Individual Consultant for formal education (Nepalese Nationals only)

Contract

This is a Consultancy contract. More about Consultancy contracts.

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, education.

The School Education Sector Plan (SESP) is developed to facilitate the country’s long-term goal and ambitions for education within the highly decentralized institutional setup in the sector that emerged over the past years in line with the Nepal 2015 Constitution. One of the major objectives of the SESP is to ensure equitable access to a full cycle of quality education for all children, including those from socially and economically disadvantaged groups and children with disabilities. As per the provisions in Nepal’s Constitution, a federal system has been established comprising of federal, provincial, and local tiers of government. In the course of establishing a legal basis to facilitate the enactment of exclusive and shared powers under the mandates of the federal government, seven provincial and 753 Local Governments (LGs), the 2018 Compulsory and Free Education Act and 2020 Compulsory and Free Education related Rules have been introduced, with the 2019 National Education Policy providing guidelines for key functions and provision of services across the respective government tiers.

There have been several guidelines and documents developed by the Government to facilitate the LGs in undertaking their new roles and responsibilities. These include the National Planning Commission guidelines to provide the local levels with necessary knowledge, information, technology, and technical support in the formulation of development plans, which have been disseminated through the Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration (MOFAGA) and the more recent MOFAGA local level planning guidelines. In addition to this, the SESP further elaborates on enabling LGs to undertake key functions (analysis, planning, budgeting, implementation, monitoring, evaluation) of education services delivered at local level.

Although Nepal has made significant progress in improving access to schools and achieving universal primary education, there are still thousands of children out of school across the country. In 2020, the gross enrolment rates for grades one to five, had increased to 119.3 per cent, however, this decreased slightly in 2021 (118.2). This progress is unevenly distributed with the majority of the out-of-school children belonging to disadvantaged ethnic and caste groups, particularly girls and children with disabilities. At the beginning of 2020, a shocking 8.4 per cent of students in grade 5 could only meet the grade-level reading proficiency as defined by the Government , and the average score of these students on numeracy was 37.2 per cent, with some provinces (Karnali and Sudurpachhim Provinces) scoring an average as low as 25 per cent (ERO, 2020). Weaknesses in access, ethnic diversity and multiple spoken languages in communities and the quality of teaching have been further exacerbated by the extended school closures due to the COVID-19 pandemic, giving rise to worrying learning losses among the country’s most disadvantaged children. Initial analysis of pre and post Covid data done by ERO, identified an overall loss of 26% across all five core subjects which include numeracy and litereacy skills. It should be noted that this would be proportionally higher for vulnerable groups like children from remote communities who had little or no access to alternative learning opportunities during school closures and children with disabilities.

As the country seeks to recover the learning losses experienced by children during the pandemic and address the broader learning crisis, it is incumbent on all tiers of government to identify appropriate learning recovery strategies in the short term. The Government in partnership with UNICEF and other education development partners has developed and initiated the School Education Sector Plan (SESP; 2022-2027), which includes the implementation of the Recovery and Accelerated Learning (ReAL) Plan to facilitate an inclusive recovery of learning loss through need-based and targeted accelerated and remedial learning programs.

As part of the joint support to the government, the EU, Finland and UNICEF have agreed on a common action to provide technical assistance to support the Government in the adaptation of the 2010 child-friendly school framework, aligning it with the Pre-primary/Basic/Secondary Learning Conditions (PPLCs/BLCs/SLCs) that schools are envisioned to meet during the SESP implementation period. For this, the current framework will be translated into a municipal level Child Friendly System (CFS), including minimum standards for enabling conditions at school and local government level to inform the local government education planning and budgeting process, and the School Improvement Plan (SIP) development, along with the development/alignment of mechanisms to monitor

This action primarily contributes to the Government’s ambition to meet the Sustainable Development Goal 4 targets by 2030, in terms of ensuring inclusive access for all to quality education and learning outcomes. It furthermore has a strong cross-cutting focus on gender equality, social inclusion and climate change adaptation and mitigation.

How can you make a difference?

