Safeguarding and Child Protection Specialist

Background information:

ACTED has been present in Pakistan since 2007, with active presence in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province, in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, Sindh and Punjab provinces. ACTED Pakistan has been responding to emergencies caused by conflicts and natural disasters, notably focusing on food security and livelihood opportunities, while supporting their recovery and investing the development sectors. ACTED is also contributing in global campaign of Girls' Education Challenge (GEC) funded by DFID through “Leave No Girl Behind (LNGB)” Programme in districts of Sindh and KP.

(GEC) LNGB Project Context:

Pakistan has the world’s second highest number of children out of school (OOS), and within South Asia is ranked the second lowest in gender parity. 55% of females are illiterate and 25 million children are OOS–77% of which have never been to school.

Given the large number of out-of-school girls (OOS) in Pakistan, ACTED has planned an integrated learning programme through non-formal based education system, which aims to address the physical, qualitative, socio-cultural, family/community and systemic barriers to girls’ access to education. Over a period of 4 years (December 2018 - November 2022), ACTED, in coordination with consortium partners, is targeting (Jacobabad and Kashmore Districts in Sindh) and Ex-FATA areas of KP (Mohmand and Bajaur Districts) to reach out to 5500 adolescent aged girls who have never been to school or dropped out of education process. Multiple cohorts of Literacy & Numeracy short learning course, Accelerated Learning Programme (ALPs), and TVET skills training will be facilitated during the life of the programme.

Ensuring safeguarding and protection mechanisms throughout the project life cycle is at the heart of GEC and ACTED commitments towards ensuring international safeguarding and protection standards and processes specified by GEC guidelines.

Position Overview: Reporting the LNGB Team Leader this is a great opportunity to anchor the safeguarding and child protection policies, procedures and measures across ACTED’s LNGB programming in Pakistan. The incumbent will lead to develop, revise, adopt and practice various safeguarding and child protection policies, craft strategies for mainstreaming protection and safeguarding standards across programme geographies.

 S/he will develop procedures, processes, tools & instruments for monitoring of standards for full implementation across all learning centers, develop safeguarding monitoring plan, establish SOPs for survivors of violence, TORs for various stakeholders and service line departments in districts contributing to service referral mechanism/system with strong follow-up and coordination to ensure seamless implementation of all safeguarding agreed measures. S/he will lead on the connections with relevant stakeholders/institutions of government, non-government entities, national and international organizations, civil society, related technical working groups and forms related to safeguarding and child protection with strongest ongoing support and training to field teams, partners, sub-contractors, new hires. Represent LNGB and ACTED Pakistan on all Safeguarding and Child Protection seminars, forums, discussions as ACTED is commitment to zero tolerance to all forms of violence against children, beneficiaries and staff.

Essential Job Responsibilities

Strategy

• Responsible for providing in-depth technical support to ensure that activities implemented for children, adolescents, and vulnerable adults are protection sensitive; specific to implementation level requirements in line with safeguarding and protection standards of ACTED and DFID/Girls Education Challenge.
• Provide input into writing strategies for working with children and vulnerable adolescents/adults, to ensure safeguarding for all beneficiaries and target communities across ACTED projects in Pakistan.
• Ensure ACTED and its consortium partners adhere to the (IPs, downstream partners, service contractors, sub-contractors etc.) protection/safeguarding policies and procedures and incorporate all safeguarding best practices into LNGB programming and comply with government and legislative as well as donor requirements.

Technical

• Deliver technical on the job support to field teams on safeguarding and protection mainstreaming in learning spaces/target communities including periodic training as necessary component of programme.
• Review, support and monitor safeguarding practices in the LNGB Project as well as assist other ACTED projects with the integration of child safeguarding and protection in their work plans.
• Participate in needs assessments, situation analyses, and project design in line with ACTED child protection approaches and methodologies.
• Be able to contribute to the development of strategies, approaches, methodologies and tools related to child and vulnerable population protection in emergencies and in development.
• Take the lead in initiating and spreading innovative child and adolescent centered participation and engagement practices to add value to ACTED mission.
• Design specific tools and modules for safeguarding/child protection activities with a focus on children and adolescents as needed.
• Train the Community Based Organizations, School Management Committees, and community volunteers to learn and comply with children and adolescent protection needs.
• Ensure child protection messages and information about available services are consistent and available to all LNGB centers.
• Map the legal, medical, justice, psycho-social welfare child and adolescent/adult at risk protection arrangements in target areas. From this, develop and manage a comprehensive referral system to contribute to support children and vulnerable adolescents/adults in the case of violence and other risks to safeguarding.
• Ensure reporting and responses for incidents or risks of violence and other safeguarding risks/breaches are in accordance with ACTED policies;

