Project Assistant

**Position Title and Grade**: Project Assistant, Grade E **Reports to**: Senior Adviser: Women & Girls **Duration of Contract**: Up to a three**-**year term **Direct Reports**: There are no direct reports in this position. **Position Location**: Burnaby, British Columbia - Commonwealth of Learning (COL) helps governments and institutions to expand the scale, efficiency and quality of learning by using new approaches, appropriate technologies, and open and distance learning (ODL) methodologies. Headquartered in British Columbia, COL promotes innovation and works with international partners to facilitate learning in support of sustainable development. It is financed by voluntary contributions from Commonwealth Member States._ **Overview of the Position**: The Project Assistant will work closely with the Senior Adviser: Women & Girls to support the implementation of a project aimed at training disadvantaged women and girls in remote and rural areas in the five countries of the project (Bangladesh, Malawi, Mozambique, Pakistan and Sri Lanka) to enhance their livelihoods. The Project Assistant will provide administrative and operational support to ensure the project is delivered within the approved proposal and budget. **Duties and Responsibilities**: - Provide administrative and operational support to the Senior Adviser: Women & Girls in the delivery of the project. - Assist in engaging with local partners and relevant stakeholders in the five countries of implementation to identify priority communities and the knowledge and skills needed by women and girls from those communities. - Assist in conducting country-specific climate risks analysis to inform all relevant activities and developing country action plans aligned with the expected results. - Assist in overseeing the training of staff capacity of local educational partners to develop quality content to support the development and provision of appropriate and context-specific educational, vocational and skills training courses, platforms and opportunities for women and girls in local languages. - Support the development and delivery of the training programme using available and affordable technologies for learner support. - Support the Senior Adviser: Women & Girls in catalysing links with labour market and financial institutions to support employability and entrepreneurship. - Arrange Steering Committee meetings for the project that monitor progress and circulate the required reporting as stipulated by COL. - Assist in updating the monitoring and evaluation framework for the project, collecting the necessary data from partners and drafting the final report in accordance with COL’s RBM framework. - Undertake other tasks as may be assigned in relation to this project. **Qualifications** **_Essential_**_:_ Post-secondary education at a college diploma level or higher. **_Desirable_**_:_ Formal training in the use of online tools for data and information management and statistical data analysis. **Experience**: **_Essential :_** - Five or more years of experience in a range of administrative roles with some exposure to project coordination. - Ability to network with people and organisations internationally using both inter-personal skills and technologies. **_Desirable_**_:_ Any experience of working in education, government or international development **Skills/Abilities**: - **_Communication -_** Ability to communicate both verbally and in writing with a wide network of contacts in a clear and concise manner that displays sensitivity to ethnic and gender issues. This includes the ability to communicate and work with others, both within and outside of COL, by promoting co-operation and collaboration to achieve collective outcomes, gathering, sharing and disseminating information with others, and appropriately giving and being open to feedback from team/co-workers. - **_Attention to Detail -_** Conscious of maintaining high standards of quality and accuracy with a good sense of follow through on tasks with the ability to consistently produce error-free output. - **_Online Productivity Tools -_** Skills to use online productivity tools at an advanced level to create, retrieve, store and exchange information and with the ability to learn and adapt to new systems with ease. - **_Organisation and Time Management -_** Ability to organise, prioritise and complete assignments in a manner that efficiently utilises resources and optimises efficiency and to be flexible in accepting variable and diverse job assignments. - **_Contract Coordination -_** Ability to draft contracts and agreements as per established contract templates and track deliverables and payment within the allocated budget. - **_Financial Awareness -_** Ability to prepare financial budgets in an effective, efficient and judicious manner and track related expenditure in accordance with policies and procedures. **Personal Attributes**: - Commitment to the ideals of COL,