Adam Smith International Jobs Assessment Coordinator

August 18, 2016 admin

Adam Smith International Jobs Assessment Coordinator: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Education Sector Programme (KESP) Technical Assistance (TA) team’s mission is to work at provincial, sub-provincial and school levels to provide comprehensive, flexible and high quality technical support to the Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in the delivery of its strategy and priorities for transforming education service delivery. The TA constitutes a component of the wider DFID and DFAT-funded KESP programme which also includes Sector Budget Support and an infrastructure component.

A new Education Sector Plan (ESP) for the period 2015-2020 has recently been launched, with an accompanying Joint Review Framework (JRF) and describes the KP Government’s comprehensive and ambitious strategy for the development of the elementary and secondary school sector in the Province. It details ten priorities: (i) redeveloping the approach to training and selecting new teachers; (ii) developing a consolidated, needs based, high quality approach to CPD; (iii) redeveloping teaching cadre employment rules; (iv) establishing a sustainable approach to provision of facilities; (v) launching new benefits aimed at children most at risk of educational deprivation; (vi) scaling up partnerships with the private sector; (vii) launching a draw down fund for use in emergency situations; (viii) testing and updating of population data; (ix) developing of district officials’ management skills; and (x) pegging the education budget to inflation.

Purpose of Role: To provide technical support to PEAC and BISE in developing high quality curriculum based assessment instruments for grade 5, 8, 9, 10, 11, and 12, ensuring its construct validity, reliability and psychometric robustness.

Background: The provincial government accords high priority to the promotion of universal quality education in the province. Several reform initiatives are already underway to implement this agenda. The success of these initiatives is contingent upon improvement in student learning. Therefore, student learning at various levels requires to be assessed regularly. Such assessments of student learning will be used to drive reforms aimed at improving teaching and learning. The research on education reforms also suggests the importance of assessments as a strategic instrument to implement a uniform and universal education system.

In order to achieve this vision, the ESED has decided to make class V assessment for the year 2017 mandatory for all students of public and private primary schools of KP and FATA. In 2018, the large-scale assessment will assume the status of primary school terminal examinations. Similarly, large-scale assessment at the grade-VIII level will be introduced in 2018 before the universal examination in 2019. The direction of reforms is to progressively deemphasise rote learning in KP’s classrooms and gear the assessments/examinations toward testing a wide range of knowledge and skills. These improvements will also cover the examinations at secondary and higher secondary levels. KESP will provide technical assistance to the assessment and examination institutions, namely PEAC and BISE, in implementation of this assessment reforms agenda.

Responsibilities

The Assessment Coordinator will undertake the following tasks:

Provide academic administrative support for conducting Assessment workshops for PEAC and BISE participants
Provide technical assistance in planning and facilitation of workshop
Review and improve developed items of different subjects
Assist in data analysis and report writing
Provide logistic and technical support in organizing trainings in field
Assist in coordinating BISE and PEAC for nomination for the workshops
Coordinate with BISE and PEAC to ensure availability of all required training material
Maintain record of developed item bank and model papers
Assist in coordinating and updating other trainings information with PEAC/BISE
Undertake any other tasks related to training activities conducted by T&L team.

Deliverables: The Assessment Coordinator is ultimately accountable for the timely and quality delivery of all assigned tasks related to assessments and any additional task assigned to her/him in this role.

Duration: 40 days between August and September 2016 (extendable till June 2017).
Location: Peshawar, Pakistan Apply