(EOI)Develop and pilot a short course: fundamentals of natural language processing with a focus on machine translation for linguists in Rwanda
- Dashboard
- Job Detail
Expression of Interest (EOI)Develop and pilot a short course: fundamentals of natural language processing with a focus on machine translation for linguists in Rwanda
Background
The Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH is a federally owned international cooperation enterprise for sustainable development with worldwide operations. GIZ has worked in Rwanda for over 30 years. The primary objectives between the Government of Rwanda and the Great Lakes Region and the Federal Republic of Germany are poverty reduction and promotion of sustainable development. To achieve these objectives, GIZ Rwanda is active in the sectors of Decentralization and Good Governance, Economic Development and Employment Promotion, Energy and ICT (Information and Communications Technology), Natural Resources, Peace and Security and Sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV).
Context
About the GIZ Digital Transformation Center Rwanda
The Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH is a federally owned international cooperation enterprise for sustainable development with worldwide operations. GIZ has worked in Rwanda for over 30 years. The primary objectives between the Government of Rwanda and the Federal Republic of Germany are poverty reduction and promotion of sustainable development. To achieve these objectives, GIZ Rwanda is active in the sectors of Decentralization and Good Governance, Economic Development and Employment Promotion, Energy, and ICT (Information and Communications Technology).
The program "Digital Solutions for Sustainable Development" (DSSD) aims to promote the development of digital solutions, digital inclusion and professional ICT skills and capacities. In 2019, DSSD opened the Digital Transformation Center as a hub for innovation and collaboration among public and private sector, academia, and civil society. Over time, other projects such as FAIR Forward, Make-IT in Africa, Africa Cloud, and the Support Program to the Smart Africa Secretariat joined the Digital Transformation Center.
About the Digital Transformation Center’s AI Hub
One of the focus areas of the Digital Transformation Center is Artificial Intelligence. Against this background, the AI Hub Rwanda has been founded, bundling all AI initiatives implemented by GIZ in Rwanda. It comprises two projects, the global FAIR Forward program as well as the component for Machine Translation of the DSSD program. The vision of the AI Hub Rwanda is to co-create a vibrant and inclusive ecosystem in Rwanda harnessing the benefits of open and ethical AI for sustainable development. Our mission is empowering our partners through providing open AI training data, capacity building, and development of ethical policy frameworks towards building community-driven AI solutions.
Specifically, we are working in 3 key areas:
Open data, models and use cases for Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Machine Learning for Earth Observation (ML4EO): We facilitate the creation and open provision of non-discriminatory and inclusive training data and open-source AI applications. Open access to African language data is a key priority to enable the development of AI-based voice interaction in local languages to empower marginalized groups.
Capacity building: We aim to strengthen the capacities of local actors (local developers, universities, companies and start-ups, governments, as well as civil society) in the development and application of artificial intelligence. For this purpose, we offer "on-the-job" training as well as specific training formats and fellowships.
AI policy: We advocate for value-based AI that is rooted in human rights, international principles such as accountability, robustness, security and safety, transparency of decision-making, fairness, and privacy, drawing on European experiences such as the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Therefore, the project supports the development of effective political and regulatory frameworks as well as policy dialogues at the national and regional level to promote AI adoption for sustainable development and inclusive growth in Rwanda.
About the University of Rwanda’s College of Arts and Social Sciences, School of Arts and Languages
University of Rwanda’s College of Arts and Social Sciences, School of Arts and Languages is one of the four schools of the College whose programmes are very useful to the society. Its graduates are contributing greatly to the development of the country in different areas: languages and communication, translation, and interpreting, editing, publishing, international relations, education, tourism, etc. The demand for more graduates is still high to contribute to MICE (meetings, incentives, conferences, and exhibitions), library and book publishing and communication industries in Rwanda. Within the School, two options, i.e., Translation & Interpreting and Linguistics & Literature can well be involved in the machine translation project. Indeed, modules of translation, linguistics, computers and translation, computational linguistics which are key in the project are offered. There are general and specialized translation combinations: English-Kinyarwanda and vice versa. Academic staff, students and alumni in areas of Translation & Interpreting and Linguistics & Literature will be mobilised to be on-board.
About the Machine Translation component
In the area of machine translation, the project aims to “improve the preconditions for the use of machine translation in the public sector and in the digital ecosystem.”
