PM/SPM - Mentoring and Teacher Support (Academics)

Job Title: Project Manager/Senior Project Manager, Mentoring and Teacher Support (Academics)

Organisation: Central Square Foundation

Team: Strategic Support States - Foundational Literacy and Numeracy (FLN)

Location: Hyderabad, Telangana

• About Central Square Foundation:

Founded in 2012, Central Square Foundation (CSF) is a non-profit philanthropic foundation working on the vision of ensuring quality school education for all children in India. We are driven by our mission to transform the school education system with a focus on improving children's learning outcomes, especially in low-income communities.

Learn more about CSF on our website.

• About the team:

Strategic Support States (SSS) team at Central Square Foundation assists the states in designing and implementing the respective state missions to ensure FLN learning outcomes for children. Spread across five states, the Project Management Units (PMUs) of the team work closely with the state bodies in co-ideating goals of the missions, identifying critical workstreams, setting indicators of success across the workstreams, and reviewing mission progress. Apart from these core activities, the SSS team also conducts action research projects and pilots context-specific programs to accelerate student learning.

CSFs work in Telangana:

CSF has been actively working with the Department of School Education (SCERT, Samagra Shiksha), Telangana, on its FLN mission, ensuring that all children in pre-primary (PP1, PP2) & primary grades (1-5) receive quality education and achieve the desired FLN outcomes. To bring fidelity in the implementation of the mission, CSF has taken proactive steps to provide strategic support to select districts/regions. These interventions serve as demonstrative models to showcase how targeted strategies and coordinated efforts can lead to significant improvements in FLN outcomes within the specified timeline. CSF's interventions extend beyond mere support, encompassing strategic planning, capacity building, and continuous monitoring of the implementation process. By closely working with State and District Officials in SCERT, Samagra Shiksha, grassroots NGOs, and local elected bodies, CSF aims to address implementation challenges, identify gaps, and prioritise areas that can drive significant improvements in FLN outcomes. These interventions serve as catalysts for change and provide valuable insights into effective implementation strategies that can be scaled up across the state.

Position Summary

Central Square Foundation is an Equal Opportunity employer and encourages applications from qualified individuals regardless of race, religion, national origin, sexual orientation or disability CSF is seeking a Project Manager/Senior Project Manager to join the State Project Management Unit (SPMU) in Hyderabad to support the design and implementation of a comprehensive foundational learning programme across pre-primary (PP1 & PP2) and primary grades (15) with a focus on mentoring, teacher support. This role focuses on critical academic workstreams including Mentoring and Coaching, Teaching- Learning Materials, Teacher and Academic cadre Capacity Building, Assessments, and Classroom Observations and involves close day-to-day collaboration with state government officials. Beyond designing academic interventions with internal CSF teams, the Project Manager/Senior Project Manager will be responsible for ensuring their effective execution by navigating complex stakeholder landscapes, building consensus across diverse and often critical voices, and driving coordinated action to move work forward at scale.

Roles and Responsibilities of the Project Manager/Senior Project Manager:

• Develop work products, documents, and outputs related to academic workstreams in consultation with the internal CSF teams (such as Classroom Instruction Practice and Assessments team) and academic partners:

Mentoring:

• Design and integrate an on-site support program for teachers informed by evidence collected through the classroom observation process for improving the effectiveness of teaching and learning.
• Support Mentor cadre: Design and support the mentor cadre especially Mandal Education Officers and Complex Headmasters by enabling them to provide hand-holding support to teachers in classrooms through observations and having debrief conversations post observation. Most critically, act as the central point of coordination between CSF, state-level stakeholders, and District-level implementers and enablers. Navigate differing priorities and perspectives to build consensus, secure buy-in, and maintain momentum for program implementation. Proactively manage relationships with senior officials, technical experts, district-level administrators, and Resource Persons.

Teacher Support:

• Teaching-Learning Materials and Instructional Design: Support the state designing quality curricular and instructional materials for the state such as academic calendar, learning outcome framework, teacher guides, lesson plans, student worksheets, ready to reference explainers.
• Assessments: Support the state in developing an assessment framework for early grades, including system assessment and school-based assessment (formative and summative assessments)
• Continuous Teacher Professional Development: Provide support to the state for conducting training needs assessment, situational analysis, design of high-quality teacher training modules, trainer capacity building, training monitoring, and feedback

• Support the PMU for continuous program monitoring and course correction during the implementation of academic workstreams
• Knowledge management and documentation of the implementation of work

Required Qualifications, Skills, and Abilities

• Bachelors degree; a Masters degree preferred (in education, development studies, public policy, and social sciences)
• 3-6 years of work experience preferably in the education sector demonstrating remarkable project delivery and stakeholder management
• Preference for candidates displaying work experience in academic areas of education such as classroom teaching, curriculum, instructional design, etc.,
• Keen interest in the Development/Education sector
• Fluent in both Telugu and English with excellent written and oral communication skills
• Strong growth and learning mindset
• Strong skills in stakeholder management, problem-solving, and analytical thinking
• Proven ability to thrive in ambiguous and evolving environments

Additional Details

• Start Date: As soon as possible
• Compensation: Remuneration will be competitive with Indian philanthropy pay scales and will depend upon the candidates experience levels.

Central Square Foundation is an Equal Opportunity employer and encourages applications from qualified individuals regardless of race, religion, national origin, sexual orientation or disability.