Job Summary

The role holder will provide the strategic thought leadership for the ECD interventions in the Nitunze Project (an Integrated Child Survival project) and in the Country Office. Nitunze aims to ensure that children under 5 in Turkana North sub county and Mathare in Kenya survive and thrive. This 3-year project will apply a WHO-approved integrated approach to ensure that children under 5 recover from common childhood diseases. That malnourished children under 5 are successfully treated; that families have enough resources and knowledge to feed their children; that children under 5 have access to safe drinking water and good hygiene and sanitary conditions and that children under 5 have better access to health, nutrition and WASH services through accessing early childhood development (ECD) centers. He/she should be knowledgeable, skilled and provide technical oversight in service delivery with emphasis on ECD. He/she will be accountable for the preparation of strategic direction for ECD, annual work plans, capacity building of teachers, parents and liaison with community health volunteers.

Responsibilities

Strategic Programming, Representation and Fund raising

• Be fully aware of national policies, strategies and other initiatives and developments by government and other stakeholders relating to early childhood development.


• Ensure that ECD programme remains relevant to the external environment and participate in the relevant ECD national level coordination meetings, early childhood development Working Groups and other national level forums (for example, Nurturing care, ECD Network etc).


• Support in fundraising for the Country Office by developing  proposals for ECD programming in line with the country strategic objectives and Government of Kenya policies and legal frameworks.


• Ensure presence at relevant coordination meetings at national and sub-county levels, and sometimes even with stakeholders. 


• Ensure active dissemination of programme findings and lessons learned through the production of lessons learned documents and their effective dissemination to key stakeholders.


• Programme Quality


• Ensure quality programme implementation across ECD programming areas – both humanitarian and development initiatives in education and support the quality of ECD programming. Where necessary provide technical training for project staff and partners as required.


• Work with Technical specialists and project team to identify areas of integration where ECD can be included in funding proposals and especially within Health and Nutrition programming.


• Knowledge management


• Work with MEAL team to develop and up-date monitoring and evaluation framework and key indicators for ECD that helps each project improve quality of reporting.


• Promote the sharing of best practice and learning in relation to ECD programming, advocacy and campaign activities amongst Area Programmes in the country.


• Contribute to documentation of case studies and human-interest stories.


• Staff Management


• Manage staff in challenging environments and ensure a balance between the safety of personnel and the quality of data.

Manage the performance of direct reports athrough effective use of the Performance Management System including the establishment of clear, measureable objectives, ongoing feedback, periodic reviews and fair and unbiased evaluations; coaching, mentoring and other developmental opportunities; recognition and rewards for outstanding performance; documentation of performance that is less than satisfactory, with appropriate performance improvement work plans.