Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights & Gender Specialist

The Organisation

Plan International is an independent development and humanitarian organisation that advances children’s rights and equality for girls.

We believe in the power and potential of every child. But this is often suppressed by poverty, violence, exclusion and discrimination. And it’s girls who are most affected.

Working together with children, young people, our supporters and partners, we strive for a just world, tackling the root causes of the challenges facing girls and all vulnerable children.

We support children’s rights from birth until they reach adulthood. And we enable children to prepare for – and respond to – crises and adversity. We drive changes in practice and policy at local, national and global levels using our reach, experience and knowledge.

We have been building powerful partnerships for children for over 85 years, and are now active in more than 80 countries.

DIMENSIONS OF THE ROLE

The overarching purpose of the role is to provide technical advice on SRHR and GBV in the Ukraine refugee response in Poland, together with partner organisations.

Plan International global work on sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) has been developing over the past decade and is underpinned by a gender-transformative approach aiming to tackle root causes of gender inequality and shifting unequal power relations that shape the prevailing social and gender norms that control girls’ sexuality.

Our key areas of work on SRHR in the response are:

• Work with health service providers to strengthen access for refugees and vulnerable people to timely, comprehensive SRHR information and services, including contraception and abortion care and prevention and treatment of STIs, with focus on adolescent girls and young women. In particular, strengthen access to clinical management of rape, MHPSS and other GBV services for survivors of SGBV
• Supporting access to comprehensive sexuality education and dialogue that enables adolescents to explore values and attitudes, and build skills and coping mechanisms regarding sex and sexuality, when possible or life skills curricula
• Support girls and young women’s menstrual health and hygiene
• Connect with and support multi-sectoral interventions to prevent and respond to sexual and gender-based violence with focus on child and women survivors, including improved access to clinical SGBV services, MHPSS services and child protection services
• Cash and voucher assistance for SRH services

This also includes advocacy and influencing approaches for providing SRH services to refugees to the fullest extent of the law and working in cooperation with other agencies and partners to provide relevant and timely support. The role will require close collaboration with Plan International colleagues and partners who deliver multisectoral services to support refugee families in Poland (e.g. education, protection, livelihoods and economic opportunities etc.).

In Poland, Plan International is responding through partners and our response is focusing on child protection, mental health and psycho-social support, education and SRHR. The selected candidate will be expected to lead the SRHR response, with focus on supporting local partner organizations to deliver SRH information, education and services to young women and adolescent refugees, including to survivors of sexual violence. The role will be based in Poland with the Poland response as its primary focus, but may include travel in the region at a later stage to support SRHR in all countries where we respond to the Ukraine crisis.

This role is also intended to strengthen the Partner Organisations’ commitment to a safe, responsive and inclusive response, with strong focus on gender equality and social inclusion.

Accountabilities

• Providing technical support on SRHR to Plan International and its partners in support of programme and project design, resource mobilization and implementation, grounded in locally led and gender and inclusion principles.
• Manage current partnerships and develop new ones with local SRHR, GBV in line with Plan International's partnership approach.
• Lead capacity development initiatives for staff and partners on SRHR of adolescents young people and women on gender and gender-based violence.
• Work with Plan International staff and partners to strengthening the integration of SRHR throughout the response.
• Supporting SRHR advocacy and influencing together with partners
• Represent Plan International in relevant coordination bodies (incl. HEALTH; SRHR and GBV sectors), and work closely with the (child) protection and GBV sector to implement strong integrated interventions at facility, community, and referral levels.
• Contributing to global learning, by documenting evidence from programs and sharing best practices with colleagues across the Plan International federation

Location: Warsaw, Poland

Type of Role: Fixed Term contract upto 12 months

Reports to: Programmes & implementation Manager

Grade :15

Closing Date : 30 November 2023

Equality, diversity and inclusion is at the very heart of everything that Plan International stands for.

We want Plan International to reflect the diversity of the communities we work with, offering equal opportunities to everyone regardless of age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex or sexual orientation.

Plan International is based on a culture of inclusivity and we strive to create a workplace environment that ensures every team, in every office, in every country, is rich in diverse people, thoughts, and ideas.

We foster an organisational culture that embraces our commitment to racial justice, gender equality, girls’ rights and inclusion.

Plan International believes that in a world where children face so many threats of harm, it is our duty to ensure that we, as an organisation, do everything we can to keep children safe. This means that we have particular responsibilities to children that we come into contact with and we must not contribute in any way to harming or placing children at risk.

A range of pre-employment checks will be undertaken in conformity with Plan International's Safeguarding Children and Young People policy. Plan International also participates in the Inter Agency Misconduct Disclosure Scheme. In line with this scheme we will request information from applicants previous employers about any findings of sexual exploitation, sexual abuse and/or sexual harassment during employment, or incidents under investigation when the applicant left employment. By submitting an application, the job applicant confirms their understanding of these recruitment procedures.

Please note that Plan International will never send unsolicited emails requesting payment from candidates.