Consultancy for Mental Health, Social Media and Gaming

The UNICEF Gulf Area Office (UNICEF GAO) is unique in its mandate. It is accountable for providing programmatic support to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Kuwait and Qatar. In addition, it identifies, cultivates and sustains partnerships with Gulf-based partners to generate resources for the organization globally. UNICEF has a role to play in ensuring rapid development in the Gulf is child sensitive and child focused and that children remain at the heart of the national development dialogue.

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UNICEF Gulf Area Office (UNICEF GAO) supports the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries to advance the rights of children under the framework of a sub-regional programme that outlines expected results to be jointly achieved by the end of 2018. The next programme of cooperation (2019-2023) between UNICEF and the Gulf countries is being finalized and is expected to commence in January 2019.

Child protection related targets have been included in Saudi Arabia national development agenda and vision. Therefore, the strengthening of the child protection system is an on-going priority and result area for UNICEF GAO and its annual workplans with national partners in Saudi Arabia. Efforts include measures to promote the implementation of existing laws, strengthening coordination between relevant actors, improving services, raising awareness about key issues as well as the mechanisms to prevent and address these concerns.

While Saudi Arabia is committed to comprehensively addressing child protection, including violence against children, it must also promptly respond to emerging issues as they arise. Most recently, a range of stakeholders, including representation from line ministries have come together to collectively address a number of reported incidents involving children provoked by social media to undertake highly risky behavior, including suicide. UNICEF GAO recognizes that an appreciation of the ways in which digital media impacts children to be evolving, though advances have been made globally in understanding child and adolescent development and the ways in which children of progressive age seize opportunity and risk.

A national workshop was held to study the issues of electronic games. Focused working groups were formed to study the challenges and solutions in the legislative, educational, awareness, therapeutic and security aspects.  The working groups recommended that the Family Affairs Council should conduct a quick rapid assessment of this issue.

Under the leadership of the Family Affairs Council, UNICEF GAO is seeking to identify a consultant to assist with a rapid assessment to: a) better understand how mental well-being among children may be impacted by participation in social media, b) to better understand the variety of policies, services, and measures provided by national actors to address mental health of children engaged in social media; and c) to consider efforts that can be undertaken in the short term to prevent and respond to the types of incidents of risky behaviors that have been reported and d) to outline additional issues for policy and programme consideration when placing mental health as it relates to social media engagement in the broader child protection framework in the country.

The purpose of this consultancy:

Contribute to the understanding of national partners of the factors that could enhance and undermine the mental well-being of children and adolescents who participate in social media.

The Consultant would be expected to undertake a rapid assessment that would assist decision-makers in Saudi Arabia to develop to:

1. Undertake a rapid mapping to determine what each efforts a range of stakeholders as identified by the Family Affairs Council currently have underway to address the range of opportunities and risks presented by children and adolescents engaged in digital platforms and social media;
2. Review existing Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) legal structures, as made available by national partners;
3. Review any existing data on internet and social media usage, differentiated by age, gender, geographical region;
4. Summarize emerging gaps in current service provision and policy frameworks for safeguarding the well-being of children and adolescents online and on social media;
5. Catalogue emerging findings as short term recommendations as well as an agenda for future action which can be used to link findings with more long-term efforts to address child protection as it relates to violence, exploitation and abuse.

The consultant will be expected to deliver the following:

• A report based on interviews with a list of stakeholders at national level identified and facilitated by UNICF GAO and the Family Affairs Council. The format of this report (including discussion on topics to be covered) will be agreed to with UNICEF GAO during the initial days of the in-country mission [Expected to be completed by 10 November];
• A rapid assessment summarizing a) existing services and legal parameters catering for social media usage at national level, b) emerging gaps in services and policies based on available and promising international practice (noting that this is an emerging field globally), and c) a list of short term recommendations as well as long-term recommendations identifying areas for additional research and field work [Expected to be completed by 30 November].
• An agenda, summary brief/report of the emerging findings, and presentation to be used during a roundtable discussion of key national partners tasked with better understanding and catering for children and adolescents engaged in social media. In addition, a final version of the rapid assessment with comments by UNICEF GAO and the Family Affairs Council should also be submitted. [Expected to be completed by 15 December].

To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have¦

• Master's Degree or higher in Child Psychology, Child Development, Child Rights, Social Work, or other relevant Social Sciences degree.
• A profile with some mix of the following skills will be considered: Prior experience and working knowledge of children and digital media, application of child rights, professional experience in the field of child and adolescent development, demonstrable experience reviewing state of literature and practice on range for policy-makers, ability to draft policy briefs, synthesize broad range of information into succinct, easy-to-understand formats, ability to work across cultures, ability to engage with national authorities with credibility and professionalism, prior experience working with diverse stakeholders.
• A fluent in English (written and spoken); Arabic skills would be an asset.
• A Prior work or research related to the Middle East would be an asset.

For every Child, you demonstrate¦

UNICEF's core values of Commitment, Diversity and Integrity and core competencies in Communication, Working with People and Drive for Results.

The technical competencies required for this post are¦.

View our competency framework

http://www.unicef.org/about/employ/files/UNICEF_Competencies.pdf

UNICEF is committed to diversity and inclusion within its workforce, and encourages all candidates, irrespective of gender, nationality, religious and ethnic backgrounds, including persons living with disabilities, to apply to become a part of the organization.

Remarks:

Mobility is a condition of international professional employment with UNICEF and an underlying premise of the international civil service.

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process.