Background/Context:
The IRC has operated in Syria since 2012, providing protection, health, economic recovery, and early childhood development programs in Idleb, Aleppo, Ar-Raqqa, Hassakeh, and Deir ez-Zor, with new programs expanding into Hama, rural Damascus, and Homs. With a team of over 350 members, the IRC has established trust and strong community relationships, ensuring access and effective service delivery.
Expérience
Our longstanding experience in the country to date provides a strong foundation for the IRC to further adapt and expand its programming across Syria, in order to respond to the new realities, with a greater focus on resilience and recovery initiatives. Alongside this, the IRC also It plays a significant role in Syria’s NGO, donor, and coordination forums, holding key positions and actively engaging in advocacy efforts.
Early Childhood Development (ECD)
IRC is implementing ECD program to provide early learning and nurturing care to children and caregivers affected by conflict and displacement across the Middle East. Our goal is to create inclusive environments where all children, regardless of their background, can reach their full potential, especially in communities that have experienced the brunt of the conflict.
Job overview:
The ECD Senior Manager will provide technical leadership and strategic guidance to strengthen the quality, relevance, integration, and scale-up of Early Childhood Development programming in Syria. The role will support the design, adaptation, implementation, and continuous improvement of evidence-based ECD approaches, while building the technical capacity of IRC staff and partners.
The Senior Manager will work collaboratively with local partners, municipalities, government counterparts, NGOs, IRC sector teams, MEAL, Partnerships, Grants, and Technical Units to ensure that ECD programming is contextually appropriate, inclusive, aligned with national priorities, and integrated across relevant sectors.
Responsibilities:
Technical Leadership and Program Quality
Formation / Diplômes
In collaboration with the ECDE Coordinator, Education Technical Unit and Regional ECD Technical Team, develop and contextualize country-specific technical standards and guidance for child-facing and caregiver-facing ECD programming.
Ensure that ECD content, curricula, tools, and program models are aligned with local and national standards for early childhood development and early childhood education.
Lead the technical quality assurance, adaptation, and rollout of ECD training packages for IRC staff and partners.
Provide technical guidance to ensure that ECD activities are age-appropriate, inclusive, gender-sensitive, conflict-sensitive, and responsive to the needs of children and caregivers affected by crisis and displacement.
Autres informations
Work closely with the MEAL team to strengthen ECD monitoring, evaluation, accountability, and learning systems, ensuring that data and client feedback inform program quality, adaptation, and decision-making.
Provide technical input to ensure ECD programming contributes to the IRC Syria Strategy, particularly relevant outcomes related to child development, caregiver engagement, inclusion, resilience, and integrated service delivery.
Coordinate with relevant technical, grants, MEAL, partnerships, and program teams to ensure ECD activities are technically sound, feasible, and aligned with program quality standards.
Présentation du poste
Internal and external representation
Serve as the ECD technical focal point at country level, representing ECD priorities, technical standards, learning, and evidence in relevant internal coordination and management forums.
Participate actively in internal coordination and technical meetings to promote effective information sharing, problem-solving, learning, and evidence-based decision-making.
Advocacy, partnerships and scaling
Provide overall direction to align the scaling design with relevantSyria national strategies and ECD and Education needs.
Ensure scaling and partnerships efforts are rooted in the partnerships principles and abides by the IRC partnership management system
Coordinate the team dynamics to foster a shift in mindset towards scaling and oversee the scaling process and ensure different team members are accountable to their roles
Establish and maintain solid relationships with ECD and Education stakeholders, networks and government agencies that support IRC’s ECD scaling and sustainability objectives.
Integration and mainstreaming of ECD across sectors
Identify and support opportunities for integrated ECD programming across sectors, including Education, Child Protection, Health, Women’s Protection and Empowerment, Protection, and Economic Recovery and Development, in collaboration with country program senior management, business development, and sector teams.
Provide technical guidance, tools, and capacity-building support to help other sector teams integrate age-appropriate, caregiver-focused, inclusive ECD approaches into their programming, including where ECD is not funded as a stand-alone component.
Technical Capacity Strengthening, Learning and Staff Development
Develop and implement technical capacity-strengthening plans for ECD staff and partners, including coaching, mentoring, on-the-job learning, peer learning, and structured training.
Support staff and partners
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