To achieve this, the project is focusing on the following areas:
In the first area of action, the measure supports local actors (especially young developers) to collect baseline data in the form of translations (parallel text corpora) as well as to develop a prototype model for machine translation Kinyarwanda-English.
In a second area of action, the measure strengthens the capacities of local actors (local developers, universities, companies, governments, and civil society) in the development and application of machine translation. For this purpose, the measure offers "on-the-job" training as well as specific training formats.
The third area of action builds on the previous action areas to first identify and elaborate use cases (such as the translation of digital services or applications) based on the capacities built with local actors. The measure then supports these local actors in implementing the use cases.
In line with the second action area, the DSSD program has partnered with the School of Arts and Languages of the College of Arts and Social Sciences at the University of Rwanda to design and develop a short course on “Fundamentals of Natural Language Processing with a Focus on Machine Translation for Linguists” to augment local capacity in the natural language processing subfield of AI. To this end, DSSD requires the services of a contractor with applied pedagogical experience to co-develop, implement, facilitate roll-out, and evaluate the efficacy of a short course on the application of natural language processing in translation and other conversational applications.
Goals and Objectives:
Machine learning (ML) techniques often work better when the algorithms are provided with pointers to what is relevant about a dataset, rather than just massive amounts of data.
When discussing natural language, these pointers often come in the form of annotations—metadata that provides additional information about the text. However, in order to teach a computer effectively, it’s important to give it the right data, and for it to have enough data to learn from.
The purpose of this assignment is to upskill linguists, translators, interpreters, and other students from the School of Arts and Languages in the field of natural language processing for machine translation and conversational AI. To provide practical hands-on modules that will equip graduates of the short course with knowledge to contribute and maintain to the linguistic facets and functions of the human language technology pipeline.
The specific goals and objectives are the following:
Develop and pilot a stand-alone training program on the fundamentals of natural language processing for machine learning with a focus on machine translation for linguists in Rwanda. The training program should supplement participants’ existing knowledge in computer-assisted translation and enable them to contribute to the various stages of machine translation processes i.e., content curation, post-editing.
Curate a curriculum of instructional content free of charge for participants and prepare all resources in a way that can then be used to design an Open Educational Resource (OER), enabling future cohorts of the short course to continuously access the educational material at no expense.
Once successfully piloted, provide support and advisory to integrate the course into the professional training programme of the University of Rwanda.
Target Group:
In relation to the partner institution’s student demographic, the short course should be designed and developed for the key user group:
18 – 40-year-old, seeking either to upskill, reskill, or acquire practical hands-on experience in linguistic annotation
Applicants to the program should have educational or professional background in any domain of applied linguistics or traditional and/or computer-assisted translation and have a strong interest in human language technology. Additionally, participants should have knowledge of basic ICT skills; information literacy, processing and presenting information, and online communication and collaboration.
Content:
Theoretical and computational linguistics are focused on unravelling the deeper nature of language and capturing the computational properties of linguistic structures. Natural Language Processing (NLP) attempts to adopt these insights and algorithms and turn them into functioning, high-performance programs that can impact the ways we interact with computers using language. Working with language technologies requires data, large amounts of textual or speech data depending on the task.
However, it is not enough to simply provide a computer with a large amount of data and expect it to learn to speak—the data has to be prepared in such a way that the computer can more easily find patterns and inferences. This is usually done by adding relevant metadata to a dataset. Any metadata tag used to markup elements of the dataset is called an annotation over the input. However, in order for the algorithms to learn efficiently and effectively, the annotation done on the data must be accurate, and relevant to the task the machine is being asked to perform. For this reason, the discipline of language annotation is a critical link in developing intelligent human language technologies.
For linguists, e.g. translators and interpreters, this poses an opportunity to drive this development and benefit from new language technology but also a challenge if capacities are lacking to partake in it.
This course is supposed to help them realize the opportunities and meet the challenges that specifically linguists encounter in this field. Participants of the short course shall be enabled to partake in the business value-chain and applied academic realm of human language technologies. Any approach to do so has to be application-oriented and consider the strengths and skills a linguistic education such as in translation and interpreting has to offer in the area of NLP and machine translation. Furthermore, the specific conditions of linguistic education and practice in Rwanda must be taken into consideration.
