consultant; Partnerships and reporting. Req # 569654

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. 

And we never give up. 

For every child, LOVE

Vacancy Announcement: Consultant

Consultancy Title: Partnerships and reporting consultant

Section/Division/Duty Station: Education Section – PG – NYHQ

Duration: 1 March 2024 – 31 December 2025

Home/ office Based: REMOTE

About UNICEF

If you are a committed, creative professional and are passionate about making a lasting difference for children, the world’s leading children’s rights organization would like to hear from you. For 70 years, UNICEF has been working on the ground in 190 countries and territories to promote children’s survival, protection, and development. The world’s largest provider of vaccines for developing countries, UNICEF supports child health and nutrition, good water and sanitation, quality basic education for all boys and girls, and the protection of children from violence, exploitation, and AIDS. UNICEF is funded entirely by the voluntary contributions of individuals, businesses, foundations, and governments. UNICEF has over 12,000 staff in more than 145 countries.

BACKGROUND

Purpose of Activity/Assignment:

Safe to Learn is a global initiative launched in 2019 to catalyse commitments and evidence-based action to end violence in and through schools by 2030.  Safe to Learn brings together a powerful coalition of partners from education, child protection, health, gender, and social and behaviour change. Together, Safe to Learn partners leverage each other’s strengths and unique expertise to ensure that every child can learn safely. Safe to Learn works to prevent and respond to violence in and around schools to improve learning outcomes and better leverage investments in education towards violence prevention and response. To accelerate action towards this shared mission, Safe to Learn partners developed a 3-year Strategy (2021-2024) to develop an ecosystem for at-scale change and embed violence prevention in education systems at the country level.

The Safe to Learn Secretariat provides technical guidance and knowledge generation and management for use by the various stakeholders, particularly field practitioners. Safe to Learns mission is to leverage the role of the education sector in preventing and responding to violence against children in and around schools recognizing that violence against children must be addressed in all settings and support high quality and effective interventions across the humanitarian-development-peace nexus.  As of 2023 based on an Advisory Board decision to move Safe to Learn to an education partner Safe to Learn transitioned to UNICEF Education Programme Group in New York. 

The Education team does not have funding to cover all planned activities that continue until the end of 2025. Based on business needs, some deliverables may be completed if additional resources become available.

Scope of Work:

The overall goal of this consultancy is to support the implementation of the STL strategy and mandate including maintaining STL partnerships, donor relations and grants management, work plan development, and supporting the implementation of joint programming in regions and countries and building synergies across the coalition of partners. The consultant will work within the Safe to Learn Secretariat under the overall guidance of the Safe to Learn Global Coordinator and collaborate closely with Safe to Learn partners and UNICEF Education, Child Protection and Social and Behaviour Change staff.

Terms of Reference / Key Deliverables:

Task 1 Support the Safe to Learn Secretariat on partnership, planning, and governance. 

• 4 PPTs and meeting outcome reports delivered by 31 Dec 2024
• 4 PPTs and meeting outcome reports delivered by 31 Dec 2025
• 2 PPTs and meeting outcome reports delivered by 31 Dec 2024
• 2 PPTs and meeting outcome reports delivered by 31 Dec 2025
• 4-6 ppts and 4-6 sets of talking points delivered by 31 Dec 2024
• 4-6 ppts and 4-6 sets of talking points delivered by 31 Dec 2025
• Partnership and resource mobilisation strategy developed and updated by 31 Dec2024.
• Partnership and resource mobilisation strategy updated by 31 Dec 2025
• 2024 annual work plan developed, and lessons learned documented by 1 Apr 2024
• 2025 annual work plan updated, and lessons learned documented by 31 Jan 2025

Task 2 Support resource mobilisation, donor relations, and grants management

• Centralised platform for donor engagement delivered and updated 2 times per year by 31 Mar 2024
• Centralised platform for donor engagement updated 2 times per year by 31 Dec 2025
• Implementation actions relating to partnerships documented and actioned for 10 working group meetings by 31 Dec 2024
• Implementation actions related to partnerships documented and actioned for 10 working group meetings by 31 Dec 2025
• Central system for STL grants monitoring developed and updated 2 times per year by 31 Dec 2024
• Central system for STL grants monitoring updated 2 times per year by 31 Dec 2025
• Minimum 2 new partnerships identified and established by 31 Dec 2024
• Minimum 2 new partnerships identified and established by 31 Dec 2025
• Minimum 4 donor proposals/ concept notes delivered; 1 donor roundtable organized by 31 Dec 2024
• Minimum 4 donor proposals/ concept notes delivered; 1 donor roundtable organized by 31 Dec 2025

Task 3 Monitoring and learning relating country engagement and joint programming.

