100 field team members across Sierra Leone and Ghana. Currently, I use a combination of KoboCollect, CommCare and Power BI to manage the M&E processes of this program.
- Since the official start of the project in January 2022, I have authored one inception report, one annual report and five quarterly reports for the World Bank as part of the dissemination plan of the MEL framework.
- I have also held several reflection meetings with the Ministries of Education in the two countries regarding policy-relevant issues observed in the qualitative and quantitative data coming from the field.
- Together with two other projects, the Ghana program won the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Government GOVTECH Prize in early 2024. A key factor in winning this award was the amount of quality data that was produced to showcase the progress of the program. The Sierra Leone program was also nominated for the same award
- As part of this role, I also play a leading role in the review of the entire organization's M&E system to centralize the monitoring process for tracking the organization's progress toward its goals. This process covers all portfolios, programs and country offices.
- Another key role I play is using the data and information generated from this very huge program to support the organization's fundraising activities. In December 2023, the organization was selected for The Times & Sunday Times Christmas appeal, which generated £1.4 million.
Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning Manager
Plan International
02.2020 - 02.2022
- As a MEL Manager at Plan International, I led the design and implementation of the M&E systems of two programs, funded respectively by UKAID and implemented in Zimbabwe and Ghana.
- Through this program, I first introduce Salesforce into Plan International as an effective cloud-based software for managing M&E processes. For this, I became a key member of a team of MEL professionals within Plan International that led the organization’s effort to develop a central MEL system for tracking progress toward its goals.
- Under the name ‘PMERL System,’ salesforce was later adopted to manage the organization’s global Monitoring and Evaluation processes in 2021. I also used SAP ERP for program planning and management.
- Quarterly and annual reporting, a monthly update on progress to FCDO, project adaptation recommendations based on data evidence, and sharing learning products with other external stakeholders were some of my primary responsibilities and achievements.
- During the COVID-19 pandemic-related school closures, Plan International collaborated with the government of Ghana through the Ministry of Education to deliver basic school lessons through national television. I led the design and implementation of an emergency M&E system, including a remote data collection methodology to track these activities.
- I led the design and implementation of three evaluations during the period with Plan International
- Keen to showcase some of our achievements, I led Plan International to present a paper at the 2021 UKFIET at Oxford. The title of the paper was “Practical Support in an Unexpected Time: Learnings from Plan International’s Girls’ Education Challenge portfolio on Resilience, Wellbeing, and Safeguarding in its COVID-19 Response”
- Again, I later published a paper in the Journal on Education in Emergencies (EiE) about my experience supporting the Ghana Ministry of Education with data during the COVID-19 pandemic. The title of the paper is “Data Disaggregation for Inclusive Quality Education in Emergencies: The COVID-19 Experience in Ghana”
- Numerous short articles that I authored and co-authored with colleagues have also been featured on the websites of the FCDO and Ghana’s Ministry of Education
- I also supported the organization's bid for the Education Outcomes Fund project with a situational analysis of the current challenges facing Ghana’s education system. The project worth over $10 million was eventually won by the organization.
Senior Research Analyst
Innovation for Poverty Action
09.2019 - 02.2020
- My main duties at IPA were to provide technical support to partners on the development and maintenance of M&E systems, the design of indicators, data collection methods, and data management, working both with administrative and survey data. I also assisted them to identify strengths and weaknesses in existing data collection and management systems and propose solutions
- I also synthesized and analysed qualitative and quantitative data in a structured way to find patterns, with an emerging ability to draw implications. I also trained partner organizations’ team members on M&E data collection, analysis, and summarizing.
- I translate data and insights into a meaningful story to drive strategy, action, and decision-making at an executive level.
- I also assisted in the preparation of research reports, briefs, and other documents for management, implementing partners, donors, and other external parties.
- Some of my major achievements in this position was my key role in setting up the electronic school monitoring and supervision system of the National School Inspectorate Authority (NaSIA), which they still use to date.
- As part of my major achievements in this role, I led the qualitative and quantitative data analysis and reporting of the final evaluation of a UNICEF-funded STAR project at Ghana's Ministry of Education.
- I also participated in several education research committee meetings of the Ghana Education Service.
- The data collection and visualization tools I worked with in this role include KoboCollect, tableau and Excel. I also used STATA for more advanced statistical analysis.
Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning Coordinator
Family Health International - FHI360
05.2017 - 08.2019
- My main duty was to work closely with the Ghana Ministry of Education to ensure the effective monitoring of the implementation of the USAID Partnership for Education project at the school level.
- I supported the development of mobile-based data collection systems for field data collection using ODK.
- again, I supervised a team of 73 data collectors, mostly personnel from the Ghana Education Service. I give them daily technical assistance on using the electronic data collection tool and conduct backcheck visits as part of my Data Quality Assurance monitoring plan.
- I took a central role in the analysis of the field data and feeding it into a central dashboard
- I also assisted officials of the Ministry in generating the needed information from the project dashboard and making meaning of the information.
- All project data collection was done using an electronic data collection tool called ODK. Also used Power BI for data visualization
- I report on all indicators weekly and ensure various levels of the Ministry of Education organize data utilization meetings to discuss the generated information from the data and to ensure action plans are set up and implemented for identified issues.
- In this position, I took part in baseline and endline field data collection.
- Toward the end of the project, I was part of the team that embarked on a capacity building of the staff of the Ghana Education Service on the data management system that was developed for the project.
- The capacity-building activity was to enable them to take full control of the system the project used to track school data. This was after the education minister made a specific request for the system to be handed to them for general use in all their schools.
Monitoring and Evaluation Manager
Network of Persons Living With HIV/AIDS
11.2015 - 05.2017
- As an M&E manager, I led the research agenda of a program funded by the Global Fund. The program was in 11 West African countries, with the International Treatment and Preparedness Coalition (ITPC) based in the United States as the primary recipient of the funding from the Global Fund.
- My role covered all 11 countries and involved the continuous collection of qualitative and quantitative data at selected Antiretroviral treatment facilities across these countries to track service delivery. In this role, I spent most of my time working in Ivory Coast, where the project’s offices were officially located.
- A major component of the project was the use of the monitoring data for advocacy purposes. For this reason, I kept regular contact with the Ministries of Health of the target countries so that they could keep in touch with any trends from the monitoring data that borders on policy. I shared quarterly learning newsletters from the data with the respective ministries. I also hosted semi-annual learning events.
- As one of my major achievements in this role, I was part of a team of five M&E professionals who designed and executed the baseline study of the program, covering the 11 target countries. The evaluation used a combination of qualitative and quantitative research methods.
- There was also a review of the existing documents, including health policies and National Strategic Plans of the target countries.
- I also led the design of the tools that were used for periodic data collection at the antiretroviral treatment sites. Some of these tools were later adopted by the Health Ministries of the target countries for the general monitoring of HIV/AIDS service delivery
Teaching and Research Assistant
University of Health and Allied Sciences
10.2014 - 10.2015
- My main duty was to organize tutorials in applied statistics and mathematics for students in the health sciences, including medical and nursing students. I also organized SPSS and STATA data analysis courses for final-year nursing and medical students ahead of the start of their projects.
- I also prepared additional materials on applied statistics for students
- Additionally, my one-year work at the University of Health and Allied Science was mostly used to conduct data analysis for the various research projects undertaken by the School of Basic and Biomedical Sciences faculty members.
- Within the one I was in this role, 172 students attended my tutorials and data analysis course in three different semesters.
- I also led the data cleaning and analysis of one research project that the Department of Basic and Biomedical Sciences conducted into the impact of male midwives in promoting access to safe child delivery services in Ghana.
Data Manager
Ghana Health Service
09.2013 - 08.2014
- My program planning and data management experience were born here. I was responsible for ensuring data from all regional facilities were entered into the District Health Information Management System (DHIMS) on time.
- I also reviewed all entered data and conducted data quality checks. I was also responsible for querying DHIMS every quarter to provide timely data for quarterly reports.
- I was also responsible for managing data of a UNICEF-funded newborn care program implemented by the directorate at the time. In addition, I participated in the design and execution of the program’s final evaluation and reporting.
- I became a key member of a team of IT-savvy staff that led the transitioning of the DHIMS into a cloud-based server for real-time data tracking. This new cloud-based system was dubbed DHIMS2. The Ghana Health Service continues to use this system to date.
