Major Responsibilities:
1. Technical Leadership and Program Quality:
- Provide technical leadership and oversight to ensure EECD programming is designed, adapted, and delivered in line with IRC technical standards, national curricula, and international best practices.
- Support the development, review, and contextualization of technical tools, curricula, and learning materials.
- Establish and maintain quality benchmarks and technical guidance to ensure consistency across program sites.
- Contribute to desk reviews, documentation of best practices and evidence-based approaches, policy briefs, reflection and learning sessions, and technical fact sheets.
- Provide technical input into programme design, proposals, modifications, workplans and technical components of donor reports as required.
- Identify emerging technical gaps and program quality issues and recommend practical adaptations and corrective actions.
- Support the integration of cross-cutting priorities, including disability inclusion, gender equality, SEL/MHPSS, safeguarding, protection and inclusive education, into EECD technical approaches.
2. Government and Institutional Coordination:
- Serve as the primary technical focal point for coordination with relevant government bodies and ministries, including the Ministry of Education and Higher Education (MEHE), the Ministry of Social Affairs (MoSA), and the Ministry of Public Health (MoPH).
- Represent IRC in technical working groups, sector coordination meetings, subnational level meetings, and relevant government-led forums.
- Support alignment of EECD programming with national policies, strategies, and standards.
- Build and maintain strong working relationships with ministry counterparts, donors, and other technical stakeholders.
3. Field-Level Training and Technical Support:
- Design and lead the delivery of trainings, coaching, and capacity-building for facilitators, teachers, caregivers, and partners.
- Develop training materials, facilitator guides, presentations, practical tools and follow-up mechanisms to support effective application of learning.
- Conduct Training of Trainers (ToTs) and support trained government, partner and programme staff to cascade technical content while maintaining quality and fidelity.
- Conduct regular field visits and structured observations to assess quality of implementation, provide on-the-spot technical coaching, and identify capacity-building needs.
- Document training outcomes, observation findings, and lessons learned to inform continuous program improvement.
4. Partner Technical Support:
- Support partner technical assessments and capacity-strengthening plans.
- Provide ongoing technical follow-up, mentoring and coaching to implementing partners to strengthen their technical capacity and ensure adherence to quality standards.
- Contribute with technical input to partner review meetings and feedback processes.
5. Policy, Advocacy, and Representation:
- Support the design and implementation of EECD-related policy and advocacy initiatives in coordination with government stakeholders and strategic partners.
- Contribute with technical inputs to policy briefs, position papers, presentations, and advocacy materials.
6. MEAL and Learning:
- Work closely with MEAL colleagues to ensure program indicators, assessments, monitoring tools and data collection approaches appropriately measure technical quality and outcomes.
- Regularly review program and quality data to identify trends, gaps and areas requiring technical adaptation or additional support.
- Contribute to baseline/endline assessments, evaluations, research, success stories, and other learning initiatives relevant to EECD programming.
- Facilitate technical reflection and learning sessions with program teams and partners and ensure findings inform program improvements.
- Document promising practices, lessons learned and evidence from implementation and support their translation into technical guidance and systems-strengthening work.
Key Working Relationships:
- Reports to: EECD Senior Technical Manager
- Internal Contacts: EECD team, Regional team, Policy, Advocacy and Communications team, MEAL and Partnerships teams.
- External Contacts: Relevant government ministries focal points (including MEHE, MoSA, MoPH), local NGOs and INGOs, UN agencies, and local Education/EECD stakeholders and working groups.
Requirements:
- 4-5 years of relevant professional experience in ECD programming, including technical design and delivery (a must).
- Previous NGO/INGO experience required.
- Demonstrated experience engaging and coordinating with government ministries and institutional stakeholders.
- Strong facilitation skills, and experience in training design, delivery, and capacity building.
- Good understanding of MEAL approaches and the use of data and evidence for programme quality improvement.
- Ability to translate evidence and programme learning into practical technical recommendations, tools and approaches.
- Strong representation, communication, and stakeholder management skills.
Education:
- Bachelor's degree in Early Childhood Development, or a related field.
Language Skills:
- Fluency in Arabic and English required.
Working Environment:
- Position is based in IRC Beirut office in Lebanon.
- The role requires frequent travel to programme and partner implementation sites across Lebanon.
- The position combines office-based technical work, government engagement, training delivery and substantial field-based technical support.
The IRC and IRC workers must adhere to the values and principles outlined in IRC Way - Standards for Professional Conduct. These are Integrity, Service, and Accountability. In accordance with these values, the IRC operates and enforces policies on Beneficiary Protection from Exploitation and Abuse, Child Safeguarding, Anti Workplace Harassment, Fiscal Integrity, and Anti-Retaliation.
