Background

The World Bank estimates that if every girl worldwide were to receive 12 years of quality schooling, their lifetime earnings could increase by $15 trillion to $30 trillion. An estimated 75 million girls and boys have limited or no access to education due to crises and conflicts around the globe.

In Ethiopia, Gender is deep-rooted in socio-cultural, economic, and political structures and thus, gender equality is closely linked to every development agenda, ranging from the elimination of poverty to the promotion of peace and democratic rights. Education remains to be one of the key instruments to promote gender equality and to enhance equitable growth. Therefore, promoting gender equality in the Ethiopian education and training sector has been well recognized since the launching of the education and training policy. Given this context, this “Gender Strategy in the Education and Training Sector” has been developed in line with the national priorities to be addressed in the second GTP and fifth ESDP as well as the global sustainable development agendas of gender equality in education.

Equitable provision of quality primary and secondary education for both girls and boys is an essential goal for ensuring socio-economic development. Hence, improving completion rates of primary and secondary education, for girls enables them to realize their rights and to increase their human capital. This in turn enhances their productivity and per capita income which ultimately reduces their poverty. Studies on returns to education by gender indicate that the overall return is higher for girls and women accounting for 9.8 % while for boys and men it is 8.7% (2004). And yet, investment in girls’ education is very low, mainly the share of girl’s admission to secondary school is around 44.4%( Ethiopia ECW MYRP: program Document).

In the displacement situation, the study noted that displaced women and girls were being further marginalized as a result of pre-existing gender inequalities, including widespread sexual violence against young women and girls. Several factors contribute to these risks, including human rights violations during displacement, minority status, lack of access to water, food, or fuel, lack of social support, and extreme poverty.

The multi-year resilience programs (MYRP) are funded by Education Cannot Wait to ensure access, continuity, protection, equity, and gender equality in education for children– especially the most vulnerable groups with special attention to girls, children with disabilities, and minorities.

Using schools to deliver a range of gender-responsive services helps strengthen children’s ability to cope in times of crisis, improving their overall status of well-being and resilience. Understanding the specific coping strategies and absorptive, adaptive, and transformative capacities of women, men, girls, and boys in emergency-affected school communities will be critical in developing context relevant and gender-responsive resilience-building strategies. Such school-based initiatives can be supported by strengthening the capacity of education authorities, including education planners and school inspectors, to resource, promote, and supervise their effective implementation also building institutional resilience in the sector. Schools that become platforms for integrated service delivery can be supported within a comprehensive school safety framework, where explicit gender-responsive risk reduction strategies can be implemented in and around schools to safeguard education and protect learners and education personnel.

Obstacles prevent the most vulnerable children, such as girls and children with disabilities, from accessing education, including socio-cultural beliefs; negative and prevalent stereotypes on gender and disability; lack of inclusive education system and gender-sensitive and inclusive infrastructure facilities; gender-based violence that affects vulnerable children

Child safeguarding is making an organization and its programs safe for children. It involves a collective and individual responsibility and actions to ensure that all children are protected from deliberate or unintentional acts that lead to the risk of or actual harm by anyone, who meets children or affects them through a development intervention, humanitarian responses, and operations.

 Objective and scope of the work

The purpose of this consultancy is to identify gender inequality issues and child safeguarding challenges in implementing education in emergency programs and find out ways for providing safe and secure learning environments that help these groups of children to secure better learning outcome and a wider range of social, emotional, and cognitive skills necessary to live.

 The assignment is expected to identify factors that contribute to creating gender inequalities in education, the problems of child safeguarding, and the development of MYRP package including guidance notes and training tools to link protection and education systems that has to be done based on the findings of the study. The specific actions that each stakeholder needs to take have also been considered in this study.

The findings will be an input to meet our goals that aim to improve access, learning, reduce inequity in education, and strengthen national education systems.

Expected deliverables

Deliverable 1: Inception report detailing the consultant's understanding of the task and the methodology to be employed to complete the task and the production of the proposed deliverables forward, including a work schedule.

Deliverable 2: Detailed Gender Equity Research reports describing the proposed research on gender equality, safeguarding in emergencies, and development of child safeguarding MYRP package including guidance notes and training tools to link protection and education systems.

Deliverable 3: Final Gender Equity Research studies report

Duration of the contract

The consultancy is expected to take 60 working days

Job Requirements

Required Expertise and Qualification

Education qualification of the consultant firm :

• Key staff in the firm need to have a postgraduate or other advanced university degree (at least MA. or equivalent) in the area of gender and development, other Social Science or related field and A minimum of 10 years of professional work experience in Gender equality and Inclusion, child safeguarding 
• Experience of the consultant firm :
• At least 10 years of professional experience in Gender equality and Inclusion, child safeguarding
• Demonstrated experience in education sector gender equality and inclusion in humanitarian settings,
• Extensive conceptual and practical knowledge of national government operating strategic principles including plans and policies;
• Experience in working and collaborating with stakeholders including governments civil society and communities in Ethiopia;
• Demonstrated ability of analytical and report drafting work;

How to Apply

Application procedures

Qualified and interested candidates are hereby requested to apply (either as a team or individually). The application should contain the following:

• A technical proposal with a brief description of why the individual considers him/herself as the most suitable for the assignment, and a detailed clear methodology, on how they will approach and complete the assignment; a duly accomplished Letter of Confirmation of Interest and Availability;
• The technical proposal should also contain a personal CV, indicating education background/professional qualifications, all experience, as well as the contact details (email and telephone number) of the candidate and at least three (3) professional references;
• Financial proposal that indicates the all-inclusive fixed total contract price, supported by a breakdown of costs, as per template provided.

Detailed EOI for the Consultancy work should be Submitted in hard copy to Save the Children Ethiopia Country Office in Addis Ababa, situated around Bisrate Gabriel Church Save the Children Ethiopia Office At the Main Security Gate

Dire Complex, Behind Bisrate Gabriel Church P.O Box 387 Tel. 01137284 5561/ 0116 535174 Addis Ababa

Interested applicants should submit two separate sealed documents in which one document should include the technical proposal including of the proposed professional(s) with supporting document that shows previous work experience. The second document should include professional fee stated work along with copy of renewed Audit License to the above mentioned address of Save the Children, Ethiopia Country Office before or on March 05,2021 at 4:00 P.M in person.

Closing date for submission of the application package is end of business day on: March 05, 2021

Bid shall be submitted in the box ready at reception for this purpose

Save the children reserved the right to cancel all the bid or partially