Education Officer

United Nations Children's Fund

Mekelle, Ethiopia

UNICEF works in some of the world’s toughest places, to reach the world’s most disadvantaged children. To save their lives. To defend their rights. To help them fulfill their potential.

Across 190 countries and territories, we work for every child, everywhere, every day, to build a better world for everyone.
Summary of key functions/accountabilities:

  • Support to programme development and planning
  • Programme management, monitoring and delivery of results
  • Technical and operational support to programme implementation
  • Networking and partnership building
  • Innovation, knowledge management and capacity building
  • Support to programme development and planning
  • Contribute to the preparation and updating of the situation analysis for the development, design, and management of education related programmes/projects with a specific focus on learning outcomes, curriculum development, accelerated education, teacher training and development, gender, and inclusive education.
  • Contribute to the development and establishment of sectoral programme goals, objectives and strategies and results-based planning through research, collection, analysis and reporting of education and other related information for humanitarian and development planning, contingency planning, and goal setting.
  • Provide technical and administrative support throughout all stages of programming processes by executing and administering a variety of technical programme transactions, preparing materials and documentations, and complying with organizational processes and management systems, to support programme planning, results-based planning (RBM) and monitoring and evaluation of results.

Programme management, monitoring and delivery of results:

  • Work closely and collaboratively with internal colleagues and partners to collect, analyze, and share information on learning assessments, curriculum reform, accelerated education, teacher training and development, inclusive education, and gender responsive education.
  • Suggest solutions for routine programme implementation and submit reports to alert appropriate officials and stakeholders for higher-level intervention and/or decisions. Keep record of reports and assessments for easy reference and/or to capture and institutionalize lessons learned.
  • Participate in monitoring and evaluation exercises, programme reviews and annual sectoral planning exercises with federal and regional government and other counterparts and prepare minutes/reports on results for follow up action by higher management and other stakeholders.
  • Monitor and report on the use of sectoral programme resources (financial, administrative, and other assets), verify compliance with approved allocation, organizational rules, regulations/procedures and donor commitments, standards of accountability and integrity.
  • Report on issues identified to ensure timely resolution by management/stakeholders. Follow up on unresolved issues to ensure resolution.
  • Draft regular/mandated education program/project reports for management, donors, and partners to keep them informed of program progress.

Technical and operational support to Quality and System Recovery interventions under the Education programme:

  • Undertake field visits and surveys and share information with stakeholders to assess progress and refer to relevant officials for resolution. Report on critical issues, bottlenecks, and potential problems for timely action to achieve results.
  • Provide technical and operational support to government counterparts, NGO partners, UN system partners and other country office partners/donors on the application and understanding of UNICEF policies, strategies, processes, and best practices on education related issues to support programme implementation, operations, and delivery of results.
  • Liaise with Regional and Country Office colleagues across the education and protection sections on issues related to curriculum reform, learning assessments in recovery contexts, accelerated education, teacher training, inclusive education, and gender transformative approaches towards education.
  • Support the innovative approach of quality interventions programme implementation of (Assessment for Learning, Foundational Literacy and Numeracy, Digital and Distance Learning strategies for emergency contexts).  

Actively participate and engagement with General Education Quality Improvement Programme:

  • Where needed, undertake field visits and surveys, and conduct action research, analysis, advocacy tools and policy briefs to inform and share information with stakeholders to assess progress to improved coordination, planning, monitoring and refer to relevant officials for resolution.
  • Support the Education Specialist to conduct capacity needs assessments and analyze the education systems functionality at regional, woreda and kebele levels, and provide inputs to inform capacity improvement plans and develop training materials as required by UNICEF.

Networking and partnership building:

  • Build and sustain effective close working partnerships with regional government counterparts (College of Teacher Education, Universities, Teacher Associations, Youth and Women’s Association, and Zonal and Woreda Education Offices)  and national stakeholders, including the Ministry of Education and the national education cluster/EiE TWG.
  • Draft communication and information materials for the Education Specialist to promote awareness, establish partnerships and alliances, and support fund raising for education programmes.

Innovation, knowledge management and capacity building:

  • Contribute to identifying, capturing, synthesizing, and sharing lessons learned for knowledge development and capacity development of stakeholders.
  • Apply innovative approaches and promote good practice to support the implementation and delivery of concrete and sustainable programme results.
  • Research and report on best and cutting-edge practices for development planning of knowledge products and systems.
  • Participate as a resource person in capacity building initiatives to enhance the competencies of clients/stakeholders.

Work modalities: 

  • Base: The staff member will be based in the Mekelle Field office in the Tigray region of Ethiopia with required missions to the Shire sub-office for planning/coordination meetings. In addition, the staff member will undertake field monitoring and to affected zones across the region on regular basis.
  • Work arrangements: The staff member will work closely with the Education Specialist (P3) based in Mekelle and the education programme team, in addition to the Education Specialist (NOB) based in Shire, the Country Office Education Programme Staff, as well as child protection programme staff at the field office, sub office and country office level.

To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have:

  • Bachelor's degree in education, psychology, sociology, or another relevant technical field.
  • A minimum of 2 [Two] years of relevant professional experience in programme planning, management, and/or research in education is required.
  • Relevant experience of designing or reviewing curriculum content and education sector planning is considered is desirable.
  • Understanding of key issues and best practice in relation to inclusive education and equity-based education sector planning is an desirable.
  • Relevant experience of designing and implementing accelerated learning modalities and teacher’s capacity building in an emergency context is an asset.
  • Relevant experience of working in UN system is considered as an asset.
  • Experience of working in Tigray region and fluency in local language is considered an asset.
  • Developing country work experience and/or familiarity with emergency is considered an asset.
  • Fluency in English is required. Knowledge of another official UN language (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian or Spanish) or a local language is an asset.

Source: https://jobs.unicef.org/cw/en-us/job/567178