National Consultant - Learning Passport Platform Initiative at the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF)

United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (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.

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job Title: National Consultant - Support Coordination and Implementation of Learning Passport Platform Initiative (11.5 months)

Job no: 538277
Location: Nigeria
Contract Type: Consultancy
Level: Consultancy
Categories: Education, Monitoring and Evaluation, Planning, Consultancy, Programme Management

Purpose of Activity / Assignment
The Learning Passport, a partnership between UNICEF, Microsoft, Cambridge, and supported by the Boston Consulting Group, has been established to, 1) provide local, contextualized content with a supplementary library of global content, mapped together via research by Cambridge; 2) provide a platform to serve this content to children and youth online or offline, via a platform being developed by Microsoft, and 3) with an individualized record of learning for a user, that is portable across physical and digital borders. The Learning passport, as an extraordinary emergency response, will create country-level sites available that would like to make access to curriculum and learning materials available for students with connectivity both at school and at home.

The envisioned digital platform aims to enhance continued engagement with families and parents on learning at home by providing practical resources and materials that can be applied in home settings. The envisioned digital platform aims to enhance continued engagement with families and parents on learning at home by providing practical resources and materials that can be applied in home settings. Its second aim is to strengthen professional development opportunities and facilitate collaboration between educators at preschool, primary and secondary education levels, and other staff on sharing ideas, best practices and activities that can be implemented in schools.

COVID-19 pandemic presents a unique challenge for Nigeria’s education system and the emerging situation is going to transform the way public education is being delivered ever before. With this new normal, education system both private and public is being prepared to deliver blended form of classroom- both face-to-face and through using online digital platforms. In Nigeria, there have been efforts by governments, private sector and key education stakeholders to promote continued learning and bridge potential learning gaps. These efforts range from large-scale, low tech solutions that do not require internet-enabled devices (radio and television), to high tech alternatives (virtual classrooms, video conferencing, animated lessons and online resources libraries) that require internet-enabled devices.

In short, while the key focus of this initiative is learning, quality and portability for children whose education has been disrupted by emergencies, the medium and long-term goal is to help establish a quality system of online and offline education, collaboration and support to children and parents.

How can you make a difference?
Under the overall supervision of the UNICEF Nigeria Education programme section, the guidance of Learning Passport Global Program Manager, and in close cooperation with Director ICT of the Federal Ministry of Education, Nigeria, an individual consultant is required to provide the following services:

Learning Passport Platform Coordination and Management:

• Lead the deployment of Learning Passport Platform and serve as key focal point and liaison among all key actors, including the CO, HQ, WCARO and the Federal Ministry of Education.
• Act as a National Team Lead consultant who will be responsible for the coordination of the teamwork and timely submission of deliverables;
• Create and manage a Learning Passport Platform community among UNICEF staff, the Ministry of Education, central educational institutions and other relevant national partners engaged in deployment, producing knowledge management resources and organizing activities to ensure collaboration among members of the community and documenting lessons learned, challenges, and good practices.
• Serves as lead for programme design and user experience.
• Provide on-the-ground support to users (learners, teachers, parents) and stakeholders at key moments of engagement.
• Scope complementary ICT for learning and Edtech tools that could be integrated to support Learning Passport-related technology efforts, in coordination with Instructional/curriculum experts and IT consultant.
• Lead, coordinate and supervise the mapping of the digital curriculum available at the national level and international levels, and propose and supervise necessary adaptations
• Establish and maintain regular consultations with relevant national and international actors in relation to platform development and content development/curation
• Provide guidance from both short and long-term perspectives to the process of Learning Passport platform deployment and content development for all education levels, professional teacher development and non-formal education.
• Provide inputs and support the drafting of reports to internal and external stakeholders and funders of the Learning Passport.
• Coordinate and supervise the work of the Learning Passport national team.

Support Coordination with National and International Stakeholders:

• Maintains regular communication with UNICEF Country office and Global Learning Passport manager.
• Maintains regular communication with all relevant national counterparts, including civil society, academia, and institutions
• Shares best practices between Learning Passport participating countries and other countries in the region with similar efforts.

Key Deliverables
Learning Passport Platform coordination and management:   

• Learning Passport platform deployed
• Content developed/adapted for all education levels, non-formal education, and teacher training
• Support provided to users (teachers, students, parents) at key moments of engagement
• Coordination and supervision of the Learning Passport team conducted
• Facilitate and conduct a digitalization orientation programme for SUBEB
• Monthly monitoring progress report on implementation and operationalization of digital  learning platform

Support coordination with national and international stakeholders:

• Maintains regular communication with UNICEF Country office and Global Learning Passport manager.
• Maintains regular communication with all relevant national counterparts, including civils society, academia, and institutions
• Shares best practices between Learning Passport participating countries and other countries in the region with similar efforts.

Other activities needed to support the purpose of this contract:

• Logistics support provided for meetings/interviews/focus groups with actors and stakeholders
• Other relevant support provided as per need

Deliverables - Timelines:

• Month wise plan for the deployment of Learning passport, progress report, meeting minutes, content materials developed for primary classes - 15 April 2021
• Finalization of user testing instruments and their administration and reports, Website and content materials identified and uploaded, progress report - 15 May 2021
• Learning passport platform prepared, hosted and running, progress update report - 15 June 2021
• Class-wise learning materials mapped and upgraded materials uploaded, monthly progress report - 15 July 2021
• Monitoring reports and Ground support report – users (learners, teachers and administrators), monthly progress report - 15 August 2021
• Dissemination report of learning passport usability, challenges, and plan for upscaling to other 12 states - 15 Sept 2021
• Plan and design for 12 states Learning passport - 15 Oct 2021
• Materials, website and platform ready and running for additional 4 states - 15 Nov 2021
• Materials, website and platform ready and running for additional 4 states - 15 Dec 2021
• Materials, website and platform ready and running for additional 4 states - 15 Jan 2022
• Final report, process documentation, Human interest story - 15 Feb 2022

Requirements
To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have:

• An advanced university degree (Master's or higher) in IT, Education, Educational Technology, Child Development, Social or Natural Sciences or another relevant field.
• At least five years of professional work experience in IT development, education technology, formal and non-formal education, teacher training, e-learning and distance learning.
• At least two years of proven experience in project management/programme coordination, involving multiple stakeholders.
• Excellent knowledge of information management systems.
• A first University Degree in a relevant field combined with two additional years of professional experience may be accepted in lieu of an Advanced University Degree.

 Other Competencies:

• Demonstrated ability and experience in coordination and supervision is required.
• Ability to work under pressure.
• Excellent communication abilities, in both written and oral forms.  The consultant should be at ease in presentations and meetings.
• Demonstrated ability to work in a multicultural environment and to establish harmonious and effective relationships both within and outside the organization, more specifically with the Ministry of Education and other educational institutions.
• Knowledge of the situation of children and adolescents in Nigeria.

All applicants will be screened against the qualifications and requirements set above. Candidates fully meeting all the requirements will be further evaluated based on the criteria below:

• Technical Criteria - Interview – 70 % of total evaluation– max. 70 points:
  • Education: 20 points
  • Previous experience: 25 points
  • Technical questions at the interview: 25 point
  • Only candidates who obtained at least 70% of points from the technical part (who will score at least 49 points) will be qualified for consideration for financial proposal evaluation.
• Financial Criteria - 30 % of total evaluation – max. 30 points.

For every Child, you demonstrate:

• UNICEF's values of Care, Respect, Integrity, Trust, and Accountability (CRITA)
• To view our competency framework, please visit here.

Application Closing Date
4th March, 2021. W. Central Africa Standard Time.