Community Integrity Building (CIB) & Social Accountability Activities for Students and Citizens Ellen Goldberg Programme Director Integrity Education July 2015

Citizen & Student Participation – Social Accountability Community Integrity Building – CIB Guide ( Student Monitors – students monitoring public projects and service delivery through or in their school, university or NGO – “CheckMySchool” – ( ); an example of a student accountability project related to their school including academic integrityhttp:// Integrity Lens – Analysing a situation using the Integrity elements: Accountability, Competence, Ethics, without Corruption. How each stakeholder behaved in these areas, whether the proper systems and procedures were in place, and then developing an action plan to fix the problems.

Citizen Report Cards -(CIB Guide, page 11) – a survey of citizens to assess their satisfaction with public services, followed by feedback and action Surveys – Internal & Expert (CIB Guide, pages 10-12, 24-29) – data collection by trained individuals and experts and reporting back to the surveyed for discussion about action Joint Working Groups (CIB Guide, pages 6-9) – citizens and local authorities learning and working together to solve integrity challenges in public service delivery Public Hearings - meetings between citizens and public officials or other leaders to present and discuss research findings, social problems, provide feedback on public projects and services, etc. Citizen & Student Participation – Social Accountability

Social Audit (appropriate for secondary school pupils, as well) – review of public projects and service delivery to identify and analyse problems, and develop solutions for implementation; followed by feedback to stakeholders Investigative Reports – investigate activities in the community that might be related to corrupt practices or integrity challenges, followed by feedback to stakeholders Requests for Access to Information (CIB Guide, pages 22-23) – submit requests for information from government departments regarding public budgets and services, then analyse and use the data for monitoring and advocacy Citizen & Student Participation – Social Accountability

Legal & Social Clinics – establish in your university legal and/or social clinics, through which (mainly) senior law or social work students advise citizens about problems they have in these fields, including integrity, corruption, access to public information, negotiating through the government bureaucracy, etc. Supervision by university faculty. Recruitment Integrity Test – Review recruitment procedures (e.g. in your institution) to determine if they can prevent corrupt practices, and join committee to monitor actual recruitment processes to determine if they are being implemented properly. At end, provide feedback. Citizen & Student Participation – Social Accountability

Interviewing victims of corruption or beneficiaries of another’s integrity – Connecting emotionally to the consequences of corruption/ maladministration as well as integrity Advocacy & Media – “See-Click-Fix” – ( - reporting local problems and getting them fixed…closing the loop! – Using media and journalism to raise awareness of issues – Advocating for policy change After identifying an act of corruption or maladministration, prepare an action plan for implementation to prevent it from occurring again; share and discuss with your colleagues Citizen & Student Participation – Social Accountability

Revenue/Budget Watch – Monitoring public budgets; sometimes ‘translating’ published budgets to be understandable by regular citizens E-accountability and ICT Tools – Compare transparency and accessibility of various government s’ websites around the world, and encourage more public information important to the people to be disclosed – E-Procurement – develop online procurement processes that minimise corruption, especially by diminishing access between bidders and decision-makers – Using technology tools to record and validate data collected, as well as communicate results openly Citizen & Student Participation – Social Accountability

Have your students read some Case Studies ( and identify community-based monitoring or information- gathering activities; then assign your students to use some of these tools, appropriate for your country, and report back what they did and what they learned from it. Select 3 Activities adaptable for your students and how you would implement them – with sample topics Select 3 Activities that might be difficult for your students and explain why; then try to find a way they could be adapted to work Student Participation – Social Accountability