Position Title: Project Associate - District
Department: State Project Management Unit (SPMU) – FLN & Quality Education, Jharkhand
Reporting to: District Lead – SPMU
Location: One of the Division Headquarter (District) with frequent travel to allocated districts

Number of openings: Three (03).

Organization Profile:

Founded in 2000 on the belief that World Change Starts with Educated Children®, Room to Read develops children’s foundational literacy skills, as well as life skills that promote gender equality. Committed to accelerating learning outcomes for more children, more quickly, we have benefited 45 million children across 28 countries. In India, we are working since 2003 and have positively influenced lives of more than 18 million children. Presently, we work across the 10 Indian states of Chhattisgarh, New Delhi, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Telangana, Uttarakhand, and Uttar Pradesh. Learn more at www.roomtoreadindia.org.

About the Project:

Room to Read, in partnership with the Jharkhand Education Project Council (JEPC), is setting up a State Project Management Unit (SPMU) to strengthen the Quality Education ecosystem in the state over a five-year period (2025–2030). The SPMU will design and implement initiatives aligned with the state’s FLN (Foundational Literacy and Numeracy) Mission and other quality education interventions at scale across Jharkhand. This includes driving academic excellence, system strengthening, teacher development, data-based decision making, and community engagement across all districts.

Position Summary:

The District Project Associate will report to the State District Lead and play a critical role in implementing the State’s FLN and Quality Education initiatives across all the allocated districts. The role will involve close coordination with the district education departments to drive strategic execution, capacity building, and data-driven decision-making. The PA will lead a team of District Academic Coordinators (DACs) and closely work in alignment with the SPMU team to ensure timely implementation of project activities and reform strategies. This role requires a balance of academic expertise (FLN and Primary school education), team management, stakeholder engagement, and project monitoring. The role will focus on system strengthening at district level, providing academic leadership, supporting implementation of state priorities on FLN and quality education, and ensuring effective stakeholder engagement.

Key Roles & Responsibilities:

A. Project Implementation and Coordination:

• Support the initiative in the allocated (multiple) districts and guide the team for improving FLN outcomes in the short and long term by fostering activities between districts, to drive change and prioritizing interventions, to achieve desired learning outcomes of children.
• Collate insights and learnings from the districts and block level review meeting, EVV data and share with supervisor for review and improvement of the project, to achieve desired objectives.
• Participate in monthly review meetings held in state and districts to support the DCs/DEOs/BPOs/ DACs in setting the FLN focused agenda for these meetings, reflecting on insights from data collected by the districts, and prioritizing the project goals at the district level.
• Coordinate with the district officials for timely delivery of FLN Kit/ Teaching learning Material to all schools, and support in tracking the progress regularly.
• Guide the team to facilitate district and block-level campaigns/ events aligned with SPMU goals and ensure timely implementation.

B. Technical (Academic) Support:

• Act as the district-level anchor of the SPMU, championing the FLN and Quality Education reform agenda across allocated districts for primary grades.
• Support teams to foster strong partnerships with district education functionaries to create a shared vision for FLN success.
• Coordinate with district officials for effective usage of existing and new teaching learning material by teachers, children, CRPs as desired.

C. Capacity Building and Training:

• Support the capacity building of district and block officials in innovative thinking, leadership and effective execution leading to an overall improved administrative capacity in the district, by facilitating learning visits, interactions with experts, facilitated and targeted FLN sessions.
• Support team members to facilitate capacity building of key stakeholders including Block Education Officers, Cluster Resource Persons and teachers on technical (academic) knowledge and skills through regular trainings, workshops and meetings on FLN and quality education goals, ensuring coherence with the state roadmap.
• Strengthen district mechanisms for quality data reporting through regular mentoring of stakeholders on the use of tools like the EVV app, to reflect on the data and use it for decision-making and course correction.

D. Monitoring, Evaluation and Reporting:

• Track implementation progress, data collection and analysis systems for the districts using established monitoring tools (EVV) and frameworks, ensuring actionable insights reach all the relevant stakeholders in a district.
• Collate monthly data and reports as per the template, for all the allocated districts and share with DL-SPMU, capturing achievements, gaps, and recommendations based on field insights.
• Collate and document key insights, case studies, and success stories from the field to build a repository of implementation learnings.

E. Team Management and Mentoring:

• Supervise and mentor a team of District Academic Coordinators (DACs), supporting them in effective field engagement, data-based decision-making and achieving district level and state level FLN - quality education goals.
• Build a strong performance and learning culture among the team through regular coaching and field accompaniment.

Any additional tasks allocated by supervisor, with-in the scope of the overall project and program implementation done by Room to Read across states.

Qualification and Requirements:

• Postgraduate degree in Public Policy, Development Studies, Education, Management or a related field.
• Minimum experience of 5 yrs in development sector, government engagement, with atleast 2 years of relevant experience in the school education scale-up project.
• Prior experience of working with Government at state or districts level is a must.
• Strong understanding of government systems, protocols, administration, and decision-making processes.
• Excellent team management and coordination skills.
• Ability to analyse data and generate insights for decision-making.
• Strong verbal communication and writing skills in Hindi and good writing skills in English.

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.

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.

Application Procedure:

Kindly CLICK HERE  to submit the application.

Due to the high volume of applicant responses, not all applicants may receive a response from Room to Read. Room to Read is an equal opportunity employer committed to identifying and developing the skills and leadership of people from diverse backgrounds. We always encourage women to apply.

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