Education Information Management Specialist

Contract

This is a UNV International Specialist contract. This kind of contract is known as International UN Volunteer. It is normally internationally recruited only. More about UNV International Specialist contracts.

Humanitarian action is of fundamental importance to UNICEF and encompasses interventions aimed at saving lives, alleviating suffering, maintaining human dignity, and protecting the rights of affected populations wherever there are humanitarian needs, as well as interventions addressing underlying risks and causes of vulnerability to disasters, fragility and conflict. UNICEF’s humanitarian action is guided by the Core Commitments for Children in Humanitarian Action (CCCs) which set organizational, programmatic and operational commitments and benchmarks against which UNICEF holds itself accountable for the coverage, quality and equity of its humanitarian action and advocacy and which are mandatory for all UNICEF personnel.

Furthermore, UNICEF is committed to support humanitarian coordination through the cluster approach. Introduced as part of the humanitarian reform, the cluster approach, aims at ensuring clear leadership, predictability and accountability in international responses to humanitarian emergencies by clarifying the division of labor among organizations and better defining their roles and responsibilities within the different sectors involved in the response. As a member of the IASC, UNICEF work along with national and local stakeholders (including national and local authorities, CSOs, and communities) to support humanitarian coordination and to improve the collective impact of humanitarian response. Whether the cluster approach is activated or not, UNICEF plays a key role in both global and country-level interagency coordination for its areas of programmatic responsibility. As Cluster Lead Agency (CLA) for Nutrition, WASH, Education (co-led), and Child Protection Area of Responsibility (AoR) within the Protection Cluster, UNICEF is committed to fulfil the core functions defined by the IASC when the clusters are activated or when UNICEF is asked to support sectoral coordination.

A well-run Cluster coordination team, including Information Management (IM), is a formal deliverable of the Cluster Lead Agency and forms a part of the agency’s work. The Education Information Management Specialist is a core member of the Cluster coordination team.

The post holder is responsible for managing and coordinating the information management (IM) function to enable the effective functioning of the Cluster, and the achievement of the core cluster functions, throughout the Humanitarian Programme Cycle in order to facilitate a timely and effective Cluster response.

The postholder's main tasks and responsibilities will include but not be limited to:

The postholder's main tasks and responsibilities will include but not be limited to:

Coordination and representation • As a member of the coordination team, contribute to the effective roll out and monitoring of the core cluster functions (as outlined by the IASC Reference Module) and to the Humanitarian Programme Cycle (HNO, HRP and CCPM), • Represent the Cluster IM function at all levels and coordinate with others within the function to ensure effective communication, reporting and engagement, • Actively engage with other IMs through relevant IMWGs, including participating in and representing the Cluster in the inter-cluster information management working group (IMWG), • Promote harmonized and coordinated approaches to IM across partners, AoRs/ Clusters/ Sectors/ Working Groups and OCHA.

IM function management • Create and implement an IM strategy, data collection and analysis plan that take into account the information needs of stakeholders and that are compliant with standards and protocols for ethical data and information management, • Implement/support regular secondary data reviews and primary data collection including designing questionnaires using appropriate tools, • Conduct data processing including organizing, cleaning, triangulating, evaluating and validating the data, • Analyse data to meet identified information needs of Cluster members and other stakeholders, • Create accurate, quality and timely information products that are in line with agreed style guides, • Disseminate data and information products through appropriate channels, • Maintain and ensure the accessibility of a common and shared secure storage system, • Gather feedback on IM products and use to make improvements.

Needs assessment and analysis • Working collaboratively with other members of the Cluster, contribute to the planning and implementation of education needs assessment and analysis, including joint assessments and analysis, at national and sub-national level, • Work with Cluster participants to identify information gaps, agree and implement ways to bridge those gaps by providing technical support to partners. This includes the collection of information on response modalities and cross-cutting issues such as economic needs, markets, price monitoring, disability, protection and gender issues to support a comprehensive understanding of issues affecting education, • Analyse needs assessment data to provide required information for the HNO including estimating People in Need (PIN), • Compare and align joint needs analysis findings with other AoRs/ Clusters/ Sectors/ Working Groups and participate in developing reports.

