Our Expertise

ARDI has extensive experience managing small-grants programming across Syria to support local civil society organizations (CSOs), with emphasis on women and youth-led organizations. ARDI-managed small grants enable carefully selected CSOs to implement their approved project proposals to creative positive change in their communities. 

Projects led by local CSOs and supported by ARDI focus on a range of impact areas, including peacebuilding, addressing gender-based violence, countering extremism, education and after-school activities, economic empowerment, and political participation. ARDI’s field-based and management teams provide ongoing technical support and coaching during the implementation of CSO projects to transfer knowledge that fosters local civil society strengthening and ensuring the quality and effectiveness of efforts in line with project targets, timelines, and budgets. 

Across all programming, ARDI strives to develop the capacity of local female and male-led civil society organizations and actors across Syria to enable them to design and implement meaningful, high quality, and impactful social impact projects that effectively address the localized needs, challenges, and goals of Syrian civilians.

We emphasize coordination and cooperation among civil society organizations, as well as furthering coordination and collaboration between civil society organizations and local governance councils to collectively address local challenges and achieve goals. ARDI works to support internally displaced persons (IDPs) who are currently in the northwestern and northeastern parts of Syria in all interventions with a focus on enhancing co-existence between local and IDP communities to further joint visions and goals for the future. 

Women and youth-led civil society organizations often face greater social, economic, and political barriers to achieving their personal, professional, and community-wide goals across Syria. Understanding these additional hurdles, ARDI focuses significant attention upon working alongside and provide targeted support to female-led CSOs and community leaders that enable them to enhance their service provision organizational capacity, and decision-making abilities on-the-ground. Additionally, we work to empower local female leaders with skills, training and hands-on coaching, field experience, and opportunities to evolve their organizations and increase their ability to meaningfully participate in the social and political sectors.

ARDI also understands that addressing gender inequality issues cannot be conducted without working in partnership with men and boys. ARDI ensures that our women’s empowerment and gender equality-focused programming engages both females and males in order to help create shifts in understanding and practice around these important issues. 

ARDI conducts technical field research on targeted issue areas and populations to better understand their realities, needs, challenges, and goals. We begin each new programmatic initiative with an assessment to uncover and better understand the local community’s needs, challenges, risks, and goals so that the initiatives we lead fit the local environment and culture, do not replicate already-conducted efforts, but rather build upon and further them, and match the goals for the future that stakeholders envision for their own communities. 

We have experience designing and conducting in-depth, cross-regional surveys among five Syrian minority groups (Alawites, Christians, Druze, Ismailis, and Shi’a Muslims), surveys focused on the challenges and needs of Syrian women and girls from different regions, and the political, economic, social, and conflict-related experiences and challenges. ARDI uses mixed-method and participatory approaches to survey data collection and partners with local organizations, leaders, and members of our network of field offices to collect and clean data.