Consultancy - MHPSS Community of Practice Facilitator, ECARO (Home-based)

Consultant Medical & Health Programme & Policy

Contract

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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, care

How can you make a difference?

Purpose of Activity/Assignment:

Supporting UNICEF in Italy in building and maintaining the MHPSS Community of Practices for adolescent and young migrants and refugees.

Background

A UNICEF Migrant and Refugee Response is operational in Italy since 2016, based on official agreements with National Authorities aimed at providing technical support for the protection and social inclusion of refugee and migrant children, families and women. UNICEF is also implementing the third phase of the EU Child Guarantee to counter child poverty and social exclusion of the most at-risk groups of children, including migrant and refugee children.

A two-pronged approach combines humanitarian service delivery with capacity building, policy reform and technical assistance in cooperation with governmental counterparts and civil society. Child Protection is one of the core pillar of the National Response and is focused on 1) promoting minimum child protection standards in border and transit areas, as well as across the reception system; 2) strengthen the system to provide quality mental health and psycho-social support to migrant and refugee children as well as caregivers; 3) promoting family and community-based solutions for unaccompanied and separated children; 4) strengthen the guardianship system for unaccompanied and separated children.

Against this background, UNICEF, on the base of evidence generated through dedicated research, aims at establishing a Community of Good and Promising MHPSS Practices with specific expertise with adolescents and young migrants and refugees. A Community of Practice, CoP, is defined as a group of public and civil organization actors representing different services and methodological perspectives, working in the field of mental health and psychosocial support, exchanging and developing knowledge through systematic discussion, facilitating and systematizing the exchange in order to identify solutions and proposals of specific programmatic and advocacy relevance. The existing CoP includes MHPSS service providers operating in some of the Regions being mostly affected by the migrant influx or being particularly proactive and organized in receiving migrants and refugees (Sicily, Apulia, Latium, Emilia-Romagna, Piedmont, Lombardy), and will be expanded to include practices in other relevant regions in Italy as to gain national representativeness.

Through the CoP, UNICEF aims to:

• Develop a set of agreed minimum quality standards to support adolescent migrants and refugees, including aimed at reinforcing qualified referral mechanisms, and in line with the 6 key factors identified through the research ‘Mental health and psychosocial support services for Unaccompanied and Separated Children and Young Refugees and Migrants in Italy: mapping of good, promising and emerging practices.’
• Promote and improve inter-agency and inter-sectoral coordination, exchange of learning and good practices, encourage technical peer-support among the practices.
• Engage the CoP to create capacity building opportunities for MHPSS professionals working in different settings, both in health, social and educational services as well as reception system for migrant and refugee adolescents and youth, including unaccompanied minors on minimum standards to be guaranteed in order to promote psycho-social wellbeing and mental health.

UNICEF will oversee and coordinate the working group. The CoP will be activated on a monthly basis on an ad hoc issue that can be proposed by both the participants and by UNICEF or by the institutional stakeholders that UNICEF supports within the scope of its operational mandate in Italy (Ministry of Health, Ministry of Labor and Social Policies, Ministry of the Interior, AGIA, etc.…). Exchange between CoP members will mainly take place remotely and will be facilitated by UNICEF. The minutes of the meeting and the operational and advocacy conclusions agreed by the CoP will be systematized in a summary document which will be subjected to revision and integration by all the participants. The results of the consultations will be also shared with the institutional stakeholders that UNICEF supports within its operational mandate in Italy.

The facilitator of the CoP is foreseen to engage, activate, coordinate and follow up with the representatives of MHPSS services members of the CoP with the aim to keep the engagement and put in place a collaborative consultation process within the established network of the Community. The Facilitator cultivates and sustains the community through consultation, encouraging participation, reporting community of practice activity, collecting and sharing evidence of participation and impact, supporting community of practice events (including face-to-face meetings and webinars).

