Call for EOI Junior short-term experts (JSTEs) to configurate tablet devices PN: 18.2208.9-002.00 QuA-VET

I. General information

1. Brief information on the project

The Multi-Donor Action “Improving the Quality and Attractiveness of Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) in Lebanon for poor and vulnerable social groups” is jointly co-financed by the European Union and the German Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). The joint action is implemented by GIZ as a specific Action within the wider BMZ project “Improving the Quality and Attractiveness of TVET in Lebanon (QuA-VET)”.

The aim of the action is to orient the vocational training towards the qualification needs of the labour market in sectors with sustainable employment potentials, therefore improving the employment capacities for poor and vulnerable social groups living in Lebanon. The implementing partner, the Directorate General for Vocational and Technical Education (DGVTE), requires further support in involving the private sector in vocational education and training. Thus, the project’s emphasis is placed on improving the partnership between vocational training institutions and the private sector. This includes developing modularized and practice-oriented training programmes in selected sectors, digitalizing e-Learning Lessons for the technical theoretical subjects of the promoted TVET programs and General Subjects and enhancing the quality of in-company training for employees and work-based learning for vulnerable individuals.

The target groups of the project are vulnerable youth and young adults (aged 15-35), including Syrian and Palestinian refugees, individuals from hosting communities, TVET Lebanese students, unemployed or underemployed individuals (aged 17 to 35), and employees in Micro, Small, and Medium-sized Enterprises (MSMEs) seeking to improve their employment prospects through relevant qualifications.

2. Context

a. Background – e-Learning

Considering the stumbling economic situation that is affecting Lebanon at several levels, the elevated transportation fees, and the unstable security situation in some regions of the country, public TVET students are not attending schools on regular basis.

Based on the experience in e-Learning which the GIZ projects’ ProVTE , VTE4all , and the currently running, QuA-VET have collected and considering that the teaching and learning at distance will be a constant in the future in the form of blended learning, the project has developed and published the technical theoretical courses of Baccalauréat Technique (BT) Industrial Mechanics and Technicien Superieur (TS) Health Inspection and Food Safety (HIFS) in e-Learning modality, and it intends to extend the development of e-Learning Lessons (ELLs) to include the BT2 General Subjects, in addition to the technical theoretical courses for two new sectors.

This will ensure that students have access to a larger number of courses and their learning is not interrupted due to the instability in the country. Moreover, the lessons in EL modality will be a support for teachers during the in-presence lessons.

b. Outline of the mission

To assure the equal access of students, from all the technical schools involved in BT “Bâtiment et Travaux Publics” to the e-Lessons uploaded on the Learning Management System (LMS), 500 tablet devices have been distributed during 2020-21 academic year, under the EU-funded ProVTE project. Additionally, the EU-funded VTE4all project equipped all BT1 students from 16 TVET schools with tablet devices, to access the e-Lessons of General Subjects. The QuA-VET project developed and launched the Technical Theoretical Subjects of the above-mentioned specializations in BT and TS as e-Learning Lessons for the academic years 2022-23 and 2023-24 and distributed 565 tablet devices to the students and teachers in its 13 partner TVET schools to access the e-Lessons.

The project will be developing the courses in two new sectors in addition to the ones of BT2 General Subjects in e-Learning modality for the 2024-25, 2025-26 and 2026-27 academic years. To allow approximately 652 students and teachers from up to 24 TVET institutions to access and complete the e-Lessons on the LMS, 652 tablet devices and power banks will be procured and distributed.

Therefore, junior short-term experts selected from public TVET institutes, with expertise in Tablet devices and/or IT equipment maintenance, are required to be trained on and supervised by an expert to configurate and maintain up to 570 tablet devices in total to be distributed to the partner TVET schools.

c. GIZ shall hire the contractors for the anticipated contract term, from 20.08.2024 to 29.08.2025

d. The contractors shall provide the following work/service:

• Meet with project manager, project team members, staff of the DGVTE and of other organizations involved in the project as considered necessary.
• Inform and regularly consult the project team members.
• Attend an in-presence training session on how to set up and configurate tablet devices.

• Configurate up to 102 devices in the project’s office premises between August and October 2024 under the supervision of the expert: download all applications needed on the tablets as requested by project team (such as Moodle, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, etc.), and the activation of the restrictions on non-educational applications.
• Configurate up to 348 devices in the project’s office premises between November 2024 and January 2025 under the supervision of the expert: download all applications needed on the tablets as requested by project team (such as Moodle, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, etc.), and the activation of the restrictions on non-educational applications.
• Configurate up to 120 devices in the project’s office premises between April and May 2025 under the supervision of the expert: download all applications needed on the tablets as requested by project team (such as Moodle, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, etc.), and the activation of the restrictions on non-educational applications.
• Report all installations, configurations and accounts created on the tablet devices in an Excel sheet to the project team.
• Remain available for any technical support needed in relation to the tablets distributed to schools.
• Carry on all activities necessary for the accomplishment of the required outputs / results.
• Write mission report and required administrative deliverables.
• Be accessible after the short-term mission through the internet for follow-up discussions.

Administrative Deliverables

• A comprehensive end of mission’s report, submitted to project advisors for revision and approval following the structure:

1. Scope and objectives of the mission
2. Approach adopted for conducting the mission
3. List of outputs produced during the mission (including meetings and people met)
4. Description of the outputs produced during the mission
5. Problems and challenges encountered during the mission
6. Recommendations for the follow-up of the mission
7. Recommendations for the improvement of project implementation

• All documents produced should be delivered in hard copy and in digital form using exclusively MS-Office applications. 

II.      Tender requirements

   1.  Qualifications of proposed staff

               1.1 General qualifications

Education:   Univerity degree at bachelor level or LT in Computer Science, Information Technology, or any other related field.

Professional experience:  At least 2 years of working experience in IT related work in the public TVET sector.

                1.2   Experience in the region/knowledge of the country

At least one year of working experience in Lebanon.

                1.3    Language skills:

Business fluency in Arabic Language

Business fluency in English Language

2.   Quantitative requirements