Globally there is a growing need for reliable, ethically collected data to better understand, respond to and prevent violence against women

Since 2018, the University of Melbourne, in partnership with UNFPA, ANROWS and the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) has offered the kNOwVAWdata training course as a four week intensive face-to-face course for professionals seeking to build their skills in measuring violence against women. This online course in an adaption of this face-to-face training.

The curriculum development was informed by the experience of Dr. Henrica (Henriette) A.F.M. Jansen, who has provided training and technical assistance in measuring the prevalence of VAW for two decades and across more than 40 countries worldwide.

The curriculum draws from decades of existing materials and resources developed by global experts on the measurement and use of VAW prevalence data, much of which started with and is building on the World Health Organization (WHO) Multi-country Study on Women’s Health and Domestic Violence against Women, a study that has set the standards that we still use today for the measurement of VAW prevalence. The resources used in the course are well documented and cited throughout the course materials.

The kNOwVAWdata course provides the depth and breadth of knowledge required to conduct rigorous and ethical prevalence surveys and other research on violence against women. The course leads to improved data literacy for overall measurement and use of data on violence against women (VAW). For further information see kNOwVAWdata.com.

The kNOwVAWdata training course will cover:

• Key concepts relevant to VAW
• Tools used to generate reliable and comparable data
• Processes involved in undertaking a national prevalence study and other forms of VAW research
• Ethical and safety guidelines
• Data management, analysis and dissemination
• Working with qualitative and administrative data
• Stakeholder engagement
• Strategies for ensuring an inclusive approach to understanding VAW

This course aims to build a global professional workforce that is data literate and skilled in undertaking reliable and ethical VAW research.

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Designed For

This course will be valuable for professionals from all over the world that are involved in the measurement of VAW, including representatives from national statistics offices, women’s machineries, and other government agencies practitioners researchers and international consultants addressing VAW.

Learning Outcomes

1. Understanding of the pervasiveness of VAW, its characteristics, causes and impacts.
2. Understanding of the role of international mandates on VAW.
3. Understanding of use and limitations of different data sources and the role of statistical surveys.
4. Understanding of the core UN and SDG indicators on VAW.
5. The ability to use different tools to measure VAW and to estimate the relevant indicators of VAW.
6. Understanding the strengths of a dedicated survey on VAW.
7. The ability to apply the WHO ethical and safety guidelines in survey planning and implementation.
8. Be able to organize and implement a VAW survey in your country context.
9. Understanding how to prepare a comprehensive data analysis plan report outline, including the computation of relevant SDG VAW indicators.
10. Increased data literacy to interpret and explain multiple forms of data on violence against women.
11. The ability to use data to make recommendations for post-survey action that are country-specific and in line with international best practice.
12. Understanding the importance of stakeholder involvement in survey planning, interpretation, dissemination and use of the results.
13. Understanding how to tell a compelling data story that can be used for advocacy, policies and interventions.

Course Units

All subjects are stand-alone and can be enrolled in separately. Those wanting to complete the full kNOwVAWdata course, and achieve the kNOwVAWdata Professional Development Certificate, will need to complete all four kNOwVAWdata online subjects.

Subject 1: Gender Awareness (this is a pre-requisite for all subjects 2-4)

• Tutorial 1: Thinking about gender and gender inequality
• Tutorial 2: Violence against women key terminology
• Tutorial 3: Gender and violence against women
• Tutorial 4: Causes and consequences of violence against women

Subject 2: Introduction to Researching Violence Against Women

• Tutorial 1: Measuring Violence Against Women
• Tutorial 2: Quantitative measures of VAW
• Tutorial 3: Conducting qualitative research
• Tutorial 4: Ethics, risk and safety
• Tutorial 5: Planning your research

Subject 3: Working with prevalence data and other quantitative measurement of VAW

• Tutorial 1: Appropriate survey tools and methodologies for measuring prevalence
• Tutorial 2: Planning a survey
• Tutorial 3: Adapting questionnaires for the context
• Tutorial 4: Building a research team fieldwork logistics
• Tutorial 5: Managing and analysing data

Subject 4: From Data to Action: Interpreting and Reporting on VAW for Policy and Practice

• Tutorial 1: Data literacy – reading and interpreting
• Tutorial 2: Reporting data
• Tutorial 3: Using data to inform policy
• Tutorial4: Managing resistance and backlash
• Tutorial 5: The study is released – what next?

Assessment

• Assessment in each subject includes tests and quizzes, short answer activities and case studies.
• A Certificate is provided upon satisfactory completion of each subject.
• Those who participate in all four subjects and wish to receive a Professional Development Certificate will be required to develop an individual or country research manuals (VAW Study Protocol).
• Participants successfully completing all four subjects and a VAW Study Protocol will receive a kNOwVAWdata Professional Development Certificate awarded by the University of Melbourne and are eligible to be included in the UNFPA register of kNOwVAWdata trained specialists.

Delivery Mode

This course is delivered online and students can study in their own time and location. Course materials can be accessed using a web browser.

• Opportunities to attend live sessions and interact with other learners.
• Live sessions will be recorded for those who cannot attend.

Testimonial

"This training has empowered us by enabling us to truly understand data on violence against women so that we can use it for policy and decision-making."

-2019 kNOwVAWdata course participants from Kiribati, Agnether, Melinda, Teritia Aritia

Course Leaders

• Dr Kristin Diemer
• Dr Cathy Vaughan
• Dr Henriette Jansen

Contributors

• Larissa Fogden
• Violeta Politoff
• Jeanine Hourani
• Joanne Rowe
• Australian Bureau of Statisticsada (ABS)
• Australia's National Research Organisation for Women's Safety(ANROWS)

Application Procedure

Subject 1 and 2 will be released in December2020.
Subjects 3 and 4 will be released in February 2021.

Please complete the application form and we will notify you once the course is released.

Application Form

Course Fees

• Full Course Fee:AUD$2,625(incl. GST)
• Full Course Group Discounted Fee(3 more from the same organization):AUD $2,400(incl. GST)
• Single Subject (inclusive of pre-requisite gender subject):AUD $875
• Single Subject Group Discounted Fee(3 more from the same organization):AUD $800

Contact Us

E: mobile-learning@unimelb.edu.au

T: +61 3 8344 5673