2007 Testimonials - Course 5E: Rights-Based Programming

What participants said about this course:

"The course fit well with my expectations, specifically in: general understanding of RBA and programming; understanding the main issues and tendencies in RBA; learnig and use of tools, instruments, and links; practical exercices."

"With no prior experience in rights-based programming I am happy to say that the course gave me a very practical insight as well as an understanding of rights-based principles and how these are applied in different phases of project programming."

"This course has met my expectation through readings, discussion, assignment, chat session, and facilitator's feedback."

"The course has meet my full expectations."

"The course met my expectations very well, as it was very structured and the topics had been systematically introduced."

"Yes, it met my expectations."

"I was new to the contents of this course and I was very much satisfied with the course."

"[Course met my expectations] very well! The interactions amongst us course mates was very enlightening and well guided by the course guide."

"This course fully met my expectation and was even more complete than I thought it would. The content was very interesting and the instructor managed to stimulate good thinking on the part of the participants."

"This course fully met my expectations - beyond all my expectations… It did exactly what I understood from the website that it will do when I applied for it."

"Met my expectations pretty well, I am very happy with the overall learning although in the beginning I felt a bit frustrated waiting for a more concrete level including tools… that came later. I had an expectation of learning didactic tools for how to teach others on different levels but maybe that would have to be dealt within another course.."

"I think it met my expectations well. I liked the format of the course- the exercises, readings, weekly question and one group exercise."

"I have found the course meeting my expectation in terms of both content and method. The materials posted on each week, the feedbacks of the facilitator and the contribution of participants were quite relevant and enriching."

"When I saw the list of course topics on the flyer, I knew I wanted to do the course, and that it was likely to provide me with the kind of learning I need at this point in my work. And my hopes were realized - thank you! The topics built on each other, and extended our knowledge at each step. I was tempted to re-do the earlier assignments at later points to see how different they'd be as a result of what I'd learned since then - but laziness got the better of that idea …. "

"The topics were in a logical order with a fair balance between topics however I think this depends also on how much and what topics individual participants felt they could do more of in order to get a good grasp of things."

"Actually, I feel there was a lack of information on the programming process, at the beginning, I mean. Of course I understand this course was more directed to people working on the area of development but as in the course also participates people from the human rights world, it would be very useful to have some a deeper introductory section on this subject as it has it on human rights."

"I acknowledge that the onus is on us to read and understand the information. I do feel I have learned more about a rights-based approach, but I feel I need to go back and re-read all the course material again to get a better understanding. I thought it would be easy to find 4 hours a week to devote to the class, but it was difficult."

"This course enabled me to improve my conceptual and operational understanding of the RBA and its importance to programming; well understand the human rights concepts; be able to integrate human rights in need assessments, objective setting, program design and implementation & evaluation."

"They were mostly good readings."

"The readings were very good."

"I was very pleased with the range of reading provided for each topic which were very useful because they provided different perspectives on the topic. I felt that my needs were met."

"I appreciated the wide variety of readings, and the division compulsory / optional readings."

"I found the combination of readings and practical application questions, very useful. The choice of readings was great - with a really interesting range of sources. I particularly liked that they included many that were grounded in real experience, rather than all theory and academic writings."

"[The weekly discussions] were interesting - as each week went along, and people added their comments to the discussion, I found the different perspectives really started challenging my thinking as they came up with ideas which I hadn't thought about or a different perspective on something which made me go 'oh, I hadn't considered that aspect of …'."

"I enjoyed the contributions and real life examples of the other participants."

"I very much enjoyed reading what each participant had to say though at times it was quite time consuming and a bit repetitive."

"I found this most useful. The criticisms, different perspectives and accommodating feedback were very useful in helping me to identify my own contextual applications.
Thank you so much."

"As in any group, there were people who made very interesting contributions, and other who made less interesting contributions, not to mention that it can happen that the same person might not be constant over the 12 weeks of the course."

"Sometimes it was hard to comply with deadlines but it was a very interesting experience."

"I really enjoyed [the written assignments]. The final one was more difficult, as one would expect of a group activity … and my own holiday plans didn't help, as I wasn't able to be as supportive and collaborative with the others as I would have liked to be .. but I felt reasonably satisfied with the outcome. I learned a lot from the situational assessment ones - including the need to spend more time thinking rather than skimming along the surface of things making assumptions!"

"Clearly appropriate, relevant to the topics and thought-provoking. I think the ones that appear to be tricky provide a lot of interesting discussion, and reflects a lot of the complexities of real life situations. I am also pleased with the feedback. Excellent!"

"The group work has been somewhat challenging."

"I enjoyed these [written assignments] very much and found them to be good exercises. "

"Only the last [chat session] I found interesting, the others were not significant, every participant put their own question, no dialogue."

"I regretted not being able to participate in two of the three [chat] sessions, because of other commitments which I hadn't anticipated when I enrolled for the course. Having the transcripts on the website was good, because I was able to catch up with what had been discussed - but it made me wish even more that I'd been able to participate, as there were questions and answers that I'd like to have explored. The chat sessions are really worth pursuing, even if some of us aren't able to participate!"

"I did not find the chat sessions very useful at all. They lacked structure and substance."

"Number of chats can be increased and the times varied so that almost all the participants can take part in one chat or the other depending on which time suits them better."

"I found the chat sessions very useful, especially because they 'forced' me to do some more reading, so that I could have some questions prepared."

"I did not find the chat sessions very useful. This is something that I have already experienced with another web based course. The different time zones, and the very different quality of access to internet makes the chat session a bit complicated."

