Policy Design and Learning Specialist

Who We Are!

🌍 Africa has the world’s youngest and fastest-growing population. By 2035, the continent is poised to contribute more young people to the global workforce each year than the rest of the world combined.

At Educate! we're obsessed with impact. We leverage iterative learning to build highly scalable youth employment solutions aimed at unlocking the potential of the world’s youngest continent.

Educate! prepares youth in Africa to learn, earn and thrive in today’s economy by:
• Introducing an employment-focused school subject into secondary and
• Delivering livelihood boot camps for out-of-school youth, with a focus on marginalized rural girls and young women.

To date, more than 500,000 youth have been meaningfully impacted across Uganda, Rwanda, Kenya, and Tanzania, and along the way, Educate! has become the largest youth employment and skills provider in East Africa.

Educate! is a team of over 300 largely African staff and 300 volunteer youth mentors. We prioritize building an engaging, fulfilling and growth oriented work environment. 50% of our top 30 leaders have been with us for over 5 years, 10+ alumni have started their own organizations, and 6 current or former team members were Acumen Fund East Africa fellows.

We have been backed by top foundations such as Imaginable Futures, Livelihood Impact Fund, Jack Dorsey’s #startsmall, CIFF and Echidna Giving. Educate! won a 2018 Klaus J. Jacobs Prize and a 2015 WISE Award, and has been highlighted by the World Bank’s S4YE's Impact Portfolio, an Al Jazeera documentary, BBC, The Brookings Institution as one of 14 case studies on scaling education, and the Gates Foundation as a Goalkeepers Accelerator. In 2022, we received a catalytic investment from philanthropist Mackenzie Scott to scale our systems change work.

Educate!'s long-term vision is to design solutions that measurably impact millions of youth across Africa each year.
Good to note: To Our Awesome Applicants! 🚀💫

We know that incredible candidates sometimes hesitate to apply if they don’t meet every requirement. If this role excites you, we encourage you to apply!

We’re looking for passionate individuals who believe in our mission and can bring unique perspectives to our team—not just those who check every box. We value diversity and strongly encourage women and individuals from all backgrounds to apply.

Position Overview

Educate!, the largest youth skills service provider in East Africa, is seeking a dynamic, strategic, and high-performing Policy Design and Learning Specialist to support education system reform and drive impactful program design at scale. As we continue to strengthen our influence across government systems and expand our reach to more youth, this role requires a professional who can combine strategic thinking, technical expertise in education, and strong stakeholder engagement.

The Policy Design and Learning Specialist will be responsible for shaping and refining program design, supporting policy alignment, and driving continuous learning to improve outcomes. This includes collaborating closely with government partners, supporting teacher training and capacity building efforts, contributing to advocacy initiatives, and ensuring programs are responsive, relevant, and impactful for students and youth.

