Child Protection and Education that Protects Volunteer Specialist

Details

Mission and objectives

UNICEF is mandated by the United Nations General Assembly to advocate for the protection of children’s rights, to help meet their basic needs and to expand their opportunities to reach their full potential. UNICEF is guided by the Convention on the Rights of the Child and strives to establish children’s rights as enduring ethical principles and international standards of behaviour towards children. The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has been present in Brazil since 1950, supporting the most important changes in childhood and adolescence in the country. UNICEF participated in major immunization and breastfeeding campaigns; the mobilization that resulted in the approval of Article 227 of the Federal Constitution and the drafting of the Child and Adolescent Statute; the movement for universal access to education; programmes to combat child labour; among other great advances in guaranteeing the rights of Brazilian girls and boys. In recent decades, Brazil has promoted a strong process of inclusion of children and adolescents in public policies. However, a significant portion of the population remains excluded. Therefore, in its cooperation programme with the Brazilian Government for the period 2024-2028, UNICEF focuses its efforts on the most vulnerable and excluded girls and boys, with a special focus on children and adolescents who are victims of extreme forms of violence. These children and adolescents in situations of greater vulnerability are spread throughout Brazil, but they are more concentrated in the Amazon, in the Northeast and in large urban centers. Through the UNICEF Seal, UNICEF promotes commitments to guarantee the rights of children and adolescents in the Northeast and in the Amazon regions in Brazil. In large cities, UNICEF works with a focus on reducing intra-municipal inequalities, through the #AgendaCidadeUNICEF.

Context

Since 1950, UNICEF has supported the most important transformation for children and adolescents in Brazil. UNICEF Brazil current Country Programme concentrates efforts towards boys and girls most excluded, vulnerable, and exposed to extreme forms of violence, mainly in the Amazon and Semiarid regions and the peripheral areas of large cities, through the strategies Selo UNICEF and #AgendaCidadeUNICEF. In most recent years, UNICEF programming has also included various emergency responses: in the context of the Venezuelan Migration Crisis in the North of the country, during the Amazonas drought, to address and mitigate the impacts of the COVID pandemic on the most vulnerable children and adolescents, and during the floods that affected the South of Brazil.
Through the child protection programme interventions, psychosocial support activities reached thousands of children and specialized interventions and mobile teams allowed for the identification and referral of hundreds of cases of violence, abuse, and neglect to the Child protection statutory services.
UNICEF Brazil continues to focus its attention on the importance of the right to quality education and access to school to prevent and to protect children from extreme forms of violence. This assignment will contribute to the Education and Child Protection Sections and strengthen its capacity to respond adequately to the needs of UNICEF Country Office in the Amazon region.
The emergency of the COVID-19 pandemic has had grave consequences in terms of access to education and protection. To prevent community contagion, schools remained closed for two years. The measures to contain the epidemic caused great levels of distress as we have seen in the increased number of children in need of protection services. The pandemic has evolved against a backdrop of migration influx from Venezuela, which had started in 2015. The state of Amazonas has experienced steady flow of migrants and refugees from Venezuela. Venezuelans living in the Manaus municipality have reported difficulties in accessing social services and many have turned to begging. Furthermore, more than a half of Venezuelan women reported risks of psychological or sexual violence.
The UN Volunteer will contribute with the development of initiatives conducted by UNICEF within Education and Child Protection integrated framework at the Amazon Territory, aligned with Selo UNICEF strategy and #AgendaCidadeUNICEF in Amazonas.
In that purpose, the UN Volunteer will provide technical and operational support to the planning, articulation, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of activities related to specific strategies or programmes, which include among others: integrated framework Education that Protects against violence, Child Protection strategies, and technical support to Selo UNICEF at EZ Manaus. Complementarily, the UN Volunteer will provide technical support for the implementation of UNICEF’s humanitarian response for migrant/refugee children and adolescents in the states of Amazonas, Rondônia e Acre, and contribute to the support the government authorities and partners and to position children’s and adolescents’ rights in the humanitarian response.

Task description

Under the direct supervision of the Manaus Chief of Field Office and technical coordination with Child Protection and Education national areas, the UN Volunteer will support the development and implementation of UNICEF Brazil Country Programme specially on the education that protects and child protection programme in the Amazon Territory (with focus in Amazonas, Rondônia and Acre States), contributing the following outcomes:
• Provide technical support for the design, implementation, and monitoring of the Education that Protects and Child Protection programs, focusing on advocacy and awareness-raising for violence prevention. Ensure active participation of children in these processes and promote contextualized education and intersectoral policies that enhance their retention in the education system.
• Support the strengthening of local child protection systems (SGD), enhancing their capacity to prevent and respond to violence against children. Ensure that these systems are culturally appropriate and inclusive of indigenous, afro-descendent, and migrant children and adolescents, while promoting knowledge among key stakeholders on the impact of violence.
• Assist in preparing and responding to emergencies by strengthening local systems to ensure the continuity of protection and education for children. Provide technical support to ensure that local systems are equipped to handle crises effectively, maintaining the focus on child protection and education continuity, ensuring that their specific needs are addressed during crises.
• Support the transition from emergency child protection responses to sustainable public policies, bearing in mind the humanitarian-development nexus is crucial to strengthen local services through joint action plans with state and municipal governments.
• Promote awareness about the rights and needs of migrant, indigenous, afro-descendent, and riverside populations, as well as those in urban centers, working to reduce discrimination and xenophobia while supporting access to education for children on the move and those in these diverse communities.