UNICEF: Mental Health & Psychosocial Support & Child Protection Associate – Port Vila

Organization Mission

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 fulfilling their potential. Across 190 countries and territories, we work for every child, everywhere, every day, to build a better world for everyone. And we never give up.

The UNICEF Climate, Environment, Energy & Disaster Risk Reduction (CEED) Strategy as an integral part of the Pacific Multi-Country Programme, helps to “ensure that every child, adolescent and community in the Pacific region, especially the most disadvantaged and excluded ones, live in a clean, healthy and sustainable environment; are adapted and resilient to climate and environment-related shocks and disasters; and are empowered as agents of change”. There is currently a window of opportunity to protect the most vulnerable by making communities and social services more climate and disaster-resilient, by putting children’s needs at the heart of the key decisions that are being taken and by empowering children to shape their own sustainable futures.

This strategy is being implemented across Pacific Islands Countries and Territories, including Cook Islands, Fiji, Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Nauru, Niue, Palau, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tokelau, Tonga, Tuvalu, and Vanuatu. Together, these 14 countries and territories are home to 2.45 million people, living on more than 660 islands and atolls stretching across 17.2 million square kilometres of the Pacific Ocean.

Context

Children and adolescents in Vanuatu are exposed to a range of stressors that can affect their mental health, psychosocial wellbeing, safety, learning, and development. These may include the impacts of disasters and climate-related emergencies, family and community stress, violence, displacement, poverty, school-related pressures, and other forms of adversity. Strengthening mental health and psychosocial support for children and adolescents is therefore an important part of child protection, education, emergency preparedness, and community resilience.

Schools are a particularly important setting for mental health and psychosocial support, as they provide regular contact with children and adolescents and can help identify distress early, promote positive coping, strengthen peer and adult support, and connect children to appropriate services when needed. Teachers, school leaders, counsellors, education officials, parents, caregivers, peers, and community actors all have important roles to play in creating safe, inclusive, and supportive learning environments.

UNICEF, in partnership with the Government of Vanuatu, including the Ministry of Education and Training, is supporting the rollout of I Support My Friends, a peer-to-peer approach that equips children and adolescents to recognise signs of distress among their peers and provide safe, supportive, age-appropriate assistance. In Vanuatu, the initiative is being rolled out in schools, where trained children and adolescents support peers in distress under the guidance of trained adults, using psychological first aid principles such as Look, Listen and Link.

The rollout requires coordinated support for planning, training delivery, mentoring, follow-up with schools and trained adults, documentation of lessons learned, and coordination with government and other stakeholders. The National UN Volunteer will support UNICEF’s Child Protection team to strengthen implementation quality, promote child safeguarding standards, and ensure that learning from the rollout informs future programming.

Key Responsibilities

Under the direct supervision of the Child Protection Specialist / Child Protection Officer, and in close collaboration with other UNICEF colleagues, the Ministry of Education and Training, schools and relevant partners, the National UN Volunteer will support the rollout of I Support My Friends in Vanuatu.

The National UN Volunteer will:

• Support the Ministry of Education and Training to plan and coordinate rollout activities, including schedules, logistics, materials, participant lists, workplans and activity trackers.
• Support the organisation and delivery of I Support My Friends trainings for adult facilitators, school staff, children and adolescents, ensuring sessions are safe, inclusive, age-appropriate and aligned with child safeguarding and MHPSS principles.
• Provide mentoring and follow-up support to trained adults through school visits, remote check-ins, coaching and refresher activities.
• Document implementation progress, challenges, safeguarding or referral issues, support needs, lessons learned, promising practices and participant feedback.
• Support schools and trained adults to apply safe referral pathways and maintain confidentiality, informed participation, psychological first aid and survivor-centred approaches.
• Prepare concise activity, training, follow-up and learning reports, and provide inputs to programme, monitoring and donor reporting as required.
• Support coordination and communication with UNICEF, the Ministry of Education and Training, provincial education officers, schools, communities and other relevant stakeholders, including meeting notes and follow-up actions.
• Provide general programme, administrative and logistics support for related child protection, MHPSS, adolescent participation, violence prevention and emergency response activities, and perform other related tasks as assigned.

Required Skills and Experience

• Experience in social work, psychology or community development or other relevant programmes;
• Excellent oral and written skills; excellent drafting, formulation, reporting skills;
• Accuracy and professionalism in document production and editing;
• Excellent interpersonal skills; culturally and socially sensitive; ability to work inclusively and collaboratively with a range of partners, including grassroots community members, religious and youth organizations, and authorities at different levels; familiarity with tools and approaches of communications for development;
• Ability to work and adapt professionally and effectively in a challenging environment; ability to work effectively in a multicultural team of international and national personnel;
• Self-motivated, ability to work with minimum supervision; ability to work with tight deadlines;
• Sound security awareness;
• Have affinity with or interest in child rights, volunteerism as a mechanism for durable development, and the UN system.

Core Competencies

• Accountability
• Adaptability and flexibility
• Creativity
• Judgement and decision-making
• Planning and organising
• Professionalism
• Self-management

Living Conditions

As this is a National UN Volunteer assignment, the volunteer is expected to be familiar with local living conditions and to arrange their own accommodation and living essentials, in line with UNV conditions of service.

Travel outside the duty station will be undertaken in accordance with UNICEF and UNV procedures and subject to programme needs, security clearance, and available resources.

The assignment will require flexibility and adaptability to achieve outcomes, including participation in field activities, and engagement with schools and communities in different contexts.