International consultancy- Communities Care Consultant UNICEF South Sudan for 215 days

UNICEF works in some of the world’s toughest places, to reach the world’s most disadvantaged children. To save their lives. To defend their rights. To help them fulfill their potential. 

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For every child, Care 

Purpose of Activity/Assignment:
The United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) South Sudan is a seeking a qualified Communities Care Consultant with strong background in GBV technical support and capacity building to local partners to social norms change interventions using Communities Care. Across South Sudan, GBV including sexual violence, intimate partner violence (IPV), and child marriage, are pervasive. While the full magnitude of GBV is unclear, studies indicate that more than 65 per cent of the approximately 5.59 million women and girls in South Sudan have experienced physical and/or sexual violence in their lifetimes; this is among the highest rates in the world, and twice the global average. Adolescent girls are particularly vulnerable to sexual violence, exploitation, and abuse, with child marriage on the rise. However, access to lifesaving multi-sectoral GBV responses, including health, GBV case management, psychosocial support, higher-level mental health, and other services, are very limited. Even in locations where there are services, there are multiple barriers to survivors seeking support, including self-blame, fear of reprisals, mistrust of authorities, and risk of retaliatory attacks coupled with cultural norms and values promote a culture of silence. Quality of care and capacity of service providers also impacts the utilization of services when available. Deep-rooted gender inequalities in education, economic opportunities, decision-making, harmful socio-cultural norms, and weakened social and community support systems perpetuate vulnerability and marginalization, disempowering women and girls. As a consequence, South Sudanese women and girls have some of the lowest education and health outcomes in the world.

Since 2023, UNICEF South Sudan has been scaling up efforts to address GBV and is expanding partnerships with national partners including women-led organisations (WLO) to increase the availability of GBV prevention, response, and risk mitigation interventions. As part of this, UNICEF is working with GBV partners to implement the Communities Care model, UNICEF’s flagship GBV prevention intervention to address harmful norms and beliefs that underpin GBV. In 2023, all partners participated in a 14-day training on Communities Care and are currently setting it up in their programming. The foundation and first step within Communities Care is to strengthen response mechanisms for survivors of GBV, creating an environment in which survivors can obtain holistic compassionate care and support from quality survivor-centred services. GBV services are critical to ensure women and girls receive lifesaving assistance as well as to signal to the community that GBV is an important issue requiring action. Once such services are strengthened, the Communities Care model catalyses community action to transform harmful norms and beliefs that underpin GBV. This involves forming community discussion groups and leading them through a process of self-reflection of their own beliefs regarding GBV before mobilising community action to communicate new positive norms and to create an enabling environment for change through laws, policies and protocols.

UNICEF requires a consultant to provide technical support to partners to implement Communities Care programme with a focus on strengthening community based care for GBV service delivery Part 3: Strengthening community-based care and promoting community support to address harmful practices and norms Part 4: Catalysing change.

Main Duties and Responsibilities:
The purpose of this consultancy (215 days) is to provide technical support, trainings and capacity building to local partners to implement Communities Care to address harmful norms and support adaptations to roll it out with local
WLOs. The consultant will be based in Juba with frequent travel to states where UNICEF partners are operating. The consultant will receive overall guidance and day-to-day supervision from the GBV Specialist. S/he will work closely with the UNICEF Child Protection team based in field offices and UNICEF GBV partners.
Scope of Work:

Main tasks and deliverables related to the consultancy:
1. Conduct a detailed assessment of UNICEF GBV partners identifying needs and priorities for capacity building on Communities Care, support adaptations to roll it out with local WLOs and develop a capacity strengthening plan on key areas that need support to implement Communities Care.
2. Deliver trainings and technical support to partners on community engagement and action including Community Dialogue sessions with trainings for Community Discussion Leaders (CDL), supporting CDLs facilitate Community Dialogue sessions, organizing Public Declaration events and implementation of Community Action Plans.
3. Provide ongoing mentoring, supervision and technical guidance to UNICEF GBV partners through remote and in-person support. As part of this, at least two field visits will be made to each partner during the consultancy and support provided to partners in developing monthly workplans and narrative reports on Communities care.
4. Assess availability and quality of community-based care in selected locations among UNICEF implementing partners and developing a capacity building plan to address gaps.
5. Provide trainings to strengthen community-based care to enhance GBV service delivery with GBV, health, police, legal and other service providers to improve GBV service delivery.
6. Facilitate quarterly workshops with UNICEF GBV partners to review progress, address challenges and technical capacity building needs to implement Communities Care. This should include establishing learning platforms that allow organisations rolling out Communities Care to share their experiences to promote more effective approaches but also help create solidarity between organisations engaged in the common struggle of tackling GBV.
7. Hold a participatory review workshop with UNICEF GBV partners to assess progress, lessons learned and good practices to inform programming priorities and approaches for 2025. This should include a review of baseline and endline surveys to measure progress in addressing social norms, belief and confidence in service providers.
8. Produce a final report to document engagement implementation of Communities Care in South Sudan detailing follow-up plans including technical, financial and institutional support required for the three-year partnerships with UNICEF partners.