Contents of this short course may involve: introduction to language as data, the value of language data (both speech and text), introduction to corpus linguistics, introduction to natural language processing including neural machine translation, principles of language annotation, and guidelines for computer-assisted collection/curation of good training data/language corpora. Subjects on data collection should be complemented by practically oriented beginner classes in data visualisation geared towards demonstrating the linguistics theories known to the target group, specifically in areas of morphology, syntax, and semantics
Essentially, this project intends to empower linguists to recognize the value of their work, enabling the Rwandan linguistic community to see they are data owners and gaining insight into the commercial use of such data. Practical projects should focus on dataset creation and annotation while focusing less on technical subjects in natural language processing.
Pilot program:
In a first step, GIZ together with UR intend to implement a pilot of the short course to assess the curriculum’s efficacy before integrating it into the professional development programme of UR’s School of Art and Languages.
In principle, the pilot program will be run in cooperation with UR’s colleges interested to take up the short course in their professional training program or short curriculum offers if it proves successful i.e., the College of Arts and Social Sciences (School of Arts and Languages) and the College of Sciences and Technology (School of Information and Communication Technology).
In cooperation with the University of Rwanda’s School of Art and Languages, the contractor will be provided 2 co-contractors (lecturers) to act as support and mentees during the curriculum development and implementation phases of the course. The co-contractors will always be present to assess and learn of the methods applied during instruction of the course at their campus. Additionally, they will be available to provide input and support along
One of this program’s key objectives is to extend the target group’s linguistic know-how into the computational subject of machine translation, while inadvertently introducing concepts in linguistic mediation of text to other participants with more technical background owing to the cross-disciplinary composition of involved college representatives.
The pilot course shall have the following characteristics:
The course should be developed in a blended learning format which includes in-person and virtual elements. If COVID-19 restrictions return, there should be an option to adapt it to a purely virtual format.
The course shall be implemented as a professional development training course. The exact period (around 2-3 months), times and days the course is conducted (e.g. block lectures) and the location (Kigali or Huye) shall be defined in accordance to research on the target group and in close coordination with GIZ and UR.
Up to 30 participants shall be trained who will be selected based on an open application process.
Tasks to be performed by the contractor
Against the above-mentioned background, GIZ would like to contract a consulting firm that leads the design, development, and implementation of a pilot short course on Natural Language Processing for Machine Learning with a focus on Machine Translation for Linguists such as Translators and Interpreters in Rwanda.
The service provider is responsible for the design, creation, planning, organization and implementation of the short course curriculum and the associated logistics required in delivering the program successfully, as well as evaluation, and knowledge transfer, as defined in these TORs.
In order to ensure sustainability and knowledge transfer, the bidder is required to closely collaborate with staff of the University of Rwanda’s College of Arts and Social Sciences, both for curriculum development and course implementation. UR will make a team of 1-2 lecturers available for this (based on a separate contract with GIZ).
Specifically, the contractor is required to implement the following work packages:
Work package A: Scoping and creating the curriculum content
Scoping:
In a first step, the service provider is required to conduct scoping activities to gain further insights for the design and implementation of the short course. These scoping activities would include, but not be limited to:
Conducting end-user surveys and focus group discussions to ensure the planned training programme is fruitful to end users in its content as well as in its logistics (timing. Focus groups and user surveys must encompass (i) equal number of women and men; and (ii) participants from both tertiary education and applied / professional linguistics-related contexts such as translation or interpreting.
Collaborating with the University of Rwanda to understand existing courses and training offers related to the course, as well as existing skills and knowledge of target groups, and identify gaps that the new course is supposed to fill.
Conducting thorough research on internationally recognized credentials building the curriculum on state-of-the-art science, best practices and applied tools of the industry.
Conducting research on existing programs and their applicability in the economic sector, optimal study/training times and collaboration options for gaining practical work experience by participants, i.e., applying acquired skills in live environment.
Kick-off workshop
The service provider will organize and conduct a physical (or hybrid) kick-off workshop with GIZ, UR, and government stakeholders where relevant (Rwanda Basic Education Board, Ministry of Education) to launch the curriculum development process for the short course depending on identified gaps and needs from the foundational scoping phase.