The consultant will support the joint EU-UNICEF-Finland action to support the Government of Nepal in ensuring adequate capacity at all levels to implement the SESP and provide inclusive action to quality education. Specifically, the consultant will provide administrative and technical support to:

• Local government responsible officers and decision makers and ensure they have the capacity and mechanisms to plan, budget, model, implement and monitor quality education sector plans
• 150 local governments to benchmark their education plans against the SESP strategies and program result framework targets.
• 45 local governments to ensure minimum enabling conditions are met under the Child Friendly System (CFS+) framework
• 45 local governments to ensure activities under the Recovery and Accelerated Learning (ReAL) plan is implemented effectively

Scope of work

• Liaise with the implementing partners and CEHRD to ensure timely revision of the CFS framework
• Provide technical and administrative support to CEHRD to conduct workshops and brainstorming sessions at different levels to revise and finalize the revised framework
• Disseminate drafted/updated document within UNICEF team members. Ensure comments/feedback from other sectoral colleagues, field offices are received and prepare consolidated feedback from UNICEF.
• Work closely with field offices and implementing partners to ensure local governments have received updated CFS minimum standards
• Provide technical inputs to, observe and monitor the LG training sessions on development of education plans
• Follow up with local governments to ensure local level education plans are budgeted and signed off within deadlines
• Work closely with the selected schools to ensure SIPs are developed on time and are based on CFS standards
• Provide technical support to provincial and local governments to implement ReAL plan
• Monitor activities and document evidence that includes at least one human interest story/case study per quarter

Task

• Liaise with NCO, FO, CEHRD and partners to develop an implementation plan and timelines on the review of the CFS framework
• Liaise with NCO, FO, CEHRD and partners to develop a communication and dissemination plan for the CFS framework
• Provide technical input to the revision of the CFS framework
• Attend brainstorming sessions on the review of the CFS framework
• Review timelines in liaison with CEHRD and partners on review of CFS
• Provide technical input to the training resources on development of local level SESP
• Develop a quarterly progress report
• Liaise with implementing partners and FCO to finalise timelines for provincial and local level dissemination sessions
• Finalise training plans for local level SESP
• Develop quarterly progress report
• Facilitate provincial (min 2 provinces) and local level (50% of target LGs) dissemination sessions on the CFS framework.
• Co-facilitate LG training sessions on local level SESP development
• Observe and monitor training sessions
• Develop at least one Human Interest Story/case study
• Develop quarterly progress report
• Facilitate provincial (remaining 2 provinces) and local level (remaining target LGs) dissemination sessions on the CFS framework
• Co-facilitate LG training sessions on local level SESP development
• Support LGs to implement ReAL plan
• Observe and monitor training sessions
• Develop at least one Human Interest Story/case study
• Develop final report

First Deliverable

• Submission of Implementation plan
• Submission of Communication and dissemination plan
• Submission of draft revised CFS framework
• Quarterly progress report

Second Deliverable

• Submission of revised timelines
• Finalized training resources
• Submission of final timelines for dissemination sessions
• Submission of plans for local level SESP training
• Submission of Quarterly progress report

Third Deliverable

• Submission of event completion reports
• Submission of training/visit reports
• Submission of minimum one HIS
• Submission of quarterly progress report

Fourth Deliverable

• Submission of event completion reports
• Submission of training/visit reports
• Submission of minimum one HIS
• Submission of progress report

Duration: The duration of the contract is for 11 months tentatively starting from 01 November 2023

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

Minimum Qualifications required:

Masters

Advanced university degree in Education or social sciences or discipline relevant to equity and inclusion.

Knowledge/Expertise/Skills required:

• A minimum of 5 years of experience working for education projects
• Familiar with the education context of Nepal including all federal structures
• Sound knowledge of government education policies and plans including SESP and ReAL plan
• Sound foundational learning activities, acceleration of learning approach, learning continuation campaigns and disability inclusive education
• Excellent communication, coordination, and rapport building skills including the ability to facilitate diverse groups (Government, CSOs, Technical Expert)
• Strong working knowledge of Nepali and English
• Experience in the capacity building of partners at the national, regional, and district levels

Skills required:

• Strategic thinking, analytical skill, high-level coordination, networking, and facilitation skills.
• Understanding on gender transformative programming and readiness to strengthen this competency through trainings once recruited.

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 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 the health insurance required to perform the duties of the contract are valid for the entire period of the contract.

Note: Qualified females and candidates from under-represented ethnic group in Nepal are encouraged to apply.