As Program Director, you will be responsible for ensuring the provision of political and strategic advice on human rights challenges in Africa; leading the development of regional and country strategies; representing the work of the organization to key target audiences; and effectively managing the staff and resources of your program.

The Program Assistant contributes to all aspects of program implementation and administration under the Africa Education Initiative (AEI) Ambassadors' Girls' Scholarship Program (AGSP) in approximately 15 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. The AEI-AGSP supports scholarships and mentoring programs for socially, physically, and economically disadvantaged girls in Africa.

"Publish or perish" is the warning given many academics at the start of their careers. But it's publication of a very particular kind that scholarly researchers crave. They hunger for their discoveries to achieve immortality in something seldom found on the shelves of your neighbourhood bookstore: specialised academic journals, speckled with footnotes and dense with terminology.

Batsirai Group is a Zimbabwean non-governmental organisation working to strengthen community response to HIV and AIDS. Following a successful two-year placement, the organisation is currently seeking to consolidate its work in promoting community participation within its partner communities and within its own staff. The postholder will also assist in strengthening documentation systems, organisational learning and participatory monitoring and evaluation.

Five small European countries are pooling their resources to help girls and women living in villages belonging to the Youri community in Niger. Andorra, Cyprus, Luxembourg, Monaco and San Marino signed an agreement with UNESCO on 26 April to contribute to a joint fund totaling $200,000 that will finance the project. The project focuses on reinforcing the capacities of girls and women through increased enrollment in schooling, literacy training, empowerment of women through income-generating activities and sensitization to human rights.

The Fondation Hirondelle is an organization of journalists which sets up and operates media services in crisis areas. In partnership with the United Nations Mission in Sudan, Fondation Hirondelle is starting a radio network project composed of 2 central stations and a number of regional stations in view of reaching the Sudanese population. In order to complete the team, Fondation Hirondelle is looking for two experienced news journalists to oversee the production of news and current affairs programmes in Khartoum and Juba.

The role of the Director will be primarily to enhance the coherency and improve the quality of the service delivery of the advisory practice, as well as to develop and reinforce linkages with local and international strategic partners. The Director holds final responsibility for the identification of new partners/clients and resource mobilisation. In addition, the Director is expected to personally engage in advisory services for key client accounts.

Responding to a report card of 'Can do better', Namibia has managed to raise almost US $60 million to address a critical shortage of skilled teachers and classrooms that has affected the quality of education. Recognising the development impact of a poorly-performing education system, private business and western donors last week stepped forward to help finance Namibia's Education and Training Sector Improvement Programme (ETSIP).

International Alert is looking for a committed and experienced Manager to provide strategic leadership to our conflict transformation programme in the Great Lakes region of Africa. This programme, which has a strong gender component, facilitates dialogue and trust-building between parties in conflict, conducts research and advocacy on conflict related issues and works with the international community in its attempts to assist countries either in or coming out of conflict.

As part of the celebration activities marking its tenth anniversary, EISA will launch its First Annual Symposium in Johannesburg from 18 to 20 October 2006. The theme for the Symposium is Challenges for Democratic Governance and Human Development in Africa. Please see the website for more details on the conference and the call for papers.

Cash benefits for children are reducing the impact of poverty on school enrolment in South Africa. In KwaZulu-Natal, child support grants are helping children, particularly from the poorest families, to be educated. Families receiving such grants are more likely to send their children to school at earlier ages than other equally poor households.

Zimbabwe state security agents have stepped up the use of torture against government opponents, with 19 cases reported in March compared with three during the previous two months, a local rights group said on Saturday. President Robert Mugabe's government dismisses as political propaganda charges that it uses intimidation, arbitrary arrests and torture to keep its opponents in check in the face of a deepening economic crisis many critics blame on its policies, reports Reuters.

This is a programme on M & E for Learning, Management and Accountability. Please contact Evangeline Govender for an application form or download from their website. Closing date for applications: 22 May 2006.

The South African Institute of International Affairs has launched a new portal on the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM) as a resource and training tool for African countries and civil society groups participating in the process.

HIV and AIDS, drought and conflict make it hard for developing countries to feed their children properly. Ultimately, this pushes up the mortality rate of children under five. This is according to the United Nations Children's Fund's annual report on children's progress. The UNICEF research surveyed more than 100 developing countries, 17 of which are in eastern and southern Africa. The report says virtually no progress was made in these African countries to address the problem of hunger, a major cause of the incidence of under-weight children.

Uganda is pushing for "regional cooperation" in its efforts to hunt down and apprehend the leadership and remaining fighters of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebel group, who are believed to be hiding in northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). In November 2005 UPDF operations against LRA bases in Sudan forced a group of fighters led by the second-in-command, Vincent Otti, to cross into the jungles of eastern DRC and set up camp in the Garamba National Park. The Ugandan army claims the group has since been joined by the elusive LRA leader Joseph Kony and is formulating a plan to mount further attacks on Uganda. The LRA has traditionally launched its attacks on northern Uganda from bases in southern Sudan.

The amount of funds allocated for education and health in the federal and regional budgets in Ethiopia is not children-oriented and the quality is poor, according to a recent research under taken by Save the Children Sweden.

About 40 African countries will not achieve Education For All (EFA) by 2015 due to the Aids pandemic. The global umbrella teachers' trade union, Education International (EI), has said HIV/Aids was "one of the biggest" challenges to Africa in attaining the goal. Consequently, the trade union has launched a five-year Sh1.35 billion (15 million euros) programme to sensitise teachers on Aids.

Liberia, emerging from the shadow of 14 years of civil war, now must do the best job it can to promote education for its children, The Analyst argues in this editorial. "Liberia was already behind almost all of the nascent African nations in terms of developing her human potentials before she was plunged into warfare," the paper writes. "We therefore need no reminding that we cannot afford to slack off on education."

ORC Macro a firm based in the Washington DC metro area, is looking to hire in-country consultants to conduct research and collection of information on laws and government efforts to eliminate the worst forms of child labor in Liberia, Djibouti, Guinea Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea (6 separate positions).