Training Program Framework (TPF):
Develop a TPF in close coordination with the GIZ and UR team. The TPF should include at minimum:
Results of scoping activities
Detailed definition of the target group and their needs for training. This shall be based on target group identified jointly with UR and GIZ.
Training objectives
Formats of the training and each session
Full curriculum including the training content that will be taught
Training materials and exercises in professional design
Timeline of the training as well as the curriculum spread over this period
Marketing strategy
Didactics:
The service provider shall develop a written strategy on how knowledge building of participants would be most effectively achieved. This strategy should include at a minimum:
Methodology for conducting the course instruction, including format, presentation, interaction, collaboration, and communication styles
Tools (online and offline) utilised for implementing knowledge transfer (course instruction)
Method for measuring the effectiveness of the short course
The course should be highly engaging and fun for the participants
The teaching format should encompass blended learning to include ICT based elements in order to provide students with the learning experience to meet the demands and expectations of the market.
All modules shall be highly practice oriented to develop professional skills in accordance with current market demands. Each module shall include learning / knowledge transfer formats and practical activities as well as discussion and interaction among participants.
Work package B: Implementing the curriculum and facilitating pilot course roll out
Engagement with short-term experts for course development and implementation
The service provider will procure all experts and trainers required to develop the curriculum, teach and/or transfer the knowledge to participants, as outlined in the approved curriculum (see short-term expert pool).
The service provider will oversee, manage, and coordinate with all identified experts and trainers to ensure the training program runs smoothly. This management of experts will include remuneration for professional services rendered, work allocation, experts’ days and replacement of experts / trainers due to any force majeure.
The relationship management with experts will include (but is not limited to) reaching out to experts during the pre-scoping mission, coordinating for training program (curriculum) input, course roll out management (i.e., guest lecturing, etc.) and disaster recovery management (finding suitable alternatives where experts are unavailable).
Recruitment campaign and call for applications
The service provider shall conduct a marketing campaign for not longer than 2 (two) weeks, based on the marketing strategy developed in work package A. All activities of the campaign need to be approved by GIZ.
Develop and conduct call for applications to participate in the training, which shall be publicised on at least 3 different appropriate online platforms (including social media platforms).
The call for applications must be designed together with GIZ and UR – School of Art and Languages and will include the number of participants which the program will accept, any pre-selection and/or minimum criteria required by the participant to apply as well as the format and platform which participants must use to ensure an eligible application.
The service provider must ensure that all eligible applications received are reviewed, align with the pre-selection criteria which will be determined by the service provider in close coordination with UR – School of Art and Languages and GIZ, and then only suitable candidates are selected, duly informed and fully processed in to participate in the training.
The contractor shall ensure that at least 40 applications aligning with the pre-selection criteria are received. The selection process shall be designed and executed along measurable and explainable criteria in alignment with UR and GIZ.
The contractor shall ensure that at least 40% of the trainees are women, preferably 50% or more.
Draft at least 2 blog posts over the duration of the course, highlighting the impact of the training programme.
Participant preparation
The service provider is required to contact successful applicants to the program in writing and provide them with all required next steps for their journey in the program both regionally and nationally. This will be the start of the support process for the participants.
A maximum of 3 (three) attempts must be made at contacting successful applicants (in writing and telephonically, combined) after which affording the applicant a period of 1 (one) week to respond, the next successful, eligible applicant must be contacted by the service provider.
Training implementation
The service provider shall implement and facilitate of the short course program as a professional development training course. The exact period (around 2-3 months), times and days the course is conducted (e.g. block lectures) and the location (Kigali or Huye) shall be defined in accordance to research on the target group and in close coordination with GIZ and UR.
The training and knowledge transfer will be implemented in the manner and format, utilising the tools and methodologies as outlined in the approved training program framework. The service provider may not deviate from approved process, unless by agreement with GIZ.
Access to required infrastructure and resources
The service provider shall procure, provide and maintain all resources (including personnel), communication channels, platforms, services, tools, hardware, software and infrastructure necessary for design, development and delivery of this project.
Communication and collaboration with participants and partners
The service provider is responsible for all communication with participants and partners before, during and after the scoping, design and implementation of the training, in coordination with GIZ and UR – School of Art and Languages.
