Country: Germany
Closing date: 25 Dec 2016
Background
The International Rescue Committee (IRC) responds to the world's worst humanitarian crises and helps people to survive and rebuild their lives. Founded in 1933 at the request of Albert Einstein, the IRC offers lifesaving care and life-changing assistance to refugees forced to flee from war or disaster. At work today in over 40 countries and 22 U.S. cities, we restore safety, dignity and hope to millions who are uprooted and struggling to endure. The IRC delivers education programs in 22 conflict-affected or post-conflict countries around the world. The IRC's educational interventions strive to help children and youth gain valuable skills and knowledge that will increase their opportunities and life chances, and contribute to their well-being and livelihood. The IRC supports formal and non-formal learning activities that lead to tangible learning outcomes and promotes the protection and psychosocial well-being of conflict-affected children and youth.
The IRC has been responding to the refugee crisis in Europe since June 2015, initially on the Greek island of Lesvos and today across Greece and the Balkans, providing support to Middle East and North Africa refugees who have been stranded by recent border closures or who are at risk of exploitation from smugglers. Alongside the delivery of emergency response programs, IRC is starting to deploy technical resources to support European governments and civil society organizations in the longer-term process of integration for refugees. These efforts build on IRC's long experience working in the US on resettlement and integration.
Germany received more than 1.3 million asylum seekers since the start of 2015, and is now facing the challenge as it works to address the short and long-term needs of asylum seekers across the country. The IRC has identified opportunities to provide technical assistance through tools, training, technical expertise, and interaction with organizations in Germany. This is a new approach for the IRC and will draw on expertise across the organization, including our international programs and US resettlement and integration.
Scope of Work:
The Education Specialist will provide strategic direction and vision to the IRC's education programming as it develops in Germany. S/he will be responsible for the overall quality of implementation and will work extensively with a wide range of external partners as well as closely coordinate with other aspects of IRC's work in Germany.
The Education Specialist will be responsible for providing technical assistance to local organizations to implement education projects that meet the specific needs of refugee children and youth, such as school readiness programs, remedial support, teacher training in promoting the well-being and learning needs of refugee children and youth; as well as supporting schools to address any tension in schools as a result of the influx of refugee students. The Education Specialist will also play the dual role of leveraging IRC's global experience in integrating refugees into national education systems and support local government officials as needed in identifying barriers and possible solutions for successful integration. The Education Specialist will be expected to travel approximately 30% of his/her as needed throughout Germany.
Essential Job Functions:
- Meet with German education providers (formal and informal) to assess needs and explore opportunities
- Provide technical support and guidance to local organizations in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of quality refugee education programs.
- Adapt and contextualize as needed IRC's Safe Healing and Learning Space materials; as well as its Healing Classroom materials.
- Train and provide ongoing support to staff in local organizations
- Assist in the creation of an online refugee education resource library
- Present on IRC education materials, resources and approaches at national and regional conferences/workshops
- Collaborate with Office Manager on development and maintenance of stakeholder map
- Support the IRC Germany team in troubleshooting complex problems related to the projects' technical approach or technical deliverables and coordinate with HQ technical, regional and support resources that can contribute to the solution
- Ensure projects benefit from lessons learned, promising practices, and resources developed globally in similar programs as well as ensuring that IRC captures and applies globally what is learned and developed in the field.
- Work with project staff to analyze and reflect on monitoring and evaluation data to continually inform and refine the overall project design
- Support business development and proposal writing as needed.
- Support the Deputy Country Representative and Country Representative in developing strong relationships and raise IRC's profile with specific donors as well as local government authorities.
- Other duties as assigned.
Requirements:
- Master's degree (or German University "Diplom") in Education or related field.
- At least three years of experience managing and/or advising on education projects, ideally in refugee education programs or those that target marginal and vulnerable groups
- Experience in training and facilitation, incl. online learning
- Experience in event organization/coordination
- Excellent public speaking skills
- Strong knowledge and experience with project start up and management
- At least basic knowledge of German education system and the rights of asylum seekers and refugees for access to education
- Experience with proposal development preferred
- Excellent communication skills, cultural sensitivity, flexibility, ability to improvise, team player
- Fluency in spoken and written English and German required
- Proficiency in another language of relevance to refugee groups (e.g. Arabic, Dari, Pashto, Tigrinya) a plus
- High level of tolerance for ambiguity
Working Environment: A standard office work environment is provided within an existing IRC office. Regular travel across Germany will be required.
How to apply:
Please follow this link to apply: http://www.aplitrak.com/?adid=a2F0cmluYW1pbGxlci4wMDcyMi4zODMwQGlyYy5hcGxpdHJhay5jb20