Developing Enabling Environments for Women's Access to Education and Vocational Opportunities

This report is one in a series of case studies RAND researchers are conducting as part of an independent evaluation of the BHP Foundation's Education Equity program. This case study traces the development of two efforts by UN Women's Second Chance Education Programme (SCE) in India to support policy changes that improve women's access to education and vocational opportunities. UN Women works to influence governments to support and sustain "second chance" education solutions through writing, adopting, and implementing regulations, procedures, laws, or other administrative action.

To influence policy change, SCE India leveraged a common set of strategies across the two cases featured in this research. Specifically, SCE worked with stakeholders who were already engaged with the topic, embedded technical consultants within the partner agencies, supported policy enactment by facilitating productive conversations and the logistical aspects of policy formation, and promoted structures to institutionalize proposed reforms.

This case study demonstrates that, through the provision of specialized technical guidance to high-level decisionmakers, organizations such as UN Women's SCE India can facilitate productive conversations that lead to policy change initiatives. At the same time, the prospects for these efforts remain uncertain. As explained by multiple stakeholders, SCE India faces deeply ingrained resistance to change. Moreover, SCE India and its partners are still working to develop appropriate metrics and indexes to measure change and have realized that impacts may take considerable time.