The communication with participants would specifically include, but is not limited to:
Coordinating written and verbal correspondence, queries and feedback in respect of the application process as well as training and post training evaluation as detailed in this TOR
Organising meetings, workshops and other forms of engagement required for the course design and development, course training and implementation, and post training evaluation and support
Sharing pre-work and post work content, assignment and test feedback, group work information and planning, course material and other relevant information.
Establish a communication platform on which learners can engage each other as well as trainers, in real time, during the training period (including outside of the training hours and on weekends or holidays for the participants themselves) as well as during the support period, e.g., WhatsApp, Slack
The communication with partners would include, but is not limited to:
Managing queries from media and third parties, including reasonable response times in close coordination with GIZ
Facilitating the marketing component of the training program, including engaging with media outlets and third parties to ensure a successful marketing campaign as well as fielding questions from the public
Engaging and responding to all queries, feedback and correspondence, including attendance of in-person and/or or online meetings, workshops and engagements in the course and scope of this project, including pre and post training scoping and evaluation.
The service provider must maintain open lines of communication and ensure that they are available for engagement on at least one written electronic channel and where possible one telecommunications channel (i.e., mobile/ telephone), during ordinary business hours for participants and partners during the training and for any post training support, where provided.
Work package C: Certification, post training evaluation and reporting
Participant certificates:
The contractor shall manage the certification process of the trainees. Certificates shall be designed based on GIZ design guidelines.
Post training review and participant assessment:
The service provider shall conduct a written evaluation process of the training after the completion of the pilot. The post training evaluation should contain feedback from students on trainers and third parties (guest lecturers), including qualitative feedback on content, level of complexity, professional applicability, methodology, ease of understanding and recommendation of the course, at a minimum.
Based on the evaluation, the service provider shall suggest potential amendments and changes to the content, structure and format of the training programme for potential future cohorts and/or the integration of the course into UR’s curriculum.
Evaluation process after 4 months:
The service provider shall conduct one engagement exercise (individually or collectively) with the participants, to evaluate whether all participants have applied the acquired knowledge in their professional context (public sector, private sector or academia) within 4 months after the training and can prove this with a practical example (e.g.,Spotting and naming typical errors in a given machine-translated text, actively contributing to data collection/curation for parallel datasets used by translation models).
Reporting:
The service provider will provide a written interim and final report for the project.
Interim Report
This report will be provided midway through the program, and will detail, at a minimum:
General remarks regarding the training process implementation
Participant engagement level and ease of participant understanding of content
Any logistical difficulties experienced in rolling out the course
Any envisaged aspects that should be considered, or elements that may affect program roll-out
Final Report
The service provider will provide a final, combined, report after conclusion of the training program and evaluation process.
The report shall be provided in pdf or other suitable format, including statistics, images, tables, infographics and other tools and methodology to efficiently convey the information required.
The report must be provided by no later than one calendar month after the conclusion of the evaluation process.
This report will contain information of the service provider’s efforts in formulating and implementing the following service requirements, including, but not limited to:
Assessment and evaluation of the AI training landscape (pre-training)
Design process of the curriculum (design concepts, experts engaged and thought process utilised)
Selection process of participants (what criteria was used and why, including disaggregated data on gender)
Training of the participants as well as remarks regarding the training process (including participant engagement level, ease of participant understanding, methodology that worked well and what did not work well, which participants excelled and who did not – disaggregated by gender, field of expertise and age)
Post training evaluation content
Work package D: Knowledge transfer and integration into the School of Arts and Languages’ professional training program
After completion of the pilot phase of the short course implementation, the service provider shall initiate necessary steps for handover of curricular content to the instructors from the School of Arts and Languages for continuation of the short course as part of their training program.
Co-design and preparation of course materials to be published as an open educational resource
Identify a methodology or make recommendations to implement the curriculum or adopt the training as an open educational resource (OER), which enables this training to be sustained, as either:
All or part of an existing curriculum (of a university, institute, or education body)
Run as a stand-alone program run by UR – School of Art and Languages or other entity
Prepare modules of the short course such that an Open Educational Resource can be created from them on a freely accessible platform e.g., Atingi
Provide a well-documented open access repository of all “open educational resources” and other reading, research, and publications used and recommended for this training
Develop replication kit for the partner institution
Compile a course replication kit and trainer guidelines for this pilot short course instruction, for GIZ and UR
This shall include, at a minimum:
a document of methodology and teaching format through appropriate means for online / offline knowledge transfer, including, inter alia:
which experts and third parties were used and for what purposes
tasks undertaken by trainers during training implementation
reliance placed on trainer by students
observations and recommendations for conducting training, enabling knowledge retention by participants
implicit and tacit knowledge sharing tips and tools
Capacity building for co-contractor on application of replication kit and trainer guidelines: Support local co-contractor(s) from the institution of School of Art and Languages on how to adopt and apply documentation provided in the knowledge transfer.
