Organization: UN Children"s Fund
Country: United States of America
Closing date: 08 Sep 2015
Background
According to its mission statement, “UNICEF is guided by the Convention on the Rights of the Child and strives to establish children"s rights as enduring ethical principles and international standards of behaviour towards children.” Since the creation in 1990 of the Committee on the Rights of the Child to monitor implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, UNICEF has engaged with its reporting process, encouraging States to engage in a constructive spirit with the CRC Committee; promoting a participatory and transparent process that draws the attention of all sectors of society to the rights of the child; participating in pre-sessional working groups and providing reports on the situation of children’s rights at national level; and supporting the dissemination, implementation and follow-up of the Committee’s Concluding Observations and Recommendations.
This work has been grounded in the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which, in its Article 45 (see Annex 4), gives the specialized UN agencies, in particular UNICEF, a special role in the implementation of the Convention and the reporting process. In order to guide these efforts, UNICEF has, since 1997, regularly updated an internal resource guide for country offices on the reporting process to the CRC. In 2011, this guide was adapted for use by National Committees, which was not finalised. Informal guidance has also been developed to guide country office engagement with other treaty bodies and the Universal Periodic Review process and guidance is given on an as-needed basis to National Committees for similar engagement.
The UNICEF Programme Division Human Rights Unit provides technical support to UNICEF country offices in implementing human rights related activities, including engaging with the Committee on the Rights of the Child and other human rights mechanisms. The Unit also engages with the CRC and other human rights mechanisms in their global work, including the development of General Comments, the conduct of Days of General Discussion and revision of working methods. In all this, the Unit collaborates closely with regional offices and with technical sectors in Programme Division and beyond. The PFP Child Rights Advocacy and Education Unit (CRAE) provides UNICEF’s National Committees in industrialised countries with guidance and technical support for their advocacy and Child Rights Education (CRE) activities, working closely with other relevant UNICEF Divisions. This includes providing National Committees with support and guidance on advocacy and coordination and technical support for CRC advocacy on issues such as SDG implementation, humanitarian crises, child poverty, migration, and climate change. The two teams are joining forces on the development of a comprehensive resource kit to guide UNICEF country offices and National Committees in their strategic engagement with treaty body and UPR reporting processes in order to advance children’s rights in their countries, taking an approach that recognizes the universality of children’s rights.
Purpose
The objective of this consultancy is to develop the content of an interactive resource kit to strengthen UNICEF’s country level programming, advocacy, and policy work on child rights, across all regions of the world and sectors, through strengthened engagement with treaty bodies and more effective use of recommendations. The main focus is the reporting process of the Committee on the Rights of the Child, but the kit will also serve to inform UNICEF, including National Committee, engagement with other treaty body reporting processes, in particular the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) and CEDAW, and the Universal Periodic Review process of the UN Human Rights Council.
The kit will set out the respective roles of country offices, regional offices, National Committees, the PD Human Rights team and PFP CRAE at all stages of the cycle, from advocacy for ratification of key instruments, to implementation of concluding observations, and will provide guidance at all these levels for the most strategic use of the reporting process in strengthening the implementation of children’s rights.
The basis for this work will be the existing resource guides for UNICEF country offices and National Committees, which will be revised, updated, and shared on the UNICEF intranet, in order to make the resource kit more widely accessible, more interactive and easier to navigate. It will contain links to case studies from field offices and National Committees on all stages of the process; generic PowerPoint presentations; video interviews with UNICEF country office and National Committee staff, Committee members and other resource persons; webinars; and other relevant resources from UNICEF offices, National Committees and external partners. These supplementary resources will be added over time. The resource kit and its links will be updated on a regular basis once online.
The preparation of the kit will be further informed by the recently developed “Areas of Work for the UNICEF human rights function”, resources prepared by other stakeholders, and requests and queries received from field offices and National Committees. Its development will be jointly led by the PD Human Rights Unit and the PFP CRAE Unit, in consultation with an advisory group consisting of HQ, RO and National Committee staff, and key external resource persons from OHCHR and Child Rights Connect.
Expected results and deliverables
Under the joint supervision of the PD Geneva-based Human Rights Specialist, and the Programme Specialist in the PFP Child Rights Advocacy and Education Unit, in close consultation with the advisory group to be established, the consultant/s will reconceptualise and revise the current UNICEF resource guide for CRC reporting and produce a new resource kit for engagement with the CRC, other treaty bodies (in particular CRPD and CEDAW) and the UPR, to be made available online. This will include the following activities:
· Development of a workplan for the project for approval by supervisors, based on desk review of existing resources
· Preparation of concept for the resource kit for review and approval by the advisory group. This will require consultation and collaboration with a web design expert to be contracted separately, and will also include a detailed listing of related resources to be developed and added in the future (e.g. checklists, video interviews, webinars, etc.)
· Interviews with 5-7 key stakeholders to inform the strategic direction and content of the resource kit, including development of interview questionnaire and summary report
· Identification and documentation of 5-7 case studies (maximum one page each) of strategic engagement with various aspects of the reporting processes of the CRC and other human rights mechanisms by UNICEF country offices and National Committees at national level.
· Support to the planning and conduct of a workshop with key experts to inform the development of the resource kit.
· Drafting the substantive content of the resource kit, based on the desk review of existing resources, stakeholder interviews, the outcomes of the workshop, and other resources provided by the supervisors, and incorporating comments received from advisory group on first draft
· Preparing list of Powerpoint presentations that would be helpful to UNICEF offices and national committees at all stages of the reporting process, and prepare/revise/update a set of Powerpoint presentations accordingly
Duty Station
Home based. Geneva or New York would be ideal, but not essential. Travel unlikely, except possibly to a workshop in New York.
Timeframe
35 working days
Start date: 14 September 2015 End date: 18 December 2015
A detailed workplan will be developed based on discussions between the consultant and supervisors at the outset of the project, based on the tentative timeline in the table below.
Key skills, technical background, and experience required
- Advanced degree in human rights, law, international relations, political science or related field
- 8 years of prior mid-level experience of in children’s rights, advocacy, and/or communications
- Good writing skills in English, fluency in other UN languages an asset.
- Ability to work independently and to meet tight deadlines.
- Familiarity with the work of treaty bodies, and in particular the CRC
- Familiarity with the work of UNICEF country offices and the advocacy work of UNICEF National Committees an asset
- Strong analytical and conceptual thinking.
- Experience of conceptualizing and/or designing interactive web tools an asset.
- *Please see deliverables within the following link: http://www.unicef.org/about/employ/index_consultancy_assignments.html
How to apply:
How to Apply
Applicants are requested to send their submissions to <**pdconsultants@unicef.org>with subject line: **“Treaty Body Resource Kit, Consultancy” by 08 September 2015, 5:00pm EST.
Applications must include:
· Cover letter,
· CV, and
· P-11 form (http://www.unicef.org/about/employ/files/P11.doc)
· Indicate where you heard about this advertisement
Please indicate your ability, availability and daily/monthly rate (in US$) to undertake the terms of reference above. Applications without a daily/monthly rate will not be considered.
NOTE: Files should not exceed 5.0MB limit
UNICEF is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality and culture. Individuals from minority groups, indigenous groups and persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence.
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