National Research Consultants at the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF)

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) - For 70 years, UNICEF has been working on the ground in 190 countries and territories to promote children's survival, protection and development. The world's largest provider of vaccines for developing countries, UNICEF supports child health and nutrition, good water and sanitation, quality basic education for all boys and girls, and the protection of children from violence, exploitation, and AIDS. UNICEF is funded entirely by the voluntary contributions of individuals, businesses, foundations and governments.

If you are a committed, creative professional and are passionate about making a lasting difference for children, the world's leading children's rights organization would like to hear from you.

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job Title: National Research Consultant for Intensifying Adolescent HIV Programming, NOC

Job Number: 503175
Location: Abuja
Work Type: Consultancy

Purpose of the Assignment

• Nigeria has the second highest global burden of HIV. 10% of the global population of adolescents living with HIV live in Nigeria. The planned outcome for the UNICEF Nigeria Children and AIDS section for the 2014-2017 program cycle is "By 2017, MTCT is eliminated; HIV transmission is reduced among especially vulnerable women, children and adolescents; and women, children and adolescents living HIV receive treatment, care and support". Within this result, the specific output for adolescents is that "By 2017 partners in Nigeria have increased commitment and strengthened systems for scaled-up delivery of HIV combination prevention, treatment and care services for adolescents".
• The operationalization of this output has been aligned to the four work streams of the "ALL IN" initiative namely:
  • Changing social context by working with adolescents as agents of change
  • Sharpening adolescent components of national programs
  • Promoting innovation and approaches for scale-up
  • Advocacy, communication and resource mobilization
• To achieve its planned results for adolescent and in alignment with the ALL IN initiative, UNICEF has prioritized actions in 6+1 high burden states where a lot of systems strengthening work and advocacy to leverage resources is going on.
• Two states (Benue and Kaduna states) were further prioritized as flagship demonstration states. Thus, intensive programming took place in Kaduna and Benue states between 2014 and 2016 through an 18 month intervention to pilot an approach for comprehensive HIV service delivery for adolescents and young people.
• This intervention built in capacity strengthening of the adolescent HIV service delivery systems, partnerships, community mobilization and advocacy at state and LGA levels to achieve results.
• The intervention created demand for services, provided HIV Testing services and referral for prevention, treatment and care.
• Two LGA areas of each of the states were selected for saturation of demand creation, testing and referral for treatment and prevention services. At the end of the 18 month period about 75% of adolescents and young people in the LGAs had been reached with demand creation and testing services, communities have been mobilized, service providers have strengthened capacity.
• To assess the outputs and further scale up the intervention described above, a review of the intervention was done using the "All In" assessment tools in the 2 states.
• The process included a rapid assessment, an in-depth analysis of selected interventions to identify bottlenecks and an analysis of the bottle necks to proffer solutions and a development of plans to remove the bottle necks. 17 LGA work plans were developed through this process.
• The work in Nigeria has gained global attention within UNICEF and attracted additional funding. 1.7 million dollars has been allocated to intensify Adolescent HIV programming in Nigeria with the aim of helping to identify and place 90% of the 200,000 ALHIV in Nigeria, ensure 90% of those identified are placed on treatment and 90% of those on treatment achieve viral suppression (UNAIDS 90-90-90 targets).
• The funds shall be utilized for four key intervention areas. One of the four intervention areas is "Intensifying Adolescent programming in Benue and Kaduna states".

Specific activities required to successfully roll out this intervention area include:

• Implementation of the "All In" plans in 18 LGAs identified by the "All In" assessment in Benue and Kaduna states.
• Intensive programming, engaging government, communities and young people.
• Creating evidence (profiling positive ALHIV, contact tracing, pregnant adolescents, integration for youth friendly services, determinants of uptake of services, adherence, transition etc)
• Documentation, innovation (mHealth for increasing HCT, adherence of ART).
• Evidence generation and dissemination of lessons learnt to inform a learning collaborative to influence UNICEFs advocacy and convening for taking to scale, removing law barriers ( eg age of consent).
• An operations research consultant is required to ensure evidence generation and analytic report writing of the intervention in the 2 states.

