Application deadline: 31 December 2015
Department: Global Programme Coordination
Location: Bonn, Germany
Duration: Opportunities of miniumum 4 months.
Starting date: As soon as possible.
TERMS OF REFERENCE
Internship
Global Programme Coordination Intern
Assisting with data collection, organization of workshops, communications, outreach and programme coordination activities.
Duration: minimum 4 months (starting in January 2015) at UNV headquarters in Bonn, Germany.
Background The United Nations Volunteers (UNV) programme is the UN organization that contributes to peace and development through volunteerism worldwide.
Volunteerism is a powerful means of engaging people in tackling development challenges, and it can transform the pace and nature of development.
Volunteerism benefits both society at large and the individual volunteer by strengthening trust, solidarity and reciprocity among citizens, and by purposefully creating opportunities for participation. UNV contributes to peace and development by advocating for recognition of volunteers, working with partners to integrate volunteerism into development programming, and mobilizing an increasing number and diversity of volunteers, including experienced UN volunteers, throughout the world. UNV embraces volunteerism as universal and inclusive, and recognizes volunteerism in its diversity as well as the values that sustain it: free will, commitment, engagement and solidarity.
UNV engaged 6,351 UN Volunteers in 2013, on a total of 6,459 assignments. With an average age of 38 years and the requisite professional skills and qualifications of some 5 to 10 years relevant experience, UN Volunteers served in 129 countries in 2013 and came themselves from 152. The majority – some 80 per cent – come from developing countries themselves. One third of UN Volunteers served in their own countries, with the others carrying out international assignments. UNV activities in 2013 amounted to US$210 million.
UNV is headquartered in Bonn, Germany and has approximately 150 staff positions – with the majority in Bonn and some positions with different UN peacekeeping and political missions, and in other headquarters locations (e.g. New York and Tokyo). The major organizational groups within UNV are:
- The Office of the Executive Coordinator (OEC);
- The Volunteer Programming and Management Group (VPMG) – comprising the Results Management Support Section (RMSS), the Volunteer Knowledge and Innovation Section (VKIS), and the Peace and Development Division (PDD) – comprising the Peace Programming Section (PPS), the Development Programming Section (DPS), and the Volunteer Recruitment Resources Section (VRRS); The Partnerships and Communications Division (PCD) comprising the Partnerships Section (PS, including Tokyo Liaison Office), the Communications Section (CS) and the Office in New York (ONY);
The Management Services Division (MSD) comprising the Information and Communication Technology Section (ICTS), Finance Section (FS), Human Resources Section (HRS), and the Administration Unit (AU). Additionally the Common Services Unit (CSU) provides support to the UN presence in Bonn.
Global Programme Coordination
In nearly fifty years of work in more than 140 countries UNV has amassed a considerable wealth of expertise in strengthening the complementary roles of public institutions and people in peace & development.
UNV’s global network of thousands of UN Volunteers, of all ages and from all walks of life, stimulates innovation and collaboration. This has a revitalizing effect on the work of our partners. As a bridging organization between the UN, civil society and governments, UNV is ideally suited to facilitate the effective and inclusive engagement of civil society and community groups, enabling grassroots mobilization and expanding civic engagement for development. UNV, whose volunteers are overwhelmingly from the Global South, is able to facilitate the transfer of skills and experience across different groups of developing countries.
UNV’s five global programme areas (Securing access to basic social services, Community resilience for environment and disaster risk reduction, Peacebuilding, Youth, National capacity development through volunteer schemes) seek to address the most pressing issues of today, and build on the considerable technical expertise and networks that UNV has developed in nearly half a century of working at the grassroots to policy levels in more than 140 countries.
Having a programmatic approach enables UNV and its partners to link initiatives at global, regional and national levels to common outcomes, focused on a clearly-defined results approach.
Duties and responsibilities:
Under the overall guidance of the Project Coordinator, the intern will support the implementation of projects through communicating with project partners, UNV Field Units as well as research and monitoring developments through different channels. Depending on the competencies and interests of the interns, assignments will include:
- • Assist with the collection and processing of project documents. • Support the coordination of project development.
- • Assist the preparation of workshops
- • Monitor, analyze and synthesize developments, press clippings and reports with regards to the relevant global policy frameworks and developments.
- • Develop reports or policy briefs with reviews of practices, lessons learned, and recommendations on good practices in relation to the integration of volunteerism into the relevant policy frameworks.
- • Research, collect, analyze and edit documents related to evidence of the impact of volunteerism on peace and development.
- • Assist project activities at UNV HQ in general.
- • Take minutes and prepare presentations and documents for in-house committees and Field Units.
• Perform other duties as required. The interns are also expected to strengthen their knowledge and understanding of the concept of volunteerism as well as the above mentioned policy frameworks by reading relevant UNV and other publications.
Learning opportunities for the intern.
- • General understanding of the work and mission of the UNV programme, the role of stakeholders and partners at national and global level and of volunteerism’s contribution to development effectiveness;
- • Insight and hands-on experience in UNV’s role in facilitating and promoting the project; • Insight and hands-on experience in organizing and running complex projects; and
- • Becoming more familiar with working in an International Organization and in a multicultural environment.
Minimum Qualifications & Experience
- • Education: Completed undergraduate degree (Bachelor) and current enrollment in a Master’s degree or equivalent. Only those students who will return to their studies upon completion of their internship assignments are eligible;
- • Field of study: Development-related fields such as economics, international relations, anthropology, sociology, public or business administration, or environmental studies. Other fields of study may be considered depending on the type of assignment;
- • Language skills: Written and spoken proficiency in English and preferably in an additional official UN Language (French, Spanish, Arabic, Russian, Chinese);
- • Demonstrated interest in the field of development and the work of international organisations.
- • Previous experience in: – organization of workshops/ events – partnership building and stakeholder consultations – and/ or communications and campaign management – and/ or research and policy development as well as experience in developing countries is desirable. – Knowledge of the UN work environment an advantage.
- • Enthusiastic about the role of youth volunteerism and participation in peace and development and ready to learn.
- • Experience in non – formal education an asset. • Good oral and written communications skills and demonstrated research abilities and interest
- • Internet proficiency as well as proficiency in MS Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint) is required.
- • Experience with the development of statistics, charts in Excel and Web 2.0 tools (especially social networking) an asset.
- • Experience in volunteering a strong asset.
General Terms and Conditions
- • UNDP Conditions of Service for interns (http://www.undp.org/internships/) apply for interns working at UNV Headquarters.
- • The Internship Programme operates on a non-remunerative basis. Costs and arrangements for travel, visa, accommodation and living expenses are the responsibility of the intern.
- • The purpose of the Internship Programme is not to lead to further employment with UNV but to complement an intern’s studies. Therefore, there should be no expectation of employment at the end of an internship.
- • UNV accepts no responsibility for the intern’s medical insurance or for costs arising from illness during the internship. Interns are required to provide proof of medical insurance coverage.
- • Only short-listed candidates will be contacted and called for a motivational interview that will take place on an ongoing basis.
- • Please also refer to UNV’s general terms and conditions for internships at UNV at http://www.unv.org/about-us/employment/internship.html Applications (Application form [MS Word], CV and a short paragraph on your motivation in English) should be sent via e-mail to [email protected]
