The International Rescue Committee (IRC) is one of the largest humanitarian agencies in the world, providing relief, rehabilitation, and post-conflict reconstruction support to victims of oppression and violent conflict. IRC works to address both the immediate, lifesaving needs of conflict-affected people in an emergency and the reconstruction needs in post-conflict societies. IRC is committed to a culture of good leadership, innovation in all aspects of our work, creative partnerships, and accountability to those we serve.

Scope of work/ job purpose:

Under the direct supervision of the Camp Manager and the CWI Program Manager, the CWI MHPSS Officer will supervise CWI mental health psychosocial prevention and response services in Bambasi refugee camps. The CWI MHPSS Officer will train and supervise refugee community workers and social workers to respond to GBV and MHPSS issues in the camps. This includes providing capacity-building training for IRC, RRS, UNHCR, & Partner staff and using monitoring and evaluation systems to ensure high-quality services.

Detailed responsibilities and tasks:

• The CWI MHPSS officer will provide relevant training, guidance, mentoring, and direct support to those who are suffering from mental health problems and to GBV survivors.
• The CWI MHPSS Officer provides direct mental health counseling for very difficult cases to support CWI clients to heal from trauma and/or PTSD, strictly adhere to the IRC CWI’s survivor-centered approach and GBV guiding principles.
• The role will also require support for capacity-building, including but not limited to, enhancing staff expertise in psychological first aid, trauma counseling, subsentence abuse, and self-care for secondary trauma and stress management to build internal knowledge and enable the best quality of services to beneficiaries.
• The MHPSS Officer support other CWI staff in training for implementing partners from the health, protection, and legal sectors, and will support the design and roll-out of psychosocial programming in safe spaces to support the healing, resilience, and empowerment of refugee women and adolescent girls to ensure mental health best practices are followed for optimal recovery and healing.
• Provide guidance and technical support to CWI Response Officers and refugee Social Workers managing cases of trauma, and/or PTSD.
• Develop guidelines and tools as requested in specific areas of mental health, trauma, and stress management.
• Build positive working relationships with relevant GBV program stakeholders and support CWI RO and CWI PO and the Health Clinical MHPSS Officers as requested in conducting training and mentoring sessions for service providers in the camp and for government actors in the local community.
• Work with CWI management to develop a series of sessions on mental health topics, stress management, and self-care, and deliver these sessions to refugee women and adolescent girls in the IRC’s Women’s and Girls’ Wellness Centers.
• Contribute to the development of CWI IEC/BCC materials to ensure that mental health and trauma topics are well-presented for raising community awareness.
• Organize Mental health day mass campaign and mini-awareness campaigns on harm related to alcohol and other substance use.
• Work with CWI Response Officers and Social Workers to support their well-being and management of secondary trauma, and lead group activities and workshops as requested/needed.
• Work with IRC CWI management to develop more comprehensive strategies, guidelines, and programs for stress management and staff wellbeing.
• Support CWI training, workshops, and retreats in other field sites as requested.
• Responsible for the overall provision of protection case management services and provision of the community-based, focused, and non-specialized psychosocial support
• Make sure to follow case management data protection protocol for case files and beneficiary identifying personal information.
• Compile and produce weekly and monthly MHPSS activity reports to provide information on activities conducted, topics discussed, challenges faced.
• Support the implementation of monitoring and evaluation tools and collaborate with the health clinical MHPSS Officers Integrated protection Information and PSS beneficiary counts to advise the donor reports.
• Ensure daily reporting of attendance per activity and ensure that the data collected is accurate.
• Ensure the development of effective working relationships within CWI team and Health team and stakeholders including partner agencies, UNHCR, RRS, community leaders and service providers for prompt referral, follow up and information sharing.
• Referral cases for specialized support and receive cases referred from other agencies and allocate those cases among team members. Ensure provision of feedback regarding actions taken to other agencies, when necessary and appropriate considering confidentiality requirements.
• Assist the CWI Manager with the integration of mental health and psychosocial support into general health care. These include but are not limited to training in psychological first aid, designing holistic recreational, vocational and social activities; development of material for awareness campaigns.
• Establish, equip and run recreation centres to people in need of psychosocial support.
• Work in keeping with IASC guidelines on mental health and psychosocial support and promote guidelines where appropriate.
• Participate in camp-based protection monthly coordination meetings along with the CWI team.
• Organize psycho-education sessions on mental health issues with support from Health clinical MHPSS team.
• Discharge other duties and responsibilities that can be given by immediate and technical supervisors.

Qualifications

• BA/Master’s degree in psychology, psychiatric nurse or related field with at least 2 years of counseling and social work experience
• BSC degree in Psychology, psychiatric nurse or related field with at least 2 years of counseling and social work experience
• At least 2 years of mental health and psychosocial programming experience.
• In-depth knowledge and experience of mental health and psychosocial programming in the humanitarian context are crucial.
• Familiarity with IASC Guidelines on Mental Health and Psychosocial Support In Emergency Settings
• Proven counselling skill
• Strong interpersonal and supervisory skills.
• Strong writing and reporting skills.
• Strong interpersonal skills and the ability to work within different cultural environments
• Open, hard-working, and self-motivated person.
• Able to always maintain GBV and protection principles.
• Experience in participatory techniques and community mobilization include facilitating the training.
• Trained and certified on MhGAP- humanitarian intervention Guide, trauma-focused cognitive behavioral therapy and interpersonal therapy.
• Collaborating on psychiatric intervention plans.
• Ability to always maintain GBV and protection principles, and to follow a survivor-centered approach to counseling and case management.
• Positive disposition, strong interpersonal and diplomacy skills, and proactive communication skills positive and professional attitude, able to organize, maintain composure and prioritize work under pressure. Work overtime, when needed, and able to coordinate multiple tasks and maintain attention to detail.
• Able to organize, maintain composure and prioritize work under pressure, able to coordinate multiple tasks and maintain attention to detail.
• A clear understanding of gender, power abuse, and issues surrounding violence against women.