Support and advise to the University of Rwanda on integration of the course in their academic offer e.g., professional development program
A hand over to UR – School of Art and Languages or other partners
The service provider, working collaboratively with the interdisciplinary team of lecturers especially co-contractors, will support and advise the integration of the course into the curriculum (e.g., Professional training program) of the College’s School of Art and Languages.
Certain milestones, as laid out in the table below, are to be achieved by certain dates during the contract term, and at particular locations:
Milestone
Deadline/place
Scoping
2 weeks after start of contract
Kick-off workshop with UR and GIZ
2 weeks after start of contract
First draft – Training program framework
4 weeks after start of contract
Final – Training program framework
6 weeks after start of contract
Call for applications launched
6 weeks after start of contract
Course participants selected
8 weeks after start of contract
Course pilot kick-off
10 weeks after start of contract
Interim report
12 weeks after start of contract
Course pilot conclusion
18 weeks after start of contract
Post training review and evaluation
20 weeks after start of contract
Knowledge retention strategy finalised
22 weeks after start of contract
Advisory for course integration into academic program completed
24 weeks after start of contract
Evaluation process completed
33 weeks after start of contract
Final report
34 weeks after start of contract
Period of assignment: From, November 1st, 2022, until June 30th, 2023
Concept
In the bid, the bidder is required to show how the objectives defined in Chapter 1 are to be achieved, if applicable under consideration of further specific method-related requirements (technical-methodological concept). In addition, the bidder must describe the project management system for service provision.
Technical-methodological concept
Strategy: The bidder is required to consider the tasks to be performed with reference to the objectives of the services put out to tender (see Chapter 1). Following this, the bidder presents and justifies the strategy with which it intends to provide the services for which it is responsible (see Chapter 2). This should include high-level draft of the curriculum as well as learning and facilitation methodology.
The bidder is required to present the actors relevant for the services for which it is responsible and describe the cooperation with them. A specific focus shall be put on the cooperation with the GIZ team and the University of Rwanda, School of Arts and Languages.
The bidder is required to describe the key processes for the services for which it is responsible and create a schedule that describes how the services according to Chapter 2 are to be provided. In particular, the bidder is required to describe the necessary work steps. The bidder is required to draw up a deliberate and realistic Gantt chart with explanatory notes on risks of delays and failures as well as proper mitigating and reactive measures.
Learning and innovation
The bidder is required to describe how they ensure the sustainability of the programme specifically on:
Preparing the resources of this programme available such that an Open Educational Resource (OER) can be easily created from them,
Providing a methodical strategy describing the approach applied towards capacity building for the University of Rwanda’s School of Arts Languages (learning and innovation).
Project management of the contractor
The bidder is required to explain its approach for coordination with the GIZ project. GIZ will provide one contact person for the contractor. The explanations of the bidder shall consider the following minimum standards to be met by the contractor:
The provision of at least one contact person for GIZ
The existence of substitution management
Daily availability by phone (on workdays)
Response to emails within 24 hours
Weekly availability for a physical or virtual meeting
Weekly progress reporting (verbal or written)
The submission of quality assured deliverables at least three workdays before the approval is due to be made (all deliverables need the approval from GIZ)
Personnel concept
The bidder is required to provide personnel who are suited to filling the positions described, based on their CVs (see Chapter 5), the range of tasks involved and the required qualifications.
The below specified qualifications represent the requirements to reach the maximum number of points, so they represent maximum qualifications, not minimum qualifications.
Roles may be staffed with more than one person to share responsibilities towards fulfilling the assigned work packages.