• 4 knowledge exchange/ lessons learned webinars completed and outcomes documented in 1 synthetised learning report including on adaption of approaches and implementation by 31 Dec 2024.
• 4 knowledge/exchange lessons learned webinars completed and outcomes documented in 1 synthesised report including on adaption of approaches and implementation by 31 Dec 2025
• Learning strategy developed, 8 buddy pairs set up by 31 Dec 2024.
• 8 additional buddy pairs set up by 31 December 2025

Task 4 Reporting and knowledge management

• 1 annual donor report prepared by 31 Dec 2024
• 1 annual donor report prepared by 31 Dec 2025
• 1 annual STL report prepared against the work plan by 31 Dec 2024
• 1 annual STL report prepared against the work plan  31 Dec 2025
• 4 repository updates are implemented by 31 Dec 2024
• 4 repository updates are implemented by 31 Dec 2025
• 2 Safe to Learn Strategy sessions organized and 1 report developed by 31 Jul 2025

Qualifications

Education:

Master’s degree – Education, pedagogy/andragogy, social work, social sciences, violence prevention, public affairs, human rights/humanitarian law, or other relevant disciplines.

Work experience:

• At least 5 years of experience in the field of education, violence prevention, partnership management and coordination, or EiE/humanitarian affairs.
• Experience working with coordination groups, governments, and other key education and child protection stakeholders/actors at global level.
• Previous experience with Safe to Learn including knowledge of the Safe to Learn coalition and technical tools is an asset.
• Experience of working in a highly collaborative and complex environment with minimal direct supervision
• A clear understanding of Safe to Learn and its mission.
• An excellent understanding of the field of violence against children, including the work of STL, UNICEF, UNESCO, UNGEI, End Violence Partnership, CSO Forum, Global Partnership for Education, Education Cannot Wait, and others.

Competencies/Knowledge:

• A clear understanding and knowledge of partnership strategies, experience working on projects or programmes focusing on violence prevention in schools, child protection or education.
• Demonstrate expertise in relationship management and coordination of diverse partners working together on a specific goal or outcome.
• Excellent communication skills, demonstrate expertise in writing reports, donor proposals and grant proposals.
• A commitment to excellence & attention to detail
• Ability to work well and punctually under pressure.
• Excellent interpersonal skills, with the ability to successfully interact with a diverse group of people and build consensus.
• Flexible work attitude, with the ability to follow direction and work independently across a virtual work environment.
• Excellent organizational skills, with the ability to independently track and follow-up on various tasks.
• Collaborative work style, with strong team-player attitude and ability to identify gaps and to take initiative to fill them.

Requirements:

Completed profile in UNICEF’s e-Recruitment system and

• Upload copy of academic credentials
• Financial proposal that will include/ reflect:
  • the costs per each deliverable and the total lump-sum for the whole assignment (in US$) to undertake the terms of reference.
  • travel costs and daily subsistence allowance, if internationally recruited or travel is required as per TOR.
  • Any other estimated costs: visa, health insurance, and living costs as applicable.
  • Indicate your availability.
• Any emergent / unforeseen duty travel and related expenses will be covered by UNICEF.
• At the time the contract is awarded, the selected candidate must have in place current health insurance coverage.
• Payment of professional fees will be based on submission of agreed satisfactory deliverables. UNICEF reserves the right to withhold payment in case the deliverables submitted are not up to the required standard or in case of delays in submitting the deliverables on the part of the consultant.

U.S. Visa information:

With the exception of the US Citizens, G4 Visa and Green Card holders, should the selected candidate and his/her household members reside in the United States under a different visa, the consultant and his/her household members are required to change their visa status to G4, and the consultant’s household members (spouse) will require an Employment Authorization Card (EAD) to be able to work, even if he/she was authorized to work under the visa held prior to switching to G4.  

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process

For every Child, you demonstrate…

UNICEF’s core values of Commitment, Diversity and Integrity and core competencies in Communication, Working with People and Drive for Results. View our competency framework at: Here

UNICEF offers reasonable accommodation for consultants/individual contractors with disabilities. This may include, for example, accessible software, travel assistance for missions or personal attendants. We encourage you to disclose your disability during your application in case you need reasonable accommodation during the selection process and afterwards in your assignment. 

UNICEF has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UNICEF, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination. UNICEF also adheres to strict child safeguarding principles. All selected candidates will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles and will therefore undergo rigorous reference and background checks. Background checks will include the verification of academic credential(s) and employment history. Selected candidates may be required to provide additional information to conduct a background check. 

Remarks:  

Individuals engaged under a consultancy will not be considered “staff members” under the Staff Regulations and Rules of the United Nations and UNICEF’s policies and procedures and will not be entitled to benefits provided therein (such as leave entitlements and medical insurance coverage). Their conditions of service will be governed by their contract and the General Conditions of Contracts for the Services of Consultants. Consultants are responsible for determining their tax liabilities and for the payment of any taxes and/or duties, in accordance with local or other applicable laws. 

The selected candidate is solely responsible to ensure that the visa (applicable) and health insurance required to perform the duties of the contract are valid for the entire period of the contract. Selected candidates are subject to confirmation of fully-vaccinated status against SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) with a World Health Organization (WHO)-endorsed vaccine, which must be met prior to taking up the assignment. It does not apply to consultants who will work remotely and are not expected to work on or visit UNICEF premises, programme delivery locations or directly interact with communities UNICEF works with, nor to travel to perform functions for UNICEF for the duration of their consultancy contracts.