About READ Foundation
READ Foundation is a UK based registered charity working to create school places for children living in poverty in the developing world.
We create opportunities for orphan and needy children to go to school to gain an education and build a better life for themselves. We currently focus on constructing new schools, providing quality sponsorship for orphans and are now expanding our educational portfolio to reflect the large humanitarian and development needs ongoing throughout the world.
We created our first school in 1994 with a single classroom of 25 children, while as of this academic year we are now running almost 400 schools, in which over 100,000 children study, almost 10% of whom are orphaned by father or both parents. However, with a global shortage of classrooms in the millions, there is still much to do to achieve universal education.
Purpose of Job This role involves ensuring that READ Foundation’s Orphans Sponsorship programme is coordinated and implemented effectively. This includes developing and actioning an Orphan & Child welfare strategy, including managing systems and reporting related to this programme. The candidate will be expected to work closely with field offices and local partners at the field level to ensure efficient implementation of sponsorship and child safeguarding practices.
Main Responsibilities
Include but not limited to;
Sponsorship programme
- To develop and manage READ Foundation’s orphan programme strategy, in conjunction with designing the operational plan and ensuring implementation of both.
- Assist in providing technical assistance for proposals/reviews involving Orphans and Child related Projects.
- Work closely with the Donor Care team to ensure on time, professional and appropriate correspondence to all Orphan Sponsorship Programme enquiries. Work closely with Donor Care department to manage the process of donor feedback through regular meetings and creating work plans with field offices for timely submission and upload of relevant reports.
- Conduct in-person field visits to select countries to evaluate the implementation of the sponsorship programme.
- Ensure timely and accurate Orphan Sponsorship payments to Partner offices.
- Take lead and assist in any training or capacity building exercises for Partner Offices.
- To be the main point of contact for all Orphans and Child related programmes with all READ Offices by ensuring training to staff on systems, allocation of funds and tracking of money transfers between HQ and other offices.
Systems & reporting
- Regular housekeeping of all orphan records and sponsorship reports on our Donor Management System and Orphans Portal.
- Ensure annual orphan reports and other necessary feedback information is received from Partner Offices and thus generating donor report within the system to be forwarded to respective donors.
- Assist in requesting and collating Orphan Sponsorship Programme information from Partner Offices which could be used by Marketing / Fundraising to help promote the Orphans Sponsorship programme.
- Work closely with Fundraising and Marketing departments to develop a strong Orphan’s brand and provide important inputs into the overall ‘donor engagement strategy’ set out by the Communications team.
Safeguarding
- Ensure safeguarding mechanisms are in place for projects which include children and orphans, engaging with all stakeholders both domestically and internationally.
- Develop a safeguarding strategy for the organisation.
- Contribute to the organisations safeguarding policy ensuring organisational values are adhered to by all HQ staff, field offices and partners.
- Carry out regular assessments of the Orphan & Child Welfare programmes through field visits, progress report reviews and workshops to ensure READ Foundation field offices and local partners abide by READ Foundation’s Safeguarding policy.
- Develop READ Foundation’s safeguarding programme through active membership and participation in safeguarding events, ensuring READ Foundation has membership and representation at relevant Child Protection networks and clusters.
- Regular update on safeguarding practices via online reading, attending conferences and white papers to ensure any changes in international guidelines is portrayed in READ Foundation’s safeguarding policy and the relevant staff are made aware.
Instructions to Apply
Please apply with your CV and supporting letter, outlining how your skills and experience meet the person specification for the post.
Closing date: 22/05/2022
Interviews: Rolling
Requirements
Person Specification
Knowledge
- Knowledge of safeguarding principles and their application.
- Knowledge of education focused projects (desirable).
- A proven track record of success in working in an NGO, working to deliver high quality results to deadlines.
- Experience of CRM and Project systems.
- Demonstrable experience of applying effective problem solving techniques.
- Effective communicator who is able to develop strong relationships with the fundraising team, key people within the company and external stakeholders.
Experience & Qualifications
- 2+ years’ experience within a charity or in a similar environment.
- Educated to degree level in a development or humanitarian discipline such as International development, International Relations, Project management in developing environment, NGO management, etc.
- Experience in administering safeguarding or sponsorship programmes (desirable).
- Proven experience and knowledge of effective budgetary control and grant management.
- Strong and well developed analytical skills coupled with experience of writing quality proposals and reports.
- MS Office Suite; Project management systems.
- Ability to manage multiple tasks and prioritise a complicated workload.
Skills
- Ability to work under pressure, manage time, workload and prioritise work to deadlines.
- Excellent interpersonal, verbal and written communication skills.
- Self-motivated with an ability to work independently as well as part of a team.
- Good independent judgement and ability to challenge constructively.
- Excellent organisational, planning and time management skills.
