Consultancy – Development and testing of a standard protocol for collection of data on children with disabilities in EMIS, Data & Analytics (D&A), DAPM NYHQ (home based)

Consultancy Title: Development and testing of a standard protocol for collection of data on children with disabilities in EMIS

Section/Division/Duty Station: Data &Analytics/DAPM/ NYHQ

Duration:  30 September 2021 – 12 September 2022

About UNICEF

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. 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. UNICEF has over 12,000 staff in more than 145 countries.

BACKGROUND

Article 28 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) recognizes the right of all children to receive an education, which is the basis of equal opportunity in life. Additionally, Article 24 of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) calls for children with disabilities to have access to “an inclusive, quality and free primary education and secondary education on an equal basis with others in the communities in which they live. This includes the provision of reasonable accommodations to children’s needs along with adequate support to maximize economic and social development.” Failure to including children with disabilities in the general school system and ensuring that they exercise their right to learn also compromises the achievement of SDG4. 

Despite these global ratified goals and conventions, and considerable progresses in terms of disability-inclusive legislative frameworks, large information gaps remain, and little is known about how many children experience functional difficulties and on how the environment (including physical, social, and attitudinal factors) affects children’s participation in their communities in general, and, specifically, in the educational system.

Education Management Information Systems (EMIS) are important to collect, collate and report on the experience of children in schools, as well as on the attributes of the schools, including structures, materials, services, and human resources. Too often, however, EMIS do not collect information on children with disabilities, their experience, and the existence of disability-inclusive service delivery.

Closing this information gap requires that national governments put in place suitable policies and implementation arrangements for inclusive education. To meet this objective, EMIS need to be adapted so that they regularly report on the status, experiences, and outcomes of children with disabilities, along information on the necessary inputs to ensure disability-inclusive school environments.

Terms of Reference / Deliverables

UNICEF Data and Analytics Section is seeking an experienced consultant to support the coordination of a project to address the evidence gap on disability-inclusive education systems. The project aims to identify the core components of a standardized approach to generate valid and comparable data on disability in Education Management Information Systems (EMIS). To achieve this, the project includes a sequence of activities to develop and test a comprehensive data collection protocol on children with disabilities in school contexts. The consultant is expected to contribute to all stages of project development, management, implementation, reporting and dissemination. The successful completion of this project and its outcomes will respond to a long-standing need of data that guides better disability-inclusive policies and service delivery in schools and communities. The project represents an opportunity for an experienced consultant looking to contribute to ground-breaking work to promote the rights of children with disabilities. To address the above-mentioned data needs, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has initiated the methodological work required to develop standardized approach to support EMIS to report on: 1) the number of children with disabilities, 2) the experience of children in the education system, and 3) the educational structures and resources that are required to deliver a school environment that is adequate for all children and inclusive of children with disabilities.

A testing protocol has been developed to understand whether and under which conditions, the Child Functioning Module and the Inclusive Education Module can be used to generate reliable and relevant data on children with disabilities in the context of EMIS. The testing protocol aims to generate the required information to answer four broad research questions:

1. Can a teacher’s version of the Child Functioning Module (CFM-TV) and the Inclusive Education Module (IEM) be used to provide    information on students’ functional difficulties?
2. Can mothers/caregivers provide information on their child’s functional difficulties using a self-administered version of the Child Functioning Module?
3. What additional data on educational structures, resources need to be collected to provide further information on the inclusiveness of the learning environment? 
4. What is the feasibility of complementing the data gathered by the CFM-TV with direct assessments of child functioning as a second stage screening protocol?

The scope of this consultancy is to support the project oversight during planning, execution, and reporting stages, and to contribute to the development of the final standard protocol for the measurement of disability in the context of EMIS. The data collection activities will be conducted across selected countries which have manifested interest in participating in the implementation of the testing protocol. For each country, activities will be carried out in collaboration between UNICEF HQ (D&A), the UNICEF Country Office and the National Implementing Body, and will be organized in four main stages of preparation, piloting, implementation, and reporting. A final stage consisting of concluding activities and generation the standard protocol for disability measurement in EMIS will be carried out mainly at HQ (D&A), with specific inputs from participating Country Offices.

1. Preparatory stage.
2. Country-level preparatory activities.
3. Country-level training and pilot.
4. Country-level implementation.
5. Country-level data processing and analysis.
6. Country-level final report.
7. Development of the final “Protocol to strengthen the availability of data on children with disabilities in EMIS”.
8. Miscellaneous ad-hoc activities to support project management, implementation, and dissemination activities.

Qualifications

(1) Education
Advanced university degree in education, statistics, social sciences, or related disciplines

2) Work experience
• Minimum 10 years professional experience in the field of applied research, monitoring or evaluation in education programmes.
• Proven experience in research project management.
• Knowledge and experience in conducting similar research (e.g. data collection in EMIS, inclusive education), and familiarity with the subject of disability measurement.
• Expertise in the development of quantitative research protocols involving data collection at community level.
• Proven experience of working with child disability data is an asset.
• Previous experience working with EMIS is an asset.
• Knowledge of sampling methods is not required but would be an asset.
• Strong writing and analytical skills for quality report writing (a sample of recent analytical report will be requested).
• Previous work experience with UNICEF in a similar capacity, is an advantage.
• Experience in data collection in Low- and Middle- Income countries and working experience with international organizations is an added advantage

3) Competencies

• Strong writing and analytical skills for quality report writing (a sample of recent analytical report will be requested).
• Strong coordination skills and ability to adhere to deadlines.
• Fluency in written and spoken English and any additional UN language is required

Requirements:

• Completed profile in UNICEF’s e-Recruitment system and provide Personal History Form (P11) Upload copy of academic credentials
• Financial proposal that will include:
• your daily/monthly rate (in US$) to undertake the terms of reference (can be downloaded here: https://www.unicef.org/about/employ/index_consultancy_assignments.html 
  • travel costs and daily subsistence allowance, if internationally recruited or travel is required as per TOR.
  • Any other estimated costs: visa, health insurance, and living costs as applicable.
  • Indicate your availability
• Any emergent / unforeseen duty travel and related expenses will be covered by UNICEF.
• At the time the contract is awarded, the selected candidate must have in place current health insurance coverage.
• Payment of professional fees will be based on submission of agreed satisfactory deliverables. UNICEF reserves the right to withhold payment in case the deliverables submitted are not up to the required standard or in case of delays in submitting the deliverables on the part of the consultant.

U.S. Visa information:

With the exception of the US Citizens, G4 Visa and Green Card holders, should the selected candidate and his/her household members reside in the United States under a different visa, the consultant and his/her household members are required to change their visa status to G4, and the consultant’s household members (spouse) will require an Employment Authorization Card (EAD) to be able to work, even if he/she was authorized to work under the visa held prior to switching to G4.  

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

For every Child, you demonstrate…

UNICEF’s values of Care, Respect, Integrity, Trust, and Accountability (CRITA) and core competencies in Communication, Working with People and Drive for Results.

To view our competency framework, please visit here.

Click here to learn more about UNICEF’s values and competencies.

UNICEF is committed to diversity and inclusion within its workforce, and encourages all candidates, irrespective of gender, nationality, religious and ethnic backgrounds, including persons living with disabilities, to apply to become a part of the organization.

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:

Mobility is a condition of international professional employment with UNICEF and an underlying premise of the international civil service.

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.