The Purpose of the Task

• The whole intervention as outlined above shall benefit from detailed documentation at each level working with service providers, stakeholders and state/LGA level consultants.
• The operations research consultant shall be responsible for the overall design, coordination and reporting of all operation research activities in the two states ensuring harmony and comparability of reports in the two states.
• The consultant shall develop an operations research framework for the two states. S/He shall work with UNICEF colleagues to agree on the research questions that will feed into the framework.
• Following this /He shall develop the operations research framework, protocols and plan.
• The consultant shall work with the state consultants to obtain relevant information and data required for the various pieces of research documentation.
• The reports shall be of high technical quality, standard statistical methodology and analytic frameworks shall be utilized. The outputs and deliverables shall be abstracts, technical briefs, fact sheets, journal papers etc.
• The consultant shall also support the preparation and facilitation of a learning collaborative for the dissemination of the lessons learnt from the interventions above; and other operations research activities that might emerge during the time frame of this intervention.

Assignment Tasks

• Review of project documents, meeting with relevant UNICEF staff to understand project.
• Articulate key research questions.
• Development of an operations research framework and protocols for each research question.
• Obtain ethical approval where necessary.
• Development of a detailed work plan for data collection for each research question.
• Development of report template for each research question.
• Three day Inception meeting with relevant members of the state team to share operations research plan and framework, allocate roles and responsibilities to support data collation and reporting.
• Work with state consultants and other team members to identify indicators and contribute to the design LGA and state dash boards.
• Develop monthly reporting template to UNICEF.
• Conduct 5 day monthly visits to collate for documentation.
• Submit monthly reports using agreed template.
• Develop 2 progress reports (fact sheets, human interest stories abstracts, journals, dash boards).
• Develop final reports (full project report, abstracts, and PowerPoint presentations.
• Every other documentation requirement as the need arises.
• Support development of agenda and presentations for learning collaborative.
• Support the facilitation and technical management of the learning collaborative.

Expected Deliverables:

• Operations research plan/framework
• Research protocols and ethical approvals where necessary
• Detailed Work plan for data collection
• Report of inception meeting with state stakeholders
• Design of Dash board showing indicators, definition of indicators and mechanisms for updating.
• Monthly reporting template
• Report of monthly visits
• 2 progress reports (with various components as on operations research plan)
• I final report (with various components as on operations research plan)
• Agenda and presentations for learning collaborative
• Technical and other formats of Reports of learning collaborative (as on documentation plan)

Qualifications of Successful Candidate
Education:

• Advance University Degree (at least a Masters level) in Public Health, Medical Sciences, Development areas or related field
• High level technical knowledge of international and national advances in HIV response, with special focus on adolescents and young people

Experience:

• 5 years or more experience in conducting high quality research and writing high quality reports
• Conversant with qualitative and quantitative research methodologies, use of statistical packages and applications for analysis.
• Excellent computer skills
• Proven ability to work with and coordinate a multi-sectoral team
• Self-driven and able to work alone, under tight schedules and to meet tight deadlines
• Experience in planning and managing technical meetings and conferences
• Presentation of accepted abstracts in international conferences, journal publications in international journals, experience in the use of social media platform analytics shall be an added advantage

Competencies of Successful Candidate:

• Analyzing - Analyzes numerical data and all other sources of information, to break them into component parts, patterns and relationships; probes for further information or greater understanding of a problem; makes rational judgments from the available information and analysis; demonstrates an understanding of how one issue may be a part of a much larger system
• Communication- Speaks fluently English; presents information with skill and confidence; projects credibility; structures information to meet the needs and understanding of the intended audience; presents information in a well-structured and logical way.
• Relating and networking - Easily establishes good relationships with external partners and staff; builds wide and effective networks; relates well to people at all levels.
• Drive for results - Sets high standards for quality of work; independently monitors and maintains quality of work; works in a systematic, methodical and orderly way; consistently achieves project goals; focuses on the needs and satisfaction of internal and external partners; accepts and tackles demanding goals with enthusiasm.
• Formulating strategies and concepts - Works strategically to realize goals; sets and develops strategies;
• Deciding and initiating action - Takes responsibility for actions, projects and people: takes initiative and works under own direction; initiates and generates activities and introduces changes into work processes; makes quick, clear decisions.

Application Closing Date
9th March, 2017.

How to Apply
Interested and qualified candidates should:
Click here to apply online