Education and Social Cohesion Specialist

UNICEF is mandated by the United Nations General Assembly to advocate for the protection of children's rights, to help meet their basic needs and to expand their opportunities to reach their full potential.

UNICEF is guided by the Convention on the Rights of the Child and strives to establish children's rights as enduring ethical principles and international standards of behaviour towards children.

UNICEF insists that the survival, protection and development of children are universal development imperatives that are integral to human progress.

UNICEF mobilizes political will and material resources to help countries, particularly developing countries, ensure a "first call for children" and to build their capacity to form appropriate policies and deliver services for children and their families.

UNICEF is committed to ensuring special protection for the most disadvantaged children – victims of war, disasters, extreme poverty, all forms of violence and exploitation, and those with disabilities.

UNICEF responds in emergencies to protect the rights of children. In coordination with United Nations partners and humanitarian agencies, UNICEF makes its unique facilities for rapid response available to its partners to relieve the suffering of children and those who provide their care.

UNICEF is non-partisan and its cooperation is free of discrimination. In everything it does, the most disadvantaged children and the countries in greatest need have priority.

UNICEF aims, through its country programmes, to promote the equal rights of women and girls and to support their full participation in the political, social and economic development of their communities.

UNICEF works with all its partners towards the attainment of the sustainable human development goals adopted by the world community and the realization of the vision of peace and social progress enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations.

As a multi-ethnic and multi-religious country, Sri Lanka faces many challenges in its task of rebuilding the nation, after decades of conflict. These challenges directly and indirectly contributed to weakening the country's overall sense of social cohesion between the ethnically and religiously diverse communities. The country faced severe challenges owing to the violent acts in 2019, followed by the COVID-19 lock-downs. Subsequently the ongoing economic crisis faced by the country have further challenged the social fabric and has led to division in the already fragile communities and tensions among different groups/societies. It is therefore critical to support the implementation of a multi-pronged approach that can effectively move the country towards a state of positive and productive peace and social cohesion. Investing in a strategy that targets some of the root causes of conflict, while strengthening social cohesion within society will be an important contribution to overcoming the current divisiveness between communities and building a society that is more resilient to fragmentation, hate speech and violence.

Education is increasingly recognized as a crucial factor in peacebuilding and nation-building processes. To emphasize this point, the country's ongoing education reforms have a strong focus on promoting 21st-century skills, including skills for social cohesion. Despite the challenges faced by the segregated school system, these reforms provide a window of opportunity to strengthen the education system to foster peace and reconciliation.

In-line with this, peacebuilding is a key area of focus in the UNICEF Sri Lanka Country Programme for 2023 - 2027. UNICEF Sri Lanka continues to support the Government of Sri Lanka in peace building through education in-line with Sustainable Development Goallopment Goals (SDG) 4 and 16 on Quality Education and Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions, respectively. To contribute to the achievement of these goals, UNICEF ensures that peace education is framed within a ‘continuum of education’ approach; more specifically, starting with young children (0-5 years) through early learning, continuing into middle childhood (children 6-9 years in primary education) and then through to adolescence (children 10-18 years in secondary education).

Sri Lanka is also home to annual natural disasters, which are increasing in frequency and intensity due to climate change. These emergencies close schools, disrupt children’s learning and demand a response in the education sector every year. UNICEF is closely working with education counterparts to respond and build climate-smart emergency preparedness within the education sector.


UNICEF is currently working to strengthen the promotion of foundational and transferrable skills among children and adolescents so that they are better prepared for transition into adulthood and for the world of work and, to promote social cohesion and to be prepared for emergency. UNICEF engages in various platforms to promote interaction and collaboration among adolescents.

Under the direct supervision of the Chief of Education, the UN Volunteer will undertake the following tasks:

Support programming related to developing and implementing national and provincial policies, frameworks, plans and activities to advance and promote peace and social cohesion through the education system, particularly concerning the National Action Plan on Education for Social Cohesion

Strengthen research, monitoring and evaluation to inform policies and programmes in Education for Social Cohesion

Develop and design innovative models/approaches to promote social cohesion and life skills among children and adolescents through extra-curricular activities, particularly using sports to foster 21st century skills.

Support coordination of a Reconciliation Programme with other UN agencies that aims to reduce discrimination and promote social cohesion, including with other education stakeholders, including Govt; CSOs and bilateral agencies through effective communication and networking.

Support and design new strategies and activities to promote emergency preparedness and advance a national strategy for climate smart education through coordination with different government stakeholders and development partners.

Support monitoring of existing activities in the field.

Provide input to policy briefs, communication materials and country programme monitoring and reporting documents.

Compile Education for Social Cohesion project implementation training and orientation materials.

Support other related activities within the education section as needed.

UNICEF is positioned as a key technical partner working in the area of education for Social Cohesion, skills building and climate change and Child-centred Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR). UNICEF played a key role in the development of a roadmap to mainstream peace into the education system and supported the Ministry of Education (MoE) in the review of its National Action Plan on Education for Social Cohesion and Peace (2017). In-line with the revised national action plan, UNICEF continues to support the government’s ongoing peacebuilding interventions involving curriculum revisions, developing co-curricular programmes, teacher development and strengthening school planning processes.

Through its role as sector lead in the area of Education in Emergency and DRR, UNICEF has been instrumental in developing the MoE’s Comprehensive School Safety Guidelines which has been rolled-out to all schools nation-wide. Building on this UNICEF has initiated work on promoting a climate-smart education system in Sri Lanka. UNICEF’s Climate Smart Education approach seeks to reach vulnerable and rural communities to improve equity by providing a solution for education institutions to ensure safe, resilient, accessible and green facilities that enhance quality learning based on five main pillars.  Climate ready and resilient education systems are critical to promoting quality learning in Sri Lanka.  Ideally, the climate smart education model is applied at all levels of education (from preschool to primary and secondary education), ensuring sustainability, local ownership and coherent programming.      
The UNV will be required to travel to project locations, depending on programme needs.