Training of Trainers on eMIS Tools

A Training of Trainers (ToT) on eMIS tools was organized at BRAC CDM, Rajendrapur, Gazipur on 29 and 30 October 2018. Officials from headquarters (Director, Deputy Director, Program Managers, Deputy Program Managers of different units of DGFP) and implementation districts (district and sub-district managers) participated in the ToT session. This objective of the ToT was to provide an orientation on eMIS tools and develop a pool of master trainers from the DGFP so that the master trainers from this pool could provide training support at the local level in future.

The ToT started with an opening session. Mr. Nazmus Sadat Salim, Director (MIS), DGFP chaired the opening session. At the beginning of the ToT, Md. Humayun Kabir, Senior Strategic and Technical Advisor made introductory remarks and expressed optimism that the ToT would be successful in creating a pool of master trainers in the headquarters of DGFP, who would institutionalize the eMIS within the organization and carry the torch forward. Me. Salim highlighted the importance of eMIS for the department especially in view of data. Afterwards a video was exhibited.

The following topics were covered in the ToT course: FWA eRegister, FPI eSupevison System, UFPO eSupervision System, Facility Systems/CSBA, Administrative and Monitoring Tools.

The ToT emphasized learning by doing. After each presentation on the selected topic, the participants were asked to form small groups. Participants were given tablets during hands-on practice session and case scenarios were provided to enter data and navigate through the app interface. A member of the group read out the observations at the end of each session.

Evaluation of the ToT

An evaluation was made at the end of the program. A questionnaire was served to the participants. The first question was on the participants’ expectations from the ToT. It was multiple-choice answers. The options were: a) to know eMIS in-depth, b) to train people on eMIS in future, c) to play a role in introducing eMIS in the department, d) had no specific expectations and an open space for writing their response beyond those. Altogether, 18 officials from the DGFP headquarters and field offices participated in the ToT. Of them, 17 returned the questionnaires. The responses, which are presented below, summarizes the observations provided by those participants.

It appears that there were lots of interests among the participants to know about the eMIS tools. Some of them were already considering positively about performing as a master trainer.

Some of the responses to the open field were: to identify any misconceptions, to develop training, to identify similarities or differences between the paper based register and eMIS in respect of M&E, Supervision and counseling related tools. One wanted to identify the need to continue eMIS activities.

They were also asked to note whether the expectations have been met on a scale of 1 to 3. The answers were overwhelming in favor and there were none whose expectations were not met at all.

The third question was on the presentation of tools in different sessions. They were also requested to respond on the effectiveness of hands-on practice sessions. Due to shortage of time only two sessions contained hands-on practice. The responses were as below:

Finally, the participants were requested to rate the presenters on quality of presentation, skills of presentation, interactions with the audience, and time management. The responses are summarized below.

The last question was open and the participants offered their suggestions. A number of participants suggested for increasing the training period from 3 to 5 days with more practice sessions based on dummy data. Others suggested to expand the program to field officials. One observed that there should be unique numbers for ELCOs.