Health Promoting Schools initiatives

1. Purpose of consultancy WHO is seeking to engage a national expert to support the process of adapting the Global Standards for Health Promoting Schools in Jordan through documenting the outputs of a needs assessment, landscape analysis, and national priorities.

2. Background WHO and UNESCO launched a new initiative “Making Every School a Health-Promoting School” in 2018 and developed Global Standards for Health Promoting Schools along with an implementation guide and other advocacy materials. The initiative is expected to serve over 2.3 billion school-age children and will contribute to WHO's 13th General Programme of Work’s target of achieving “1 billion lives made healthier” by 2023 and to the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals in the field of education and health. Health Promoting Schools have been recognized as a strategic vehicle to promote positive development and healthy behaviors such as physical activity, physical fitness, recreation and play, balanced nutrition, preventing tobacco use, preventing being bullied, and creating an enabling environment for teaching and learning. To accelerate global progress, a standards-driven approach towards the implementation of the recommendation that “every school should be a health-promoting school” is developed to support country implementation.

3. Work to be performed

Output1. Conduct landscape analysis by mapping existing policies, legislation, capacity, resources, and relevant stakeholders within the country related to school health and school-linked children and adolescent health programs and initiatives, to assess the situation per each of the eight HPS domains (by 1 March 2024):

o Existing interventions, programs, legislation, policies, and projects that address student/child & adolescent health and development including current interventions at schools and those that could be adopted at the school settings, as well as the results and outcomes of these initiatives and their alignment with the evidence base in what works in school setting;

o What is being done by the government, NGOs, and civil society organizations to address inequities and respond to social, economic, and other determinants of student/children & adolescents’ health problems;

o stakeholders and organizations involved in these programs and activities at the national and subnational level, and what each is doing and planning to do in the near future;

o how students/adolescents are involved in these initiatives;

o existing and potential sources of financing.

· Deliverable 1.1. Mapping existing policies, legislation, capacity, resources

· Deliverable 1.2. Desk review of relevant reports and documents

· Deliverable 1.3. Mapping of relevant stakeholders in coordination with the Ministry of Health and the World Health Organization.

· Deliverable 1.4. Conduct interviews and/or focus groups with key stakeholders from the education, health, and other sectors, and UN agencies guided by the Health Promoting School assessment tool to inform the landscape analysis (by 28 February 2023).

Output 2. Draft a report summarizing the analysis of the situation with regards to school health containing background, analysis of the key health and wellbeing problems in school-age children, barriers for students to access services, and inequalities between subgroups of students, the landscape analysis, conclusions about gaps between needs and current programs and activities and propose recommendations based on the findings (by 15 March 2023).

· Deliverable 2.1. Finalize a draft report and presentation of key findings

Output 3. Finalize a situation analysis that is validated and endorsed by key stakeholders.

· Deliverable 3.1. Plan and facilitate a national workshop with the aim to complement and validating the findings of the situation analysis (by 15 March)

· Deliverable 3.2. Finalize after the workshop, and based on stakeholders’ inputs the situation analysis and the recommendations based on the findings (by 30 March)

4. Qualifications, experience, skills and languages

Educational Qualifications:

Master’s degree in medical sciences, public health, social sciences or a relevant field

Experience:

· Essential: 7 years experience working in developing school health/adolescent and youth health policies and strategies in developing countries.

· Desirable: experience in WHO or another international public health organization or experience in working in government policy making and implementation at a senior level.

Skills/Technical skills and knowledge:

· Working with fellow professionals and excellent communication skills

· Analysis of problematic areas and providing applicable solution-focused recommendations

· Report-writing skills

· Proficiency in Microsoft Office and Microsoft Project

· Excellent interpersonal and professional skills in interacting with government and development partners.

· Skills in facilitation of stakeholder engagements/workshops.

· Evidence of having undertaken similar assignments.

Languages and levels required: Expert level in English and Arabic.

5. Location

Amman, Jordan

6. Planned timelines (Subject to confirmation)

30 working days consultancy

Start date: 15 February 2024

End date: 30 April 31 2024

7. Medical clearance

The selected Consultant will be expected to provide a medical certificate of fitness for work.

8. Travel

The Consultant is not expected to travel.

Additional Information

· This vacancy notice may be used to identify candidates for other similar consultancies at the same level.

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