Scope of Work

The CoP facilitator will have the following tasks:

ENCOURAGING PARTICIPATION AND ENGAGEMENT

• Set-up the Community of Practice through the involvement of the identified MHPSS services
• Developing and maintaining consolidate and functional relationships with each MHPSS practice part of the Community, to ensure activities and initiatives are progressed as planned
• Facilitate and support activities for community engagement through preparation, management and follow up of the meetings and activities of the CoP
• Regularly engaging with MHPSS Project Manager to coordinate activities and contents
• Support public communication and visibility of the CoP

COLLECTING, ANALYSING AND SHARING EVIDENCE GENERATING FROM THE MHPSS COMMUNITY OF PRACTICE

• Support the development of technical papers on minimum standards on relevant issues agreed upon by the CoP and concerning the MHPSS for adolescent migrants and refugees
• Detect and capture any relevant issues from different practices that could be elevated as an inter-practice discussion and connected with UNICEF programs and advocacy

SUPPORTING ORGANIZATION OF MEETINGS AND EVENTS (BOTH ONLINE AND IN PRESENCE)

• Organization of 2 in-presence meetings of the CoP
• Organization of 1 in-presence meeting with the Youth Sounding Board

Deliverables

Tasks/Milestone

Deliverables/Outputs:

Timeframe

ENCOURAGING PARTICIPATION AND ENGAGEMENT OF MHPSS SERVICES THE CoP

At least one online meeting of the CoP per month organized along with weekly contacts with the MHPSS practices members

Up to 4 meetings (27 WDs)

Regular preparation and revision of reports after each CoP meeting

9 WDs

Audio-visual contents for communication developed

14 WDs

COLLECTING AND SHARING EVIDENCE OF PARTICIPATION AND IMPACT

Analytical reports of the development and progress of the CoP

Every 3 months

(12 WDs)

3 MHPSS minimum standards technical papers drafted

30 WDs

SUPPORTING ORGANIZATION OF MEETINGS AND EVENTS (BOTH ONLINE AND IN PRESENCE)

Preparation and support for the organization of events and meetings with CoP, both online and in presence (tentatively 2)

Online meeting: 1 per month

In presence meetings: Month 4 and 8

(15 WDs)

Organization of an ad-hoc meeting with the Youth Sounding Board

8 WDs

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

Minimum Qualifications required:

Knowledge/Expertise/Skills required:

• A minimum of 3 years of professional working experience in relevant fields related to community development, national/
• Bachelor's degree in social science, political sciences, communication, psychology, anthropology, international organizations, communication, organization of events
• Proven familiarity with MHPSS international standards
• Experience working in diversified settings, engaging with multiple stakeholders
• Excellent planning, organizational and communication skills
• Excellent written, reading and speaking skills in Italian and English
• Well established experience in minutes taking and reporting Proficiency and proven experience in the use of Microsoft Office suite (e.g. Word, Excel, Power Point)
• Proven experience in the development infographics, online surveys, presentations, organization of webinars
• Good team player

Desired:

• Previous experience with UNICEF or another UN agency.
• Previous professional experience in Child Protection and/or MHPSS programming
• Expertise in community development and stakeholder engagement
• Familiar with the Italian protection and reception system for migrants and refugees

Language:

• Proficiency in written and spoken Italian and English required.

Administrative details:

Supervision

The consultant will work under the supervision of the Child Protection Specialist.

Workplace

This is a consultancy home-based. Candidates are required to have internet connection, IT and communication equipment.

Travel

This consultancy involves an estimated of 5 travels during the assignment.

Duration

The estimate duration of this consultancy is from March - December 2023 (a total of 115 working days).

How to Apply

Application should be submitted online and should include: Resume, Cover Letter and Financial proposal. A financial proposal including the fee for the assignment based on the deliverables and number of days must be submitted. Consultants are asked to stipulate all-inclusive fees, including lump sum travel and subsistence costs, as applicable.

For every Child, you demonstrate…

UNICEF's values of Care, Respect, Integrity, Trust, Accountability, and Sustainability (CRITAS).

To view our competency framework, please visit here.

*****

UNICEF is here to serve the world’s most disadvantaged children and our global workforce must reflect the diversity of those children. The UNICEF family is committed to include everyone, irrespective of their race/ethnicity, age, disability, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, nationality, socio-economic background, or any other personal characteristic.

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:

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

Individuals engaged under a consultancy or individual contract 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 and Individual Contractors. Consultants and individual contractors 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.

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Added 1 year ago - Updated 1 year ago - Source: unicef.org