Education Development Center
Founded in 1958, EDC is an international non-governmental organization that works to build bridges between educational research, policy and practice. EDC’s headquarters is located in Waltham, Massachusetts, USA, with additional offices in New York City, Washington, DC, Nairobi, and Bangkok. EDC manages 250 projects in 35 countries with more than 1,350 employees worldwide.
EDC is committed to diversity in the workplace.
The USAID-funded Connecting the Mekong through Education and Training (USAID COMET) project will help universities and vocational centers to increase the number of skilled workers in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics, Accounting and Tourism (STEM+AT) fields in the Lower Mekong countries: Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam. USAID COMET seeks to bridge the gap between the private sector, universities and vocational centers in order to ensure the supply of skilled workers meets the demands from local businesses. The project will rely on mobile technology, online learning, and traditional in-person workshops to promote regional networking in ASEAN and to help people from rural and marginalized areas access educational services.
Over the course of the five-year project, the capacity of vocational centers and universities will be strengthened so that they can develop future leaders who demonstrate the skills needed to catalyze job growth in high demand industries in the sub-region. This project will ultimately empower the Lower Mekong countries with a workforce that can bridge the development gap within ASEAN and take advantage of the benefits under the ASEAN Economic Community.
Title: Country Coordinator for Vietnam
Type of Appointment: Consultant contract; Part-time up to 120 days until December 31, 2015
Travel Required: Up to 50% domestic and 5% international travel
Job Responsibilities:
Program Management
- Serve as the focal point for the coordination of administrative and operational aspects of the USAID COMET project in the country, including supervision of project activities in coordination with senior management;
- Contribute to developing and maintaining strong partnerships with project stakeholders, including education institutions, private sector, government, and donor representatives to optimize project impact;
- Provide ongoing technical support and monitoring of USAID COMET project activities at partner institutions especially with instructors responsible for delivering USAID COMET training;
- Facilitate arrangements for organizing meetings, trainings, workshops, and other project activities;
- Work closely with and report to the Country Activities Coordinator on a regular basis to cover progress of project activities, issues of concern, and needs for technical assistance;
- Contribute to the technical design of program activities including annual workplans and the project’s grants component;
- Assist in preparing reporting deliverables including quarterly reports, annual reports, project success stories and others as needed;
- Preform other duties as requested by the project.
M&E
- Work closely with the USAID COMET M&E team to coordinate, and support the monitoring of project activities in the selected country;
- Participate in the design and administration of ad-hoc research studies, as required.
Communications
- Work closely with the USAID COMET Communications team and contribute to the development of press releases, success stories and project briefers as required;
- Contribute to the development of content for the project’s social network sites and website.
Qualifications and Requirements:
- Master’s degree with 5 years of experience in project development, implementation and evaluation, and/or program coordination or Bachelor’s degree with 7 years of relevant experience;
- Experience working with higher education and vocational institutions in a grants management and/or capacity building function;
- Have demonstrated experience working with the private sector, preferably in the skills development area or areas related to USAID COMET;
- Ability to manage multiple work assignments under minimal supervision;
- Good level of computer literacy, including database applications and knowledge of web portals;
- Excellent written and oral communication skills in English;
- Respect for diversity and ability to work effectively and harmoniously in a team and with colleagues from varied cultures and professional backgrounds;
- Experience in working on USAID-funded projects is desirable.
This is a local hire consultant position and is open only to citizens of Vietnam. Interested qualified candidates are requested to submit their CV and cover letter to [email protected] [1] by July 15, 2015. To ensure the timely review of your credentials, please insert “Country Coordinator” in the subject line of the email. Only short-listed candidates will be contacted.