**Strategic Communications Adviser, Education Pathways to Peace****Project Overview and Role**:**About the Education Pathways to Peace in Mindanao (Pathways) Program*****Education Pathways to Peace in Mindanao (Pathways) is a Philippines-Australia partnership supporting quality inclusive kindergarten to grade 3 education for all children in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM).The program focuses on early years education as the foundation for life-long learning and development. By engaging and collaborating with a wide range of education stakeholders, promoting peace in education reform, and addressing inequity and disparity in education delivery, the program also contributes to peacebuilding in the region.Delivered through the Bangsamoro Ministry of Basic, Higher and Technical Education (MBHTE), activities are directed towards strengthening education policies and institutions, ensuring accessible and inclusive education for all children, providing an integrated education system and curriculum, and improving teacher quality and development.Pathways is implemented by Palladium in consortium with the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) and Orient Integrated Development Consultants Inc (OIDCI).The program's base of operations is in Cotabato City and covers all five provinces of BARMM.**Primary Duties and Responsibilities**:**Child Protection: Level 2**The responsibilities of the project employee **may** involve contact and working with children or young people.**About the position**The** Strategic Communications Adviser** is responsible for regularly reviewing, overseeing, and advising on Pathways' strategic communications in a way that will pro-actively contribute to the achievement of Pathways' intermediate and end-of-program outcomes. The advice and recommendations will need to take account of a dynamic, complex, and politically sensitive operating context, and be in line with Australian and Philippine government policies and protocols as they relate to communications both in general and for the education sector.The position will report to the Team Leader and will require to work closely with the Communications Team based in Cotabato, Mindanao. The Adviser will be part of the program's leadership team and maintain close communications links with the MEARL and knowledge management functions and consult closely with the technical advisory team and key program stakeholders.The Adviser will lead on reviewing and if necessary, revising Pathways' overall Strategic Communications approach and plan, ensuring that the overall communications of Pathways serve the overall goals of the Program especially in terms of managing how the Program is projected to and perceived by a wide range of clients and stakeholders as well as the general public inside and outside of Muslim Mindanao. This will include, for instance, people living with a disadvantage in the BARMM due to their gender, religion, disability, ethnicity, geographic isolation, conflict, and other factors that marginalize them from participating meaningfully in society. The position requires the skills and experience to ensure that the various communication activities of Pathways are cohesive, inclusive, integrated and focused, addressing its strategic, tactical, and operational communication needs. The Strategic Communications Adviser will be required to create and oversee an implementation plan that uses multiple modalities of communications delivery systems, both online and traditional, always ensuring that the overall brand and image of Pathways as a program is properly served, while at the same time, able to reach the targeted audiences in a timely and purposive manner.S/he will also provide advice on appropriate structures, roles and other resources needed to implement the strategy, including capacity building of the core team as needed. S/he will support the implementation of the strategy, putting systems and measures in place for progress to be regularly reviewed and for the strategy and related plans and processes to be updated to ensure they are aligned with evolving Pathways vision, strategy, and plans.**Duties**:The Strategic Communications Adviser's duties will include:- Review and if necessary, revise Pathways' Strategic Communications Plan and develop a practical implementation plan, which considers the program's internal and external communications needs, and is appropriately differentiated for different stakeholders, including for DFAT, the Australian public, teachers and principals, district and provincial officials, national policy makers, teacher training institutes communities, NGOs and other donors working in the sector, and the public at large both inside and outside of Muslim Mindanao. The implementation plan should serve the purpose of the Program by being aligned with program outcomes, annual work plans, the MEARL framework, other Program strategies, and
