JOB SUMMARY:

The Senior Technical Advisor-Education will provide technical guidance to Country Offices, CARE Member Partners (CMPs), and technical units across the Program, Strategy, and Impact (PSI) team, providing input into the design of new initiatives and to the revision of existing approaches, fostering innovation and strengthening overall technical quality. They will ensure that the technical assistance process places a strong emphasis on capacity enhancement of and mutual co-learning with local teams. They will help to integrate new/proven innovative approaches to education and identify synergies with existing programs to avoid duplication and to maximize impact. 

In particular, this STA-E will serve as the Project Director (roughly 70% of their time) and provide overall leadership, direction, and management to guide the Re-IMAGINE Project in Niger successfully. RE-IMAGINE aims to test a holistic intervention package that can effectively delay first births among unmarried adolescent girls in Zinder Region. 

Specific responsibilities for RE-IMAGINE's Project Director include: (a) Providing strategic guidance for all project operations, including setting up and overseeing work plans/contracts with country office teams and partners; (b) Ensuring quality and timely implementation of interventions according to the project’s work plan; (c) Providing technical leadership to guide the project and facilitate cross-learning with internal and external partners; (d) Maintaining a strong and effective relationship with the donor; (e) Overseeing evaluation design and execution; and (f) Guiding the development of knowledge products, including documentation and dissemination of results through reports, peer reviewed journals, conferences, etc. 

In addition, the STA-E will support other projects globally as requested in education and skills. They will also contribute to resource mobilization/program development and engage with donors to generate additional funding for education/girls' empowerment programs. They will help mentor other technical advisors and staff across the organization to ensure program quality and alignment with donor requirements. The STA-E must possess excellent interpersonal, communication and analytical skills, have experience with project management, and be an experienced team leader.

RESPONSIBILITIES:

Project Leadership, Oversight, and Direction Setting

On the RE-IMAGINE Project, the STA-Education is expected to: 

• Oversee the work of a Core Program Management Team (PMT), consisting of CARE Niger's technical advisors and RE-IMAGINE's Program Manager, technical and MEL advisors from Education & Skills team (E&S) team, and technical and MEL advisors from the Global Health (GH) team. 
• Provide overall leadership for the project’s implementation, alongside counterparts in Niger and relevant staff from the E&S and GH teams, university research partners, and the donor. 
• Ensure project deliverables and expenditures are on track (aligned with Gantt chart, budget, workplan, and results framework) and that timely mitigation actions are taken and communicated with the donor as needed. 
• Ensure donor’s feedback to the various versions of the budget are incorporated, and revised versions are resubmitted on time, in collaboration with the PMT members. 
• Monitor budget implications on changes in timelines, project design, and research design and ensure the donor is informed in a timely manner. 
• Lead discussions on any budget adjustments that are needed and ensure they are communicated to the donor in a way that balances donor priorities with country office operating realities.

Collaboration, Representation, and Relationship Management

On the RE-IMAGINE Project, the STA-Education is expected to: 

• Lead weekly calls with the PMT members and the CARE Niger team. 
• Co-lead monthly meetings with the donor and project partners and ensure actions are communicated and followed up on. 
• Co-lead regular calls with CGE Nigeria to ensure regular communication and engagement to inform ongoing curriculum adaptations as well as exchange visits between the RE-IMAGINE Niger team and CGE Nigeria to inform curriculum adaptations, fidelity of implementation, and ways of working. 
• Ensure CGE’s Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) is reviewed regularly and updated as necessary based on new agreements. 
• Represent the technical work and specific grant(s) within internal and external forums which focus on knowledge management, global best practices, and research priorities.

Technical Assistance

The STA-Education is expected to support the RE-IMAGINE Project and other projects as demanded with technical assistance including: 

• Provide technical assistance to and mentoring of the CO/project staff on best practices related to key programmatic approaches. 
• Ensure implementation design, work plans, technical reports, and budgets align with donor technical requirements. This should also include the review, quality assurance checks, and signing off on all education related technical deliverables developed and used under RE-IMAGINE. 
• Collaborate with the Project Manager to develop/update the work plan for all the technical deliverables for all technical approaches (girls’ collectives’ curriculum and facilitator’s guidelines, Social Analysis and Action (SAA) approach adaptation for Niger context; FADA/men’s/boys’ engagement; religious leaders’ training guidelines). 
• Collaborate with the Project Manager and the Livelihoods Advisor on the consultancy process for completing the market analysis and the development of various training pathways for the girls transitioning from the girls’ collectives. 
• Ensure that high quality reports and communication materials are submitted to the donor, in partnership with the PMT members and the Relationship Manager, ensuring monitoring and evaluation findings are well-integrated into all donor reporting.

Resource Mobilization

The STA-Education: 

• Leads resource mobilization and new business development through the development of concept notes, program design, and/or proposals on opportunities that arise aligned with CARE’s Global Strategy, GH and E&S priorities and taking evidence-based key components to scale. This may include technical writing and providing inputs to budget designs to ensure alignment with technical approaches/program design. 
• Engage with the donor around existing and potential future funding opportunities. This may be during the scoping stage, live bids, and/or donor engagement for continuation of existing funding.

#LI-ST1