Deliverables
Conduct a detailed assessment of UNICEF GBV partners identifying needs and priorities for capacity building on Communities Care, support adaptations to roll it out with local WLOs and develop a capacity strengthening plan on key areas that need support to implement Communities Care. –
Assessment report with recommendations for technical support to implement Communities Care
15 May 2024 10%
-Deliver trainings and technical support to partners on community engagement and action including Community Dialogue sessions with trainings for Community Discussion Leaders (CDL), supporting CDLs facilitate Community Dialogue sessions, organising Public Declaration events and implementation of Community Action Plans.
-Provide ongoing mentoring, supervision and technical guidance to UNICEF GBV partners through remote and in-person support. As part of this, at least two field visits will be made to each partner during the consultancy. – 4 trainings conducted on community action and engagement (community dialogue sessions)
-16 field visits (two per each of the eight partners) with programmatic reports uploaded in e-tools 28 February 2025 30%
Assess availability and quality of community-based care in selected locations among UNICEF implementing partners and developing a capacity building plan to address gaps. -GBV service delivery assessment conducted with each of the eight partners 30 June 2024 10%
Provide four trainings to strengthen community-based care to enhance GBV service delivery with GBV, health, police, legal and other service providers to improve GBV service delivery. As part of this, at least two field visits will be made to each partner during the consultancy and support provided to partners in developing monthly workplans and narrative reports on Communities care.-Four trainings conducted on community-based care at field level 30 September 2024 20%
Facilitate quarterly workshops with UNICEF GBV partners to review progress, address challenges and technical capacity building needs to implement Communities Care. This should include establishing learning platforms that allow organisations rolling out Communities Care to share their experiences to promote more effective approaches but also help create solidarity between organisations engaged in the common struggle of tackling GBV.-
-Four quarterly review workshops held with GBV partners
-Establishment of learning forums for partners implementing Communities Care 31 March 2025 10%
Hold a participatory review workshop with UNICEF GBV partners to assess progress, lessons learned and good practices to inform programming priorities and approaches for 2025. This should include a review of baseline and endline surveys to measure progress in addressing social norms, belief and confidence in service providers
-Final review workshop conducted with GBV partners 31 March 2025 10%
Produce a final report to document engagement implementation of Communities Care in South Sudan detailing follow-up plans including technical, financial and institutional support required for the three-year partnerships with UNICEF partners.
-Report lessons learned and good practices including an analysis of baseline/endline surveys to inform plans for follow up support 15 April 2025 10%

Qualifications and experience
Masters degree in psychology, social work, gender studies or in other similar fields.
•A minimum of 8 years of experience working on GBV in humanitarian settings.
•Strong understanding of Communities Care implementation and GBV service delivery.
•Proven experience of planning and facilitating trainings, workshops and other capacity building modalities.
•Experience in collecting, collating and analysing data effectively with strong report writing skills.
•Excellent interpersonal and communication skills and the ability to effectively liaise with people in a wide range of functions in a multi-cultural environment.
•Ability to work independently and productively, with multiple stakeholders in a fast-paced environment.
•Ability to work productively in a team and independently, and to handle requests or issues as they arise.
Language Requirements: Fluency in English.

All applicants MUST submit a very detailed technical and financial proposal

For every Child, you demonstrate… 

UNICEF’s values of Care, Respect, Integrity, Trust, Accountability, and Sustainability (CRITAS). 

To view our competency framework, please visit  here. 

UNICEF is here to serve the world’s most disadvantaged children and our global workforce must reflect the diversity of those children. The UNICEF family is committed to include everyone, irrespective of their race/ethnicity, age, disability, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, nationality, socio-economic background, or any other personal characteristic.

UNICEF offers reasonable accommodation for consultants/individual contractors with disabilities. This may include, for example, accessible software, travel assistance for missions or personal attendants. We encourage you to disclose your disability during your application in case you need reasonable accommodation during the selection process and afterwards in your assignment. 

UNICEF has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UNICEF, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination. UNICEF also adheres to strict child safeguarding principles. All selected candidates will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles and will therefore undergo rigorous reference and background checks. Background checks will include the verification of academic credential(s) and employment history. Selected candidates may be required to provide additional information to conduct a background check. 

Remarks:  

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process. 

Individuals engaged under a consultancy or individual contract will not be considered “staff members” under the Staff Regulations and Rules of the United Nations and UNICEF’s policies and procedures, and will not be entitled to benefits provided therein (such as leave entitlements and medical insurance coverage). Their conditions of service will be governed by their contract and the General Conditions of Contracts for the Services of Consultants and Individual Contractors. Consultants and individual contractors are responsible for determining their tax liabilities and for the payment of any taxes and/or duties, in accordance with local or other applicable laws. 

The selected candidate is solely responsible to ensure that the visa (applicable) and health insurance required to perform the duties of the contract are valid for the entire period of the contract. Selected candidates are subject to confirmation of fully-vaccinated status against SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) with a World Health Organization (WHO)-endorsed vaccine, which must be met prior to taking up the assignment. It does not apply to consultants who will work remotely and are not expected to work on or visit UNICEF premises, programme delivery locations or directly interact with communities UNICEF works with, nor to travel to perform functions for UNICEF for the duration of their consultancy contracts.