The program operated woredas of five regions of Ethiopia: Tigray, Amhara, Oromia, Addis Ababa and SNNPR. Only eligible applicants were considered at the time of the random allocation into the "program" or "control" groups. The implementer used pre-established selection criteria and the responses to long-from questions to determine the eligibility of applicants. Women who met the eligibility criteria for participating in the WALN program, who completed the application form to provide at least one letter of recommendation and nominate five to eight mentees were considered in the pool of mentors who receive the leadership training module. Mentees were selected from amongst the nominated candidates who met the corresponding eligibility criteria. Mentees were assigned only to the mentors who nominated them. To minimize non-compliance and maximize the effectiveness of existing network ties, if multiple mentors nominated the same mentee, the mentee were allowed to pick the mentor.
The baseline survey covered the entire sample of applicants to the program. That is, the mentors and the recommended mentees were all interviewed at the end of the application phase, but before the announcement of selection results.
The objective of the WALN baseline survey was to build a comprehensive dataset, which would serve as a reference point for the entire sample, before treatment and control assignment and program implementation. To get a better understanding of the context of the survey, this section describes the survey preparation steps and methodology.