Project Lead
Tasks of the team leader
Overall responsibility for the advisory packages of the contractor (quality and deadlines)
Coordinating and ensuring communication with GIZ, partners and others involved in the project
Personnel management, identifying the need for short-term assignments within the available budget, as well as planning and steering assignments and supporting local and international short-term experts
Regular reporting in accordance with deadlines
Providing team leadership and advisory to curriculum development and course implementation
Lead advisory on replication kit and integration of course into UR curriculum
Qualifications of the team leader
Education/training (2.1.1): Bachelors’ or Masters’ qualification in education, IT, or other relevant fields.
Language (2.1.2): Good business language skills in English
General professional experience (2.1.3): 5 years of professional experience in educational / capacity development sector
Specific professional experience (2.1.4):
5 years in developing and implementing professional training programs
3 years of experience in the area of digital skills education / training
Leadership/management experience (2.1.5): 2 years direct supervisory/management experience working with cross-functional teams.
Regional experience (2.1.6): 3 years professional experience with projects in Africa.
Development Cooperation (DC) experience (2.1.7): Experience with at least 2 international development cooperation projects
Other (2.1.8): Experience with agile and state-of-the art facilitation methodologies, didactic principles for improving learning results such as co-construction of learning and online collaboration tools
Expert 1: Curriculum Development Expert – Lead trainer
Tasks of expert 1
Lead and coordinate curriculum development efforts of the project team, including assisting with the field research, focus group coordination and adaption of the feedback into course design, the curriculum and trainings materials developed.
Coordinate with technical experts of GIZ, third parties, partners and trainers in the curriculum development and course material composition, as well as follow up questions and queries that may arise throughout the project and training implementation.
Closely work with co-contractors from the UR School of Arts and Languages.
Ensuring that a comprehensive situational analysis is conducted to inform the new curriculum is up to date and relevant for local audiences.
Provide technical inputs and feedbacks to curricula guidelines, manuals, templates, and other relevant documents to be developed and ensure the course material adhere to national training guidelines and qualification standards.
Qualifications of expert 1
Education/training (2.2.1): Master’s degree in education or another relevant field.
Language (2.2.2): Good business language skills in English.
General professional experience (2.2.3): 5 years’ professional experience in the educational / training sector, preferably at a tertiary institution.
Specific professional experience (2.2.4):
5 years’ experience in developing curricula for digital skills (either in an academic or professional training context) plus knowledge of state-of-the-art learning and training methodology and didactical principles.
Applied experience working with human language technologies or other fields in linguistics.
Leadership/management experience (2.2.5): -
Regional experience (2.2.6): -
Development Cooperation (DC) experience (2.2.7): -
Other (2.2.8):
Experts 2: International linguistic engineer – Assistant trainer
Tasks of expert 2
Monitor and organize linguistically oriented tasks in close cooperation with expert 3 in the curriculum development and support expert 1 with domain-specific knowledge.
Closely work with expert 3 to adapt language-specific knowledge to Kinyarwanda
Design and lead classroom-based or online, technology-enabled learning interventions.
Prepare and assess data labeling/annotation test sets used in class
Monitor and moderate discussion forums for any online and offline engagement and encourage curiosity, dialogue and engagement from participants
Qualifications of expert 2
Education/training (2.3.1): Bachelor’s or master's degree in computational linguistics, applied linguistics or relevant field
Language (2.3.2): Proficiency in English
General professional experience (2.3.3): 4 years of professional experience working in applied and/or computational linguistics
Specific professional experience (2.3.4):
3 years of experience in Natural Language Processing
Previous experience working with language data (such as research, analysis, translation, review, annotation) for low-resource languages
Applied knowledge of structural aspects of languages (morphology, syntax, semantics)
Leadership/management experience (2.3.5): -
Regional experience (2.3.6): -
Development Cooperation (DC) experience (2.3.7): -
Other (2.3.8): -
Experts 3: Kinyarwanda linguistic engineer – Assistant trainer
Tasks of expert 3
Organize linguistically oriented tasks in the curriculum development in close cooperation with expert 2 and support expert 1 with domain-specific knowledge.
Closely work with expert 2 to adapt language-specific knowledge to Kinyarwanda.
Closely work with co-contractors from the UR School of Arts and Languages.
Monitor that curriculum content is designed and course is implemented in consideration of established local competences.
Design and lead classroom-based or online, technology-enabled learning interventions.
