Senior Research Associate - Consultancy Position

Overview 

Life Skills–or social and emotional skills–are the skills that children and youth need to understand and manage their emotions, build, and maintain positive relationships, and make responsible decisions in their communities. These skills are also important for adolescents as they progress into the workforce, helping them manage the changing landscape of the labor market. Over the last decade, there has been a lot of development around the teaching and learning of life skills in schools and out-of-school programs in India. Government institutions, non-governmental organizations, donors, and community development partners in India have advocated for a stronger focus on life skills and richer interventions that help children and youth learn and use these skills. There have also been important developments in how life skills can be assessed with children and youth.

In 2020, the University of Notre Dame’s Global Center for the Development of the Whole Child (GC-DWC) launched Project Sampoorna in Telangana. The GC-DWC partners with the Telangana, the Social and Tribal Welfare Residential schools (or Society) to build, operate, and replicate a whole child development (WCD) model for education in 451 schools across the state; this framework focuses on key life skills–self-esteem, perseverance, collaboration, critical thinking, and empathy–that are important for academic and life success of secondary school students. Building on this work, and its focus on SEL and life skills globally, the GC-DWC has embarked on co-anchoring the Life Skills Collaborative 2.0 (LSC) to strengthen learning and evidence use among organizations and institutions working on life skills with children and adolescents in India. This entails a) working with 40 organizations and institutions to understand Life Skills measurement, research, and learning needs in the country; b) increasing access to guidance and materials among organizations to adapt formative, summative, and monitoring tools; and c) increasing the capacity and capability of organizations to embed robust monitoring, evaluation, research, and learning (MERL) within their practice. The GC-DWC expects this to be a three-year initiative which began in September 2024.

The GC-DWC is hiring a Senior Research Associate based in Mumbai, India to manage this initiative. This is a mid-level full-time consultancy position that will be responsible for working closely with the GC-DWC’s global team, co-anchor organizations of LSC, and the LSC partners to understand the gaps in how organizations use learnings and evidence effectively to make decisions about their life skills programs. The Senior Research Associate will coordinate with collaborative partners on their MERL capacity and capability; develop plans to support organizations address challenges in using data and research to make evidence-based decisions; organize meetings/webinars to support cross-organization learning; support partners in developing evidence based narratives for life skills, and manage competing expectations and priorities of organizations and donors working at different scales within the country. The position's responsibilities and qualifications are outlined below

Position Responsibilities 

Research Design and Implementation (40%)

• Conduct workshops with partners and synthesize results to identify priority areas for evidence use for the collaborative
• Develop and execute research design and implementation plan in collaboration with co-anchors and partners to address priority areas identified
• Support evidence based narrative building by identifying evidence needs and fulfilling them in collaboration with the partners and co-anchors
• Lead data analysis (qualitative and quantitative) where necessary

Research coordination (30%)

• Lead IRB application and compliance for research activities where necessary
• Develop guides and case studies for the life skills ecosystem in India based on the results of research conducted
• Lead day-to-day research activities and communication with partners to successfully complete activities

Dissemination and communication (20%)

• Conduct quarterly learning webinars focused on MERL topics
• Organize in-person and virtual meetings and learning workshops
• Attend and present at national and international conferences
• Develop non-technical documents and briefs that can be shared with a wide audience

Management (10%)

• Manage relationships with co-anchors and other stakeholder groups
• Provide regular updates and program progress updates
• Manage sub-awards, contractors, or short-term consultants
• Support program reporting and donor communication on an ongoing basis

Requirements

• 5 years of experience in education or a related field with an advanced degree in education, public health, public policy, or international development (or equivalent)
• Previous work in research or programming related to life skills, social and emotional skills, or a related field
• Strong preparation in quantitative, qualitative, and/or mixed methods research approaches. This includes developing data collection tools and training teams on data collection
• Experience working with statistical software (e.g.; Stata, R), qualitative data analysis software (e.g.; Dedoose, NVivo), and digital data collection platforms (e.g.; ODK, Kobo Toolbox).
• Experience managing diverse teams and stakeholders
• Demonstrated ability to be self-organized, take initiative, provide creative solutions, navigate complex research situations, and keep track of multiple deadlines/priorities
• Excellent interpersonal skills and ability to develop and maintain professional relationships with relevant external and internal entities
• Excellent oral and written communication skills in English and Hindi
• Ability to travel within India for project work

Reporting line

The Senior Research Associate will report directly to the UND-GC-DWC’s Director for Research and work closely with the UND’s global and Mumbai-based staff. The Senior Research Associate may oversee a full-time program coordinator, contractors, and/or short-term consultants. The position is based in Mumbai, however considerations can be made for placement in Delhi on a case-by-case basis.