Designation: Social Mobilizer, Girls Education Program
Department: GEP
No of Positions: Three (03)
Location: Rangareddy, Telangana
Organizational Profile:
Room to Read India was established in 2003 and presently has programs in twelve states – Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Delhi NCR, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Telangana, Uttarakhand, and Uttar Pradesh. Room to Read is a global organization transforming the lives of millions of children by focusing on literacy and gender equality in education. Since 2000, Room to Read has benefited more than 52 million children across 29 countries. Learn more at www.roomtoreadindia.org
Position Summary:
The Girl’s Education Program is currently operating in 7 States across India – Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, New Delhi, Uttarakhand, Telangana, Madhya Pradesh, and Maharashtra. Specifically, the program seeks to achieve increased years of schooling for girls and increase girls’ self-awareness, decision- making and problem-solving skills. The Social Mobilizers are responsible for implementing the Girls’ Education program at the field level. They are the first point of contact for the girls whom we work with; they are also the point of contact for the schools and parents and hence are critical to the success of the program. The social mobilizer will report to the Program Associate/State Coordinator. The position will be field based; she will be responsible for a group of 90 girls as their mentor, support system and motivator.
Responsibilities:
Program planning, implementation:
- Develop a thorough understanding of Room to Read’s Girls’ Education program design and
- implement activities basis the Inputs from the State GEP teams.
- Responsible for ongoing implementation of the Girls’ Education program, as per the Global design.
- Program planning (in consultation with State Office and program associate)
- Attend regular weekly and monthly workshops where weekly and monthly plans are made and reviewed – also attend mandatory training of social Mobilizers.
- To Support program team in implementing the programmatic activities.
- Undertake corrective action and incorporate feedback when provided by the supervisor for life skills sessions etc.
Family and Community engagement:
- Lead and organize Teachers, family, and community meeting and consultation with school staff, teacher, parents, and community members/organizations as per design with input of Program Associate.
- Facilitating donor, INCO (India County Office), SO (State Office) team members visit.
- Looking after all logistics required to conduct any activity at school level.
- Facilitating and supporting SO/INCO team members to conduct any research/survey/study/data collection/baseline etc.
- Seeking the opportunities for networking at local level to create a resource pool to be used as a referral if there is a need.
- Ensure the sustainability of the program with the help of Bal Sakha program and other collaborations with school.
Working with girls on Life skills, Mentoring, Life skills clubs:
- Conducting life skills sessions for 90 girls in batches of 20-25 as per the prescribed session content and as per agreed plan. Each girl will receive 16 life skills sessions in one year.
- Life skills clubs/Children group formation and facilitating the group members to hold regular meetings as planned per the state Budget- 8 meetings a year with all girls.
- Conducting group mentoring sessions for 90 girls in batches of 10-12 girls regularly per prescribed content guidelines and records each session.
- Plays an active role in fleshing out the group mentoring sessions with the Program Associate basis inputs from Girls on what is required.
- Conduction individual mentoring sessions as needed.
Setting up Life skills centres /Gender Resource Centres:
- Setting up a Gender resource Centre (GRC) for life skills in schools /community for life skills sessions.
- Ensuring proper functioning and usage of GRC as per discussion with state GEP (Girls Education program) teams.
- Ensure the space is clean, safe and welcoming to girls.
- Ensure the space is well stocked with drawings/articles/ expressions of children’s voices; changing and putting up the articles/drawings/paintings on bulletin board periodically at least once a month.
Home visits:
- Mapping data as per the risk and response protocol and then making specific home visits. (The objective of the risk and response protocol is to act based on an analysis of the four risk factors for girls dropping out. This involves tracking of each girl, understanding the risk, flagging concerns, suggesting solutions, motivating the girls to take necessary action and ultimately preventing the girl from dropping out. All this requires a very high level of analytical and strategic thinking skills, which are not currently available in the SMs (Social Mobilizer).
Undertaking regular school visits.
- Handling any critical matters that may emerge from these interactions.
- Organizing/conducting programmatic activities at school and community as per mutually agreed plan and responsible for managing relationships with school, community and respond to issues that may arise.
- The quality of home visits is expected to be of high as the expectation is of higher levels of engagement and effective mentoring and outreach to families.
Record keeping, Reporting and monitoring:
- Update records of attendance and parent meetings regularly.
- Prepare and submit weekly plans during weekly reviews.
- Timely record keeping, updating the data and sharing analysis of various parameters like attendance sheets, parent meetings, drop outs etc.
- Filling up socio-economic profile of the girls.
- Regular physical verification of girls on sample basis.
- Periodic cohort risk assessment and analysis of it. Flagging issues of concern. It is expected that Social Mobilizers will undertake risk mapping of the entire cohort as many girls drop out during transition from grade 8 and grade 11. They would need to flag these cases and identify local solutions that may keep the girls in the schools.
- Identify case studies of girls, schools/communities and best practices and gather all related data and information.
- Maintaining stock register at school/center level.
- Provide a list of materials required for the girls to the supervisors.
- Filling the individual mentoring form.
- Supporting PA (Program Associate) in filling the PIMS (Program Implementation Monitoring Sheet)
Qualifications:
Required:
- Bachelor’s degree in education / social sciences or equivalent/ or higher.
- Minimum experience of 2 years (1-2 years of relevant experience in the education /development sector including internships).
- Good verbal and written communication skills in English/ Hindi and the local language of the state where position is based.
Preferred:
- Counselling diploma and/or experience of having worked on mentoring /counselling issues
- Experience working on life skills/gender /adolescents.
- Strong planning and project implementation skills.
- Ability to work in remote area and travel to communities for meetings.
- Ability to work effectively with schools and communities.
- Strong written and oral communication skills
- Good interpersonal skills and a team player.
Compensation:
Room to Read offers a competitive salary with excellent benefits. Benefits include thirteenth month bonus, health insurance and a retirement plan. The non-monetary compensation includes a unique opportunity to be part of an innovative, meaningful, and rapidly growing organization that is changing transforming the lives of millions of children in developing countries on literacy and gender equality in education.
Application Procedure:
Room to Read is a child-safe organization; all personnel are expected to adhere to Room to Read’s Child Protection Policy and Child Protection Code of Conduct.
Room to Read is proud to be an equal opportunity employer committed to identifying and developing the skills and leadership of people from diverse backgrounds. EOE/M/F/Vet/Disabled.