This role demands someone who is proactive, adaptable, and solutions-oriented, with the ability to navigate complex systems, influence stakeholders, and translate insights into action. As we scale, this role is critical in ensuring our programs remain effective, aligned with national priorities, and deliver sustained impact.
What You’ll Do🌟Government Workshop Co-Design and Coordination- 35%
• Lead the design of innovative and high quality materials for all government engagement workshops, including strategy documents, workshop agendas, concept notes, facilitation guides, education system analyses, talking points for policymakers, benchmarking reports and policy briefs.
• Participate in and support the design and facilitation of government engagement workshops, such as multi-stakeholder dialogues, learning experiences and co-design workshops, to influence government policy.
• Lead retrospective sessions post-workshops to assess what went well, what didn’t, and how future workshops can be improved.
• Develop clear next steps and action plans from workshop outcomes to inform and
• enhance future designs and materials.
• Establish a robust feedback loop to continually refine and elevate the quality and impact of materials and workshop designs.
• Provide a leadership role in quality assurance, ensuring that all materials are thoroughly vetted and meet the highest standards of accuracy, clarity, and effectiveness.
Digital Learning Design and Technology Systems- 30%
• Build and manage structured learning journeys on the LMS. Take approved curriculum content and translate it into a sequenced digital experience: organizing modules, setting progression logic, defining milestones, and configuring the platform so teachers move through content in an order that builds knowledge and skills incrementally. You own the learning architecture inside the platform, not just the content sitting in it.
• Apply instructional design principles to make LMS content accessible and actionable for teachers with varying subject knowledge. Use Tanzanian-context examples and activities that address diverse learning styles and backgrounds.
• Monitor LMS and virtual learning data, including usage, completion rates, drop-off points, and assessment performance, to identify gaps and inform improvements in content, sequencing, and platform configuration.
• Design and build structured learning journeys within platforms ensuring clear sequencing, milestones, and progression logic.
• Pull, analyze and translate data and reports from LMS and digital or virtual learning spaces to inform design decisions
• Design feature mock-ups, dashboards, and visual representations of design briefs to guide technical and product teams in developing data systems and platform features.
• Coordinate with technical and product teams to ensure platform features support effective learning, data tracking, and teacher engagement.
Policy, Standards & Systems Design - 20%
• Develop and maintain curriculum frameworks, policy guidelines, assessment standards, teacher orientation materials, and training curricula that align with government reforms and evidence from program implementation.
• Develop policy and curriculum frameworks that translate government education reform priorities into actionable implementation guidelines for schools and teachers. This includes drafting scope and sequence documents, syllabi, teacher orientation frameworks, training curricula, and assessment standards that can be adopted or adapted by ministry partners.
• Lead engagement with government and stakeholders through technical working groups, co-design sessions, and review meetings to ensure materials remain aligned with national standards and priorities.
• Turn program evidence into design decisions. Use data from classroom observations, teacher feedback, assessment results, and partner evaluations to identify gaps in existing frameworks and drive targeted revisions to policy documents, technical standards, and curriculum architecture.
• Design process management: Own and manage the end-to-end content design process by maintaining a central design tracker,deliverables, timelines and review stages, ensuring version control and quality assurance, and coordinating feedback loops to deliver high-quality outputs on time.
Curriculum Content Development & Co-Design - 15%
• Design and develop subject-specific curriculum materials including lesson plans, learner guides, textbooks, workbooks, teacher guides, and digital content aligned with Tanzanian standards (NECTA, TIE) and Educate!’s instructional approach.
• Develop content from both scratch and existing drafts, adapting to project needs (e.g., full textbooks, term lesson plans, teacher facilitation guides, or digital modules) while ensuring clarity, usability, and coherence.
• Facilitate structured co-design processes with government stakeholders, subject experts, and teachers to co-create, test, and refine materials. This includes leading working sessions, synthesizing feedback, and making clear decisions to ensure both quality and stakeholder ownership.
• Design project-based formative assessments aligned with PBA methodology, including student tasks, rubrics, and teacher guidance, to evaluate learners’ understanding and application of subject content.
Who You Are 🦸‍♀️🦸‍♂️

You bring a strong user-centric mindset, using feedback to design relevant solutions that meet user needs. You have experience driving behavior change in collaboration with government partners and building strong relationships across teams and senior stakeholders. You are a decisive and adaptable problem-solver, able to navigate complex environments, secure buy-in, and lead effective implementation. You hold a relevant degree and align with Educate!’s cultural tenets, Learn more by looking at Educate!’s culture deck here
Terms

The location is in Dar es salaam, Tanzania with frequent travel to program locations.
What We Offer
• A vibrant, mission-driven environment with a supportive and fun team.
• Competitive salary based on experience.
• Learning & growth opportunities

Application Process: Rolling basis, interviews happening soon!

Our Culture & Tenets(Values) 🌱

We’re ambitious. Are you? Educate! is growing fast, so new opportunities are opening up and expanding all the time. We’re inspired by people with drive, and we love to help them reach their full potential. We expect everyone at Educate! to contribute above and beyond their job description, grow their skills, and advance their careers, and we are committed to supporting our staff members on that journey of their careers, and we are committed to supporting our staff members on that journey.
• We put Youth First, Impact-Obsessed - We are purpose-driven, focused on impact, and prioritize what truly matters. We listen to youth, design our efforts around their needs, and ensure every dollar creates transformative experiences they value.
• We Exceed Expectations - We take pride in going above and beyond to achieve the best results—proactively identifying problems and seeking solutions without waiting or stopping at what's requested.
• We Are Always Learning - We are committed to seeking and applying new knowledge and ideas. We stay open-minded and continuously try new things, experiment, grow, and improve. We invest in learning for ourselves and our teams.
• We are One Team, Many Views - We value all individuals, believe diverse ideas and open dialogue drive excellence, foster a supportive and respectful environment where everyone can freely express themselves. We work as one team and prioritize the organization's mission over personal or team interests.
• We have the Startup Mindset - We innovate relentlessly to grow our impact, we never think “we have arrived” or “we’re done.”We constantly challenge the status quo, embrace change, and move quickly toward our vision. Unafraid of failure, we question anything that hinders progress.

Every person at Educate! — from interns to the executive director — is evaluated by how they live up to these five cultural tenets. They are at the core of how we achieve our mission and why we work as well as we do. Educate is committed to providing an inclusive and welcoming environment for all who interact in our community. In creating this environment, we encourage people from a variety of cultures, backgrounds and life experiences to join our diverse team.

We’re committed to ensuring all candidates are screened for child and youth safety. As part of the process, you’ll need to provide a Certificate of Good Conduct. Educate! reserves the right to withdraw employment offers if any risks to youth are identified.