Child Participation Officer Lumos

London, United Kingdom

Job Description

Job Title: Child Participation Officer

Location: London

Salary: £ 28000 - £ 30000 per annum

Hours: Full time (35 hours per week)

Terms: Permanent contract

Responsible To: Programmes Development Coordinator

Reference: CPO-2011-07

Background

Lumos is a registered charity working to transform the lives of disadvantaged children by facilitating the end of institutional care. We work to tackle poverty and disadvantage, to promote educational inclusion, child health and development, and to prevent child abuse and neglect in any part of the world. Our work currently focuses particularly on Moldova, Montenegro, Bulgaria and the Czech Republic.
With the involvement of skilled professionals, we raise awareness of the plight of children to those who can help and promote best practice. Our target audience includes central governments, local authorities, non-governmental organisations, local communities and the general public.

Lumos operates large-scale deinstitutionalisation programmes in four countries in Central and Eastern Europe. We also work closely at the highest level with European structures and UN agencies to foster improved international cooperation on deinstitutionalisation and to ensure that institutionalised children are a policy and funding priority in the European region.
During 2012, we are planning to expand our work into two more countries, to strengthen and build upon our advocacy work and to introduce a new programme of public campaigning to end the systematic institutionalisation of children.

Supported by the European Commission – and with partners in the Czech Republic and Bulgaria – Lumos are undertaking an 18 month pilot project entitled “Turning Words into Action: Enabling the Rights and Inclusion of Children with Intellectual Disabilities in Europe”.

Aim of this project: to improve the life chances, inclusion, access to rights and social participation of children with an intellectual disability in Europe. To ensure that all children and young people with intellectual disabilities become fully participating and included members of their communities with genuinely equal opportunities to their peers and support proportional to their needs.

Two aspects of project activities will operate concurrently: National Action and Child Participation.

National Action

Through a series of three local meetings in each project country and two transnational meetings, each country will be supported to develop within their national policy priorities a National Action Plan (NAP) for the social protection and social inclusion of children with intellectual disabilities.

Child Participation

A group of children with intellectual disabilities, both from residential institutions and family homes, will come together for a series of activities throughout the project. These activities will include consultation on the NAPs as well as events aimed at increasing the visibility and understanding of disability in local communities.

Job Purpose

The Child Participation Officer will have overall responsibility for the management of day-to-day activities of this project and for developing Child Participation activities throughout Lumos Programme work.

In both contexts he/she will have the primary responsibility in developing participatory processes with children and young people (including children with physical impairments, learning disabilities, children living in institutions or family-type environments, and young adults leaving the care system) in Lumos Programme Countries, to ensure that they are actively and meaningfully included in planning regarding decisions which affect their lives.

Role Summary

Duties will be divided into project specific duties and general duties which should each take up 50% of the Child Participation Officer’s time.

Project specific duties:

• Overall responsibility for coordinating all project activities;
• Work in partnership with the project management team and a wide range of project partners and participants;
• Facilitate and organise communications across all project participants including the Steering Committee, project partners, local working groups, and Local Coordinators (LC);
• Support LCs in the design and facilitation of child participation activities and development of children’s councils in project countries;
• Support local working groups as needed in their ongoing efforts towards production of a national action plan;
• In cooperation with the Finance & Administration Officer (FAO), organise and offer logistical support to the Steering Committee meetings; assist LCs to organise in-country meetings; attend meetings as needed and negotiated;
• Primary responsibility for organisation of transnational workshops;
• Ensure all activities and outputs are obtained in a timely manner, as outlined in the project timeline; keep track of timelines, outstanding tasks, upcoming activities; identify early warning signs and problem solve;
• Facilitate and organise the production of project outputs and publications by coordinating authors, assisting with drafting and managing production and dissemination of documents;
• With the FAO, organise materials and information for posting on the project website with frequent and timely updates;
• Organise and assist with recruitment of LCs in each project country;
• Line-manage the FAO and three LCs;
• Monitor and evaluate project activities.

General duties:

• In cooperation with the Training Officer, to train and oversee the work of local coordinators in Lumos countries of operation in child participation;
• To develop appropriate links with children and young people to prepare them and enable their participation in a safe and supported environment;
• To work in partnership with parents/carers/institution staff to support participation of children and young people;
• To enable children and young people to identify key issues affecting the quality of their lives;
• To develop participatory inclusive methodologies with children and young people;
• In cooperation with partners, to support the creation of children’s councils in all Lumos programme countries, empower children and support them to have an input in Lumos’ work and the decision-making process in their countries;
• To support the participation of children and young people in relevant facilitated activities, decision-making processes, forums and events on the reform of the child care system in their country;
• To coordinate the creation of child friendly and easy read information materials for children by children about children’s rights;
• To develop relationships with organisations working with children and young people in order to support their participation;
• To deliver, in cooperation with the Training Officer, training to Lumos staff and relevant stakeholders on child participation;
• To support the monitoring and evaluation of Lumos child participation activities.

Person Specification

Essential

• Relevant background in a field such as health, social work, education, law or international development;
• Familiarity with the international legislative and rights based framework for the social inclusion of all children;
• Familiarity with disability issues and an understanding of the social model of disability;
• Experience in Child Participation activities or setting up Children’s Councils;
• Direct experience working with children with intellectual disabilities;
• Excellent organisational skills with the ability to prioritise;
• Strong knowledge of Microsoft Office (Outlook, Word, Excel and PowerPoint);
• Ability to work well in a team and to apply initiative;
• Experience working in different cultural contexts or countries;
• Excellent written and spoken English and presentational skills;
• Availability to travel.

Desirable

• Experience managing EC projects;
• Experience advocating in policy arenas, and including children in this process;
• Experience supervising staff from a distance;
• Knowledge of other European languages.

How to Apply

To apply for this position, please submit the following documents:

• A covering letter explaining your reasons for applying and how your experience is relevant to the post (please refer it to the person specification of the job);
• Your curriculum vitae (two pages maximum);
• Details of two referees, including a recent employer (to be consulted at the later stage of recruitment);
• Equality and Diversity Monitoring Form (please download, complete and return the form on our website to help us monitor our commitment to diversity).

Please send them by email to jobs@lumos.org.uk, with the reference in the subject line, before the closing date in order to be considered for the shortlist. Alternatively you can post it to Human Resources, Lumos, 12-14 Berry Street, London, EC1V 0AU quoting the reference in your cover letter.

Closing date for applications is 5pm on Thursday 8 September 2011.

Please help us monitor the effectiveness of advertising sources by clearly stating where you first learned about this vacancy.

With a view to minimising our administration costs we are unfortunately only able to contact those candidates that have been shortlisted for interview.

All applications will be considered on merit. All applicants must have the existing right to work in the UK. Lumos requests no contact from agencies. Lumos is an equal opportunities employer.