Technical Advisor

The Advisor will provide leadership for identifying, refining, designing, overseeing the development, and monitoring the use of innovative ICT content across 4 countries. This position will provide technical guidance and support to country program staff and production teams on the appropriate use of technology to advance the goals of the project.

In addition to the Play Well project, the Advisor will provide technical assistance to additional field projects across countries that are similarly aiming to reach children and youth through distance learning.

Major Responsibilities:

Play Well Project

Serve as the lead ICT solutions expert for the project by coordinating with the project staff to conduct assessments focused on distribution options, analyze results and recommend educational technology interventions to advance project goals.
Review technologies and distribution approaches appropriate for specific project contexts (Uganda, Tanzania, Colombia and Lebanon) that will include the use of audio, and can include SMS, and Web-based applications, particularly in the context of distance learning.
Liaise with the private sector as appropriate to engage them in supporting project ICT initiatives around distribution.
Establish criteria for selecting private sector partners and assist in assessing and negotiating partnerships.
Provide recommendations for the incorporation of various technological solutions in the project in cooperation with technical partners.
Build capacity of country teams to support their execution of the projects

Other Support to IRC Field Projects:

Support field staff in the development of an education technology approach appropriate to clients’ distance learning or remote support needs
Coordinate and help country programs to develop a roadmap of short- and long-term ICT solutions
Assess the risk of using the different technology in conflict/crisis contexts
Support proposal development by working with country offices to identify technology requirements and integrate technology into program solutions
Support the field to assess and then develop partnerships with education technology providers such as Telecom, ICT Service Providers, and other technology companies to customize the solution based on specific requirements
Provide support to develop staffing plans, budgets, work plans, and M&E frameworks
Provide ongoing support in monitoring project progress to inform troubleshooting and course correction discussions
Work with project M&E team to use technology for the monitoring and measurement of the technology programs.

Qualifications

Bachelor’s Degree in Education Technology or Education, Master’s Degree Preferred
At least five years of experience managing and/or advising on education technology use in projects, ideally in low-resource and/or conflict or crisis-affected contexts
Has knowledge and experience in the design and implementation of a range of education technology tools and applications including app-based learning, mobile learning and Interactive Radio Instruction
Strong knowledge in areas of formal and nonformal primary education, emergency education, and teacher support and development
Strong knowledge and experience with project start up and management
Experience with proposal development of large scale projects across a wide variety of public and private donors preferred
Proven ability to operate in a complex organisation, across functions and countries and work on own initiative and collaboratively as part of diverse teams
Excellent communication skills, cultural sensitivity, flexibility, ability to improvise, team player.
Fluency in spoken and written French required; proficiency and/or fluency in English preferred