- I was involved in data analysis towards the drafting of the 2013 annual report of the Ghana Health Service and all four quarterly reports that were produced within the period.
Education
Master of Arts - International Development
Ghana Institute of Management And Public Administr
Accra, Ghana07.2022
Master of Philosophy (MPhil) - Statistics
University of Ghana
Legon, Accra - Ghana08.2018
Certificate - Data Analytics
Cornell University
Ithaca, New York, USA08.2017
Certificate - Programme Planning, Monitoring And Evaluation
Institute For Development Practice And Management
Accra, Ghana06.2016
Bachelor of Science (BSc. Honours) - Statistics
University For Development Studies
Tamale, Ghana12.2013
Skills
- Salesforce
- DHIMS
- DevResults
- Taroworks
- CommCare
- SurveyCTO
- Open Data Kit (ODK)
- Microsoft Power BI
- Microsoft Office 365
- SPSS
- Stata
- R
- Google Docs Editors suite
- SAP ERP
Languages
- Dagbani, Twi (Natives)
- English (Fluent)
- French (Intermediate)
- Arabic (Basic)
Publications
A. In 2022, I was also a guest for the New York University's International Education Department’s JEiE podcast titled 'Behind the Pages' to discuss intersectional issues creating education inequality for girls in Africa
B. Abdul Badi Sayibu (June 2022). Data disaggregation for inclusive quality education in emergencies: The COVID-19 experience in Ghana. Journal on Education in Emergencies (JEiE) 8 (2): 170-82. New York University, United States. DOI: https://doi.org/10.33682/6mt0-vs4g
C. Abdul Badi Sayibu, Ellie Caine, and Maggie Shergill (March 17, 2022). Ghana Learning TV: How virtual classrooms maintained girls' learning during school closures. https://girlseducationchallenge.org/blogs/blog-article/ghana-learning-tv-how-virtual-classrooms-maintained-girls-learning-during-school-closures/
E. Abdul Badi Sayibu and Ellie Caine (March 7, 2022). After-school clubs address gender barriers to education in Ghana. https://girlseducationchallenge.org/blogs/blog-article/after-school-clubs-address-gender-barriers-to-education-in-ghana/
F. Conference presentation title: Practical Support in an Unexpected Time: Learnings from Plan International’s Girls' Education Challenge portfolio on resilience, wellbeing, and safeguarding in its COVID-19 response
Conference: United Kingdom Forum for International Education and Training (UKFIET 2021), Oxford
Date: September 15, 2021
G. Abdul Badi Sayibu (2018). Modeling of Cerebral Spinal Meningitis (CSM) outbreak using stochastic epidemic models with Bayesian priors. International Journal of Mathematics and Physical Sciences Research
H. Abdul Badi Sayibu (January 2021). Impact evaluation of development programs using Bayesian longitudinal data analysis. Evaluation and Programme Planning. [Under review]
Referees
Issifu Muniratu
Country Director
Plan International
Sierra Leone
Telephone: 23275496074
Email: Muniratu.Issifu@plan-international.org
Frederick Tei-Nobi
Operations and Admin Manager
Street Child UK
33 Creechurch Lane, London
Telephone: 233244738605
Email: frederick.tei-nobi@street-child.org
Jesus Miguel Falcon
Education Program Lead
Plan International Ghana
Ghana – W/A
Telephone: 233557472077
Email: Miguel.Falcon@plan-international.org
Timeline
Evaluation Specialist
Street Child UK
11.2022 - Current
Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning Manager
Plan International
02.2020 - 02.2022
Senior Research Analyst
Innovation for Poverty Action
09.2019 - 02.2020
Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning Coordinator
Family Health International - FHI360
05.2017 - 08.2019
Monitoring and Evaluation Manager
Network of Persons Living With HIV/AIDS
11.2015 - 05.2017
Teaching and Research Assistant
University of Health and Allied Sciences
10.2014 - 10.2015
Data Manager
Ghana Health Service
09.2013 - 08.2014
Master of Arts - International Development
Ghana Institute of Management And Public Administr
Master of Philosophy (MPhil) - Statistics
University of Ghana
Certificate - Data Analytics
Cornell University
Certificate - Programme Planning, Monitoring And Evaluation
Institute For Development Practice And Management
Bachelor of Science (BSc. Honours) - Statistics
University For Development Studies