Strategic response planning • Design and implement partner presence mapping, • Contribute to the strategic planning, response prioritization and development of the Humanitarian Response Plan (HRP) or other response plans as relevant (formulation of objectives, indicators and targets, prioritizing response modalities and activities, identifying and quantifying inputs and the curation of data).

Resource mobilization • Monitor and analyse the Cluster’s financial situation and support financial tracking on the Financial Tracking Service (FTS), • Support and advocate with Cluster partners for financial reporting on the Financial Tracking Service (FTS), • Support evidence-based advocacy and resource mobilization by providing accurate, relevant and timely data, information and information products.

Implementation and monitoring • Develop, implement and maintain a Cluster monitoring plan and associated databases, including a response monitoring (3/4/5Ws) database, • Ensure the Cluster monitoring plan, and 3/4/5Ws include programme delivery modalities (in-kind, cash, voucher and services), • Support Cluster members to contribute timely and quality periodic monitoring reports on Cluster and OCHA platforms, • Conduct quantitative and qualitative gap and coverage analysis to identify gaps, overlaps and coverage of the Cluster humanitarian response, • Monitor adherence to relevant sector quality standards, regulations and codes.

Operational peer review and evaluation • Lead the annual Cluster Coordination Performance Monitoring (CCPM) exercise and annual review, • Contribute to sectoral and broader humanitarian evaluations.

Accountability to affected people • Be accountable to affected populations by maintaining an effective feedback mechanism and handling complaints appropriately, by ensuring data about the most vulnerable is systematically collected and analysed, • Ensure the inclusion of cross cutting issues (age, child protection, disability, gender, gender-based violence (GBV) mitigation and response and HIV & AIDS) in Cluster data collection, analysis and dissemination, • Adhere to child safeguarding and PSEA policies including procedures for challenging Strengthen national and local capacity • Take steps to strengthen local and national leadership and capacity by encouraging participation of local and national actors in the IM activities of the Cluster and providing support to partners to overcome technical and operational challenges in participating in IM activities, • Design and implement an IM capacity assessment and capacity development plan for Cluster partners.

• Care • Respect • Integrity • Trust • Accountability • Nurtures, Leads and Manages People (1) • Demonstrates Self Awareness and Ethical Awareness (2) • Works Collaboratively with Others (2) • Builds and Maintains Partnerships (2) • Innovates and Embraces Change (2) • Thinks and Acts Strategically (2) • Drives to Achieve Impactful Results (2) • Manages Ambiguity and Complexity (2)

A minimum of 3 years of professional experience in information management, data management, geographical information systems, assessments, situation analysis and/or PM&E with the UN and/or NGO is required.

Experience of demonstrating very strong information management skills in a professional context is essential for this post.

Experience in a humanitarian context is required, with experience of working in the humanitarian coordination system considered an asset.

Extensive work experience outside the humanitarian sector which is relevant to this post may be considered as a replacement for humanitarian experience.

CAR is a post-conflict country. From 2013, a bloody conflict between the Seleka and the Anti Balaka armed groups, over almost the entire territory of the country. Fearing the risk of genocide, the United Nations decided to send peacekeepers to the country, to protect civilians and restore peace.

The clashes having ended, entire areas of the country are always occupied by armed groups which continue to commit abuses against populations. Following the Political Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation signed on February 6, 2018 between the 14 Armed Groups and the Government of CAR, the State started to deploy its services, in particular the Armed Forces, the police, the gendarmerie, justice in several regions of the country.

The CAR has only one international airport (Bangui M’poko) which provides all air links with the outside and regions of the country. There are aerodromes in the 16 capitals of each Prefecture and in some of sub-prefectures. The road network is very poor, since there is only one main road that connects CAR to Cameroon which is paved.

Two seasons alternate the climate in CAR. A dry season and a rainy season spread over 6 months each. The most feared disease is malaria, which kills many people every year.

The hotel network is experiencing increasing growth but is still very expensive. In terms of food, there is a wide variety of local and imported products in Bangui and in some of cities of the country. But access to these products is different in parts of the country. All these difficulties make the cost of living more expensive. It is the same for services like banks, hospitals, electricity etc. which access is very limited and concentrated only in Bangui the capital.