The Diploma programme has been initiated to address the inadequate number of skilled people who can carry out M&E activities appropriately and successfully. This follows the decision by Government to introduce the cadre of M&E officers in Planning Departments in both Ministries and autonomous Departments and Government Agencies. Also, there is an increase in the demand for M&E function in NGOs and private sector organisations. Private sector actors have also begun to conduct development projects through their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) programmes. These are contributing to an increased demand for quality assurance (QA), standards and compliance, results-based management and data collection. Taken together, they have increased the number of positions required to conduct M&E. The Diploma programme is therefore being started to train M&E personnel in-order to address inadequate number of skilled people who can carry out M&E activities appropriately and successfully. OUT started a Master programme in M&E (MA M&E) back in 2014. Experience has shown students enrolled in the course lack basic skills in M&E. Moreover, the postgraduate course was designed to equip senior M&E managers, organization executives and consultants with conceptual and theoretical foundations in M&E. The Diploma course on the other hand has been designed for junior officers or people intended to take supportive function in M&E such as data collection, supervision of fieldwork and data entry/analysis.

The Diploma course is also initiated to fulfil OUT’s mandate to provide foundation courses needed to transition from secondary/tertiary to university education. This will present a path for students who did not achieve the required pass-mark for direct admission to Bachelor programme to obtain a Diploma and transgress to Bachelor and then MA M&E.