World Vision International
Employment Opportunity
Job Description
Location: Herat
Title: Child Education Specialist
PURPOSE OF POSITION:
The Child education specialist will provide technical support and guidance to the national office for the development, implementation, monitoring, evaluation, and documentation of World Vision (WV) Afghanistan's child education strategy and programs, including Early Childhood Care & Development (ECCD) projects for children ages 5-6 and bridging ECCD children to primary school.
S/he will be an integral member of the program and operations team, and will ultimately be a key player in contributing to WV Afghanistan overall goal of helping children to develop their full potential, as expressed in its national strategy.
The Child Education Specialist will work closely with other WV Afghanistan sector programs and projects, and with child education specialists in the Middle East & European Region (MEER) region and throughout the WV partnership.
The Specialist will also lead country specific education advocacy efforts and education-related project and proposal design as required. The Specialist will take the lead in acquiring new child education resources in order to achieve set strategic directions. Ensuring capacity development of national staff will also be a key priority for this position.
KEY RESPONSIBILITIES:
Strategy Development and Technical Support:
- Provide regular technical assistance and leadership in formulating an education landscape analysis, technical approach, program designs and a national strategy for child education programming.
- In close collaboration with Ministry of Education and other education players at the national and provincial levels, identify strategies that will increase net enrolment of children in primary school particularly, especially enrolment of girls.
- Create and maintain a close working relationship with WV's regional education advisor to ensure alignment with WV's regional education strategy and technical approach, as appropriate for Afghanistan's context.
- Develop a remedial education strategy for primary school drop-out children or children who place in the bottom third of the class.
- Assess the capacity of primary school teachers in teaching methodology and developing better learning environments, and develop/improve teacher training curriculum/ modules accordingly.
- Assess the on-going ECCD project and develop upon it a comprehensive school readiness strategy for existing and future ECCD activities.
- Assess caregiver support and nurture practices related to child learning and develop positive parenting education curriculum/ modules to improve their capacity.
- Participate in, and where indicated, take the lead in the development and submission of quality proposals in response to identified funding and collaboration opportunities.
- Advise and support Zone and Project Managers who directly manage and implement child education projects to ensure quality implementation that meets International and WV standards, and donor requirements. In conjunction with the M&E specialist, lead action research and evaluation exercises to ensure projects' activities and outputs are moving toward stated objectives, and recommend strategic changes to achieve alignment.
- Develop and maintain good relationships with existing donors, and explore potential donors who focus on the education sector.
- Ensure appropriate reporting that meets WV expectations and donor requirements.
- Lead capacity building all local staff related to the child education sector, but in particular provincial level education technical specialists.
- Lead in developing, adapting, and contextualise teaching and learning materials.
- Participate as needed in HR related matters such as developing job descriptions, recruitment, performance agreements, and appraisal of education project staff.
- Develop and implement a three year advocacy strategy related to World Vision's child education purposes in Afghanistan.
- Initiate or represent WV Afghanistan in networking with appropriate UN/ NGOs/donor meetings, joint agency assessments, and education sector working groups as needed or requested.
- Encourage mutual learning between WV and other organizations as well as opportunities for project and program coordination/ collaboration to encourage quality child education in Afghanistan.
- Analyse government?s education policies that may further or constrain efforts of increasing net primary education enrolment and develop strategies/actions to respond to them.
Required:
- Master's degree in child education/ early childhood care and development, international education, or relevant field.
- Demonstrated understanding of sectorial strategies, best practices, and innovation in the field of early childhood education.
- Excellent writing and effective report development skills.
- Experience in donor related program design and proposal development, including grant acquisition with public and private donors such as USAID, DfID, Canadian DFATD, Australian DFAT, etc.
- Good presentation and facilitation skills.
- Curriculum and education materials development skills and experience.
- Ability to work as a team player and coordinate activities across the provinces where WV Afghanistan operates.
- Able to live and work within a fragile context and restricted environment, and to work effectively under pressure.
- Ability to travel as required.
- Minimum 5 years program experience in child education and/ or early childhood development, with international experience.
- Expatriates in Herat work intensively together in close quarter office space and also live together in a team house. It is critical that each of them have the ability to both find personal space for themselves and honour the personal space of others, and to practice a high level of relational and personality tolerance.
Deadline is August 15th.
loading...