"The instructor was excellent."

"Full marks! I think I would have got more if I asked more questions."

"As reflected in the score above, I think [name of course instructor] did an excellent job in providing notes as well as feedback and she was superb in trying as much as possible to incorporate the views and experiences of all which demonstrated that RBA are is a useful tool to secure human rights in almost any context (development, human rights, humanitarians etc..)."

"I very much appreciated the instructor's work. It has been a very good learning experience."

"She was fantastic!"

"[Course instructor] was receptive / responsive to humor and encouraged participants by sharing their good ideas."

"I enjoyed the format and content of [instructor]'s emails to the group each week."

"[Name of course instructor] gave very positive and thoughtful feedback each week - 'correcting' very gently through giving alternative perspectives or raising questions for us to think about. I'm not sure how she could have been more 'critical' without making people feel threatened or stupid … so although I'd quite like my/our thinking to have been challenged a bit more at times, I don't think that would have been possible really. Overall - really good! Thank you!!"

"I found the course website easy to access any time - and, not being very technically-competent, that was a great relief! Thanks, [name of course facilitator/technical support], for making it all work - and for keeping us all as a 'community' during the course."

"A very easy-to-use web-site, which worked well no matter how slow the connection was (i.e. dial-up at home). Never failed!"

"[Name of facilitator/technical support] was very helpful always about uploading documents etc."

"The technical aspect of this course is well set out. I found it very easy to follow even though it was my first time to come across one. I will certainly recommend it to others I know."

"The course had a good balance between theory and practice, readings, homework, chats and exams."

"It is sometimes difficult to reconcile work schedule with the voluminous readings. Streamline / reduce reading materials to essentials. I will recommend the extension of duration of the course by two weeks."

"I learnt a lot about human rights but not as much of project management hence my decision to take the HREA course on project management after this."

"I anticipate using what I learned in the course for internal training course with my team, to provide a tool box for training to others members of my organisation and to for introducing new areas in planning, monitoring and evaluation tools for programs."

"During the month of September 2007 OACNUDH in Guatemala will give a series of seminars on RBA for program officers and directors within the UN Sistem in the country aiming at an ongoing learning process that will be channeled towards the CCA/UNDAF to be agreed upon during 2008."

"I will carry out trainings for my colleagues and local partners in Ethiopia
Contribution during the planning period to ensure the proper incorporation of the approach."

"It helped me in preparing the TOR (terms of references) for our strategic planning session. The course helped me to better do the need assessment of my organization with my senior staff."

"The course has really made me think more carefully and in greater depth about what HRBA means in practice - for programmes, for a development agency/NGO (my background), and for a government/donor agency. It made me think about when/how/why becoming "more serious" about mainstreaming human rights into our agency, could impact on our relationship with other government agencies (eg policy coherence, international engagements etc). It also got me thinking about what it might mean for our own organizational structure and internal-relationships."

"I plan to apply the course through sharing the reading materials, make a summary and organize an internal training."

"As a member of the Gender Theme Group on the UN in my country I will use the training to ensure gender is programmed from a rights based perspective in the development of our UNDAF UN Development Assistance Fund for the country."

"As a new practitioner in the area, I will further develop my skills in the discipline. However, I will use the learnings in my present work of strengthening NGO partner organizations in a rights-based approach."

"I will train my senior staff to understand the RBA concepts. I will encourage staff to integrate the concepts in their annual plans and I will encourage my supervisor to enroll other National Directors with HREA so that in all our programs in West & Central Africa we should all be thinking and applying RBA."

"One concrete example of how I've used the course … I used some excerpts from the UNDP-Philippines training manual to provide 'cue sheets' to my Advisor colleagues (as a reminder/refresher for them) on human rights treaty articles which they can cite as explicit links to human rights norms and standards in sector specific activities such as education or health. (Aiming to get more people aware of the 'L' in PANEL - because as an agency we are pretty well-aware, and make efforts to ensure, that the "Participation Accountability Non-discrimination and Empowerment" are taken into account in our programmes.)"

"I will make suggestions to Program Managers on ways to integrate human rights into the UNV Program in Trinidad & Tobago."

"The course will come in handy for me especially in planning and developing work plans for human rights activities, planning and organizing advocacy campaigns as well as human rights training within and outside of the Ombudsmans office."

"It will help me in doing situation assessments, and also in developing and monitoring programs. If the case will be, it could also help me in organizing trainings on HRBA."

"The course was a very important tool for my work and to enhance mi academic background. It enhanced my skills and knowledge, particularly in the area of programming which is not my area of expertise. However, I have to say that coming from the human rights world I expected that the conceptual part would include more information about the theoretical aspects of development, its various approaches (traditional, development as freedom, etc) and the link between human rights and development. Nevertheless, the course was very good and I appreciate very much the opportunity to learn about the experiences of colleagues working all around in development issues."

"Thank your for everything!!"

"It was fun!"

"I have benefited a lot from the program."

"It was well worth my money. Sincere thanks to HREA."

"It was a pleasure participate in the course."

"Thank you HREA for a wonderful course."

"Continue with the good work to make RBA a fashion in all organizations!"

"I really enjoyed the course and I will definitely recommend it to other people."

"Thanks for a well-run, well-designed course. I enjoyed it and will spend more time going thru all the materials again."

"Thank you very much, I learnt a lot and I enjoyed it also."

"Thanks for a great course!"

"I have appreciated this course very much and I can warmly recommend it to professionals working in this field."