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Program Overview:

The five-year READ II project, funded by USAID, will boost the quality of literacy instruction and student support, reaching out to children at risk of failure and dropout caused by cognitive, emotional and physical effects of hunger, violence, and displacement. READ II seeks to better equip teachers with effective early grade reading instruction techniques and materials in seven mother-tongue languages and English, while simultaneously building a culture of reading in the school, home and community.

Position Summary:

The Senior In-Service Enhanced Professional Development (EPD) Specialist is responsible for leading the development and implementation of an evidence-based two-tiered training and mentoring model for teachers in Grades 1 to 8.

Reporting & Supervision:

The Senior In-Service Enhanced Professional Development Specialist reports to the Deputy Chief of Party.

Primary Responsibilities:

• Ensure consistent and quality delivery of training at the Master Trainers’ Training, Training of Trainers (TOT) and Teacher Training levels.
• Train and manage Master Trainers and Trainers, when required.
• Develop TOT manuals and cluster-led training guides to facilitate greater understanding of literacy and language pedagogical components and guide implementation of evidence-based reading and writing instruction and continuous assessment.
• Develop mentoring tools for use by mentors to provide guidance and feedback to teachers.

• Contribute to the development and oversee the use of mentoring protocols and procedure that will be implemented at the school and woreda levels and monitored at the Zonal and Regional Education Bureau levels.
• Work with trainers/mentors to provide the skills and materials to continually improve, adapt, and cater trainings based on post-test performance data and information on individual teacher performance gathered during mentoring sessions.
• Develop mentor recruitment and selection criteria and formalize certification of mentors, and work to institutionalize a mentor incentive package.
• Ensure all teacher behavior and learning materials are gender-sensitive, respond to needs of children with disabilities, and be respectful of student diversities.
• Manage the outputs and performance of regionally based EPD & Pre-Service Coordinators.
• Create linkages between pre-service and in-service teacher training interventions of READ II
• Establish communication, collaboration and cooperation system across partners and stakeholders
• Collaborate effectively with Ministry of Education, Regional Education Bureaus, and Colleges of Teacher Education on training and other activities
• Collaborate with the Materials Development Specialist and the Senior Reading Specialist to contribute to the development of project reading instruction materials
• Closely work with M&E team for the monitoring, evaluation and learning related activities
• Closely work with READ II partners in order to effectively utilize technology for in-service teacher professional development

• Other related duties as assigned

Required Skills & Qualifications:

• Master’s or Bachelor’s degree in education or related pedagogically oriented field;
• At least 8 years of experience for Master’s or 10 years of experience for Bachelor specifically to improve education programming directed to rural, ethno-linguistic underserved populations;
• Demonstrated experience and knowledge of teacher professional development and mentoring
• Proven experience developing effective training materials
• Proven experience in early grade reading and literacy instruction
• Prior experience with supporting family/community engagement of education outcomes
• Professional proficiency in written and spoken and English

Fluency in English and other relevant local languagesDuty Station: READ II Central Office – Addis Ababa