Senior National Consultant at Malaria Consortium

Malaria Consortium is one of the world's leading non-profit organizations dedicated to the comprehensive control of malaria and other communicable diseases in Africa and Southeast Asia. Malaria Consortium works with communities, government and non-government agencies, academic institutions, and local and international organizations, to ensure good evidence supports delivery of effective services, providing technical support for monitoring and evaluation of programmes and activities for evidence-based decision-making and strategic planning. The organization works to improve not only the health of the individual, but also the capacity of National health systems, which helps to relieve poverty and support improved economic prosperity.

In Nigeria, based on the 2022 stratification exercise, 21 States were designated as eligible for seasonal malaria transmission (SMC). SMC is a key WHO (2012) approved approach to prevent malaria among children aged 3 to 59 months in such areas where malaria transmission is highly seasonal. SMC involves the administration of monthly treatment courses of a combination of antimalarial drugs (Sulphadoxinepyrimethamine + Amodiaquine) over 4 or 5 monthly cycles depending on the duration of the malaria transmission season specific to a given geographical area, with the objective of maintaining therapeutic antimalarial drug concentrations in the blood throughout the period of transmission (rainy season) to prevent malaria.

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job Title: Senior National Consultant

Location: Abuja (FCT)
Timeline for activities: June - November 2025

Background

• The Malaria Consortium SMC project is currently funded by a grant from the Global Fund (GF) and the Open Philanthropy Project Fund (PF). This Terms of Reference (ToR) is however focused on the delivery of the 2025 SMC round in eight states (and the FCT Abuja) with 154 LGAs/Area funded by PF: Bauchi (20); Borno (27), Kebbi (21); Kogi (21), Nasarawa (13), Plateau (17), Sokoto (23), Oyo (6), and the FCT Abuja (6).
• The goal of Malaria Consortium SMC project is to scale up SMC intervention in Nigeria. Key performance indicator is the coverage of eligible children who received full course of SMC in project sites according to national SMC guideline. Other indicators include:
  • Percentage of eligible children who received the first dose of SMC treatment course (DOTS) at the distribution site, per cycle.
  • Number of serious adverse events (SAE) reported and confirmed.
  • Volume of quality assured SP+AQ used/leftover/lost per cycle.
  • Number of reports submitted on time per state.
  • Prevalence of molecular markers associated with resistance to SMC drugs.
  • % of population informed about SMC.
  • Cost of delivery per child.
• After the delivery of SMC in each cycle, an End of Cycle (EoC) evaluation exercise is conducted to obtain timely information about the implementation phase of each SMC cycle. 
• The EoC evaluation is conducted using the Lots Quality Assurance Sampling (LQAS) methodology which is designed primarily to identify lots (designated supervision areas) that are falling short of agreed quality standards and will offer the opportunity to also measure coverage of delivery. This ToR will be implemented based on the EoC evaluation plan and guidelines for electronic data capturing.

Purpose of the Assignment

• The purpose of this ToR is to engage research personnel that will carry out data collection, analysis and interpretation for EoC evaluation based on LQAS approach. 
• The consultant and the supervisor will train data collectors and oversee data collection process while other personnel will carry out the actual data collection using an electronic platform.

Scope of Assignment

• The EoC evaluation will be conducted in the eight states and FCT Abuja supported by PF where SMC is being implemented. The process will involve identification, selection and training of supervisors at a training of trainers (ToT) and subsequently, data collectors in the states.

Methodology

• The aim of the EoC evaluation is to assess SMC coverage and adherence of community drug distributors (CDDs) to treatment protocol immediately and not more than 5 days after each cycle of treatment. 
• The findings will be analysed and any ward (lot) scoring less than 80% will be targeted for corrective measures in their area of poor performance, for improvement in subsequent cycles. (see details in the annex).

Specific Objectives

• S/he will be responsible for reviewing data (data cleaning, review, quality checks) and compiling the reports from other survey consultants. 
• S/he should work closely with the Technical Specialist, Data Analyst Specialist and survey consultants. 
• S/he will submit data, overall LQAS reports, respond to comments from reviewed reports and finalize the overall reports. 
• S/he will be identified and recruited and contracted as per the details in the timing section of this ToR for both the four-cycle and five-cycle states as some of the states (Kogi, Nasarawa, Oyo and Plateau) and the FCT Abuja would have 5-cycles.
• Receive briefing from the programme team at the National level
• Review data for quality and clean the data using STATA.
• Compile and analyze all state data set into single dataset.
• Compile and submit a single technical report highlighting key findings and recommendations from all the eight (8) states and FCT Abuja.
• Train the state consultants and supervisors.
• Work closely with the Malaria Consortium Team to get required support and documents including data and templates for the report, including the template for technical reports.
• Submit overall report.

Expected Output/deliverables
Deliverables for Senior National Consultant:

• Provide technical leadership for state-level evaluation activities, ensuring compliance with standard evaluation protocols.

Develop and submit:

• A detailed Training Agenda for the training of Supervisors and Data Collectors.
• A Training Delivery Guide, including minimum quality standards and best practices for adult learning facilitation.
• A Supervision Checklist outlining monitoring indicators and performance criteria.
• Pre- and Post-Test instruments to assess trainee knowledge acquisition.
• Facilitate high-quality training sessions for Supervisors and Data Collectors.
• Oversee the operationalization of field data collection, ensuring adherence to sampling plans, consent protocols, and data integrity standards.
• Retrieve, review, and interpret state-level analyzed data from the SurveyCTO platform.
• Facilitate feedback sessions with state-level stakeholders to disseminate preliminary findings.
• Prepare and submit:
  • Pre- and Post-Test assessment reports.
  • Submit STATA Do-Files/scripts used for data cleaning and preliminary analysis.
  • State-Specific Technical Report (Narrative format) detailing methodology, results, challenges, and recommendations.
  • State Presentation Deck (PowerPoint format) summarizing evaluation outcomes.

Requirements
Type of personnel required:

• Must be a Degree holder in Public Health, Demography, Statistics, or other related disciplines with at least 8 years’ post-qualification experience.
• Minimum of 5 years’ experience in public health research methodology.
• Must be familiar with SurveyCTO, STATA, and other statistical software.
• Ability to demonstrate good facilitation skills.
• Demonstrable report writing skills.
• Availability for the whole of the period of the survey.
• Must not be a staff of Government or involved in SMC activity at any level and in any State Ministry of Health (SMoH).
• The Lead Consultant must be resident in Abuja.

Application Closing Date
15th May, 2025; 5:00pm

How to Apply
Interested and qualified candidates should:
Click here to apply online

Note

• Kindly note that applicants who do not follow this specification will be disqualified. 
• Only Shortlisted candidates will be contacted.
• For this position, previous working experience with MC and in SMC are added advantages.
• Kindly note that applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis, and as a result, the process may conclude before the advertised deadline. Therefore, early applications are highly encouraged. 
• Malaria Consortium does not accept or ask for payment during recruitment. We also would not accept hardcopy CVs; all applications should be sent through the above link.