Programme Management

• Ensure a highly responsive and integrated programme implementation vis the safeguarding and child protection needs duly incorporated in programme design and its consistency throughout the programme life.
• Ensure the specifics to safeguarding and child protection procedural implementation is is in time and carry forward the learning to further improve on lessons learnt throughout the programme.
• Ensure all interventions adhere to ACTED’s Child Protection Policies, Safeguarding Policies, Do No Harm Principles, and Beneficiary Accountability Standards.
• Ensure reporting and responses for incidents or risks of violence and safeguarding risks/breaches are in accordance with LNGB and ACTED policies. Ensure that clear processes are in place that provide step-by-step guidance on how to report against each location and appropriate mechanisms for the management of each case in accordance with specific safeguarding policies.
• For all project activities develop detailed guidance/SOPs detailing the protection of children or adolescents/adults at risk measures to be developed and implemented;
• Create and update a ‘safeguarding risk register’ for all activities involving children and adolescents/adults at risk;
• Undertake regular audits to check processes are being followed and up to date, and that there is appropriate resource-allocation to ensure compliance;
• Work closely with all the allied units and programme teams at main and filed office to ensure all safeguarding needs are incorporated and complied at all levels of programme.

Accountability

All ACTED team members are expected to support all efforts toward accountability, specifically to our beneficiaries and to international standards guiding international relief and development work, while actively engaging beneficiary communities as equal partners in the design, monitoring and evaluation of our field projects.

 Immediate First Set of Tasks:

Most Urgent:

•        Development of whistle blowing policy, various addendums and memo based additions to various existing safeguarding policies of ACTED be used for LNGB Project including Code of Conduct, Sexual Exploitation & Abuse Policy, Media Photo Policy, SOPs for Survivors of Violence, Specific SOPs for Vulnerable Groups.
•        Core Referral Mechanism/System essential revisions under GEC specified standards, safeguarding monitoring plan for field implementation and reporting, service gap analysis of district service line departments, safeguarding risk assessment, analysis and subsequent report.
• Going Forward:
•        Develop clear procedures driven through the aforementioned policies-framework to prevent and respond to safeguarding violations.
•        Operationalize complaints’ and reporting procedures with mechanism to record, and respond to child protection and safeguarding alerts/complains.
•        Assist project partners in development, adaptation and field implementation safeguarding and child protection procedures and standards.
•        Form, evolve, and convene meetings for technical working group of safeguarding to review/discuss all mechanics adopted under LNGB requirements and suggest corrective measures as appropriate for field implementation and compliance.
•        Develop accountability implementation framework.
•        Conduct next round of trainings on safeguarding for various related stakeholders. Review of existing documents and manuals related to Safeguarding and protection (Gap identification and highlighting areas of improvement and align needed attributes in the scripts).
•        Develop specific safeguarding risk matrix through assessment and analysis in field considering the high risk operating context.
•        Incorporate PSEAH (Preventing Sexual Exploitation, Abuse and Harassment) risks that girls who have experience violence may have into the risk register.
•        Develop specific information about particularly vulnerable groups of children and associated guidance or SOP.
•        Follow-up on compliance of safeguarding through effective monitoring plan at field level.
• Required Education, Qualifications & Skills:
•        An accomplished university graduate in social sciences or a related field with minimum three to five years’ experience of working on safeguarding and child protection assignments.
•        Experience in child rights programming, child safeguarding and understanding of key global child protection codes and various Acts on Children Protection and Safeguarding. 
•        Participated in designing of child protection, sexual harassment or safeguarding policies/SOPs, TORs for any national or international entities.
•        Understandings the local context of field implementation level safeguarding and child protection related context and challenges.
•        Excellent knowledge of safeguarding related compliance mechanics, CRM (Complaints Response Mechanism), CRS (Core Referral System), and their field level implementation challenges and solutions.
•        Good experience in designing methodological tools and delivering trainings on safeguarding, child and adolescent protection, especially girls will be an added advantage;
•        Knowledge of incident investigation, analytical skills and how to improve policy and practice in the light of findings;
•        Strong coordination and proactive leadership skills, and the ability to mentor and support staff;
•        Flexibility in adopting approaches and advice to incorporate emerging and transitioning needs to evolve safeguarding and child protection procedures as per project needs during implementation
•        Ability to accurately and systematically assess and evaluate environments, with an eye for detail;
•        Be able to spot inconsistencies and potential threats and develop solutions and tools to improve risk assessments;
•        Familiarity with the project management cycle and project management tools.
•        Able to process and articulate complexity in a clear and coherent way;
•        Excellent interpersonal skills with an ability to collaborate and form effective partnerships with internal and external stakeholders
•        Well-developed team leadership qualities with facilitation, networking and advocacy skills.
•        Experience of working in a highly collaborative environment with minimal direct supervision in a complex setting.
•        Field experience of working directly with children and adolescents
•        Willingness to travel 60% of the time, often to insecure places in project areas in interior Sindh and Ex-FATA/KP Territories.

ACTED is commitment to zero tolerance to all forms of violence against children, beneficiaries and staff. 

ACTED are equal opportunity employers. 

Females and minorities are encouraged to apply.

Candidates with disabilities are encouraged to apply.