Prepare and assess data labeling/annotation test sets used in class
Monitor and moderate discussion forums for any online and offline engagement and encourage curiosity, dialogue and engagement from participants
Qualifications of expert 3
Education/training (2.3.1): Bachelor’s or master's degree in computational linguistics, applied linguistics or relevant field
Language (2.3.2): Proficiency in both English and Kinyarwanda
General professional experience (2.3.3): 3 years of professional experience working in the field of linguistics
Specific professional experience (2.3.4):
2 years of experience using digital tools in applied and/or computational linguistics
Previous experience working with Kinyarwanda language data (such as research, analysis, translation, review, annotation)
Applied knowledge of structural aspects of Kinyarwanda language (morphology, syntax, semantics)
Leadership/management experience (2.3.5): -
Regional experience (2.3.6): 2 years of professional experience in Rwanda
Development Cooperation (DC) experience (2.3.7): -
Other (2.3.8): -
Expert 4: Admin and Communication Expert
Tasks of expert 4
Coordinate communication and correspondence, amongst participants, partners, GIZ and third parties, including administrative support to participants and GIZ, through effectively maintaining and coordinating calendars, scheduling appointments and meetings, making travel arrangements and accommodations for participants as may be required throughout the project
Contribute to the dissemination of online information (Web page, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, etc.)
Collaborate with partner marketing team and GIZ to promote the training program per require media campaigns
Assist with program application process for participants, including background research
Provide tactical support to participants onsite and/or remotely and act as liaison between participants, partners, GIZ and third parties
Organize, compile, and submit support documentation on during and on completion of project, including interim and final reports, statistics and information as may be required
Coordinate training logistics to schedule and plan for training sessions
Qualifications of expert 4
Education/training (2.4.1): Bachelor's in Business Administration, Communications, or other relevant fields
Language (2.4.2): Good business language skills in English and Kinyarwanda
General professional experience (2.4.3): 4 years of media or other communications experience
Specific professional experience (2.4.4): 3 years of experience organizing events and / or trainings, including participant management, logistics, and communications
Leadership/management experience (2.4.5): -
Regional experience (2.4.6): 2 years professional experience in Rwanda
Development Cooperation (DC) experience (2.4.7): -
Other (2.4.8): Experience in organizing both physical and virtual events, workshops, and trainings
Soft skills of team members
In addition to their specialist qualifications, the following qualifications are required of team members:
Team skills to work effectively in a cross-disciplinary group
Analytical thinking to evaluate student performance data, teaching strategies, and curriculum materials
Communication skills to clearly explain any changes in curriculum or instruction to teachers and department faculty
Sociocultural competence
Efficient, partner- and client-focused working methods
Interdisciplinary thinking
Costing requirements
Assignment of personnel
The total number of expert days allocated to this assignment is 244 days for the contractor.
The calculated expert days as distributed among the work packages are as shown:
Work packages
Contractor days
WP 1: Scoping and creating the curriculum content
96
WP 2: Implementing the curriculum and facilitating course roll out
109.5
WP 3: Certification, post training evaluation, and reporting
15.5
WP 4: Knowledge transfer and Integration
23
Total
244
Travel
Travel expenses budget: Up to RWF 12,140,000 (only applies to companies and experts based outside of Rwanda)
The above-mentioned fixed, unalterable travel-expenses budget for all trips abroad and locally in Rwanda for all experts is specified in the price schedule. The bidder should include a clear overview of planned travel by international experts in the proposal. The budget contains the following travel expenses:
Per-diem allowances and accommodation allowances
Flights and other transport costs
Ancillary travel costs (visa, transportation etc.)
The costs are reimbursed in accordance with the country table in the travel expenses guidelines of the BMF circular on travel expense reimbursement (available at: https://www.bundesfinanzministerium.de) as a lump sum (per-diem allowances and accommodation allowances up to the highest rates under tax law for the country in question) or on submission of documentary proof (accommodation costs which exceed this up to an appropriate amount, the cost of flights and other forms of transport). All travel must be agreed in advance by the officer responsible for the project. Travel expenses must be kept as low as possible.
In case travel and other restrictions related to the COVID-19 pandemic do not allow physical workshops when a workshop is planned, the workshop will need to be organized as a virtual workshop. If this or other reasons lead to a workshop being run virtually then for this workshop travel costs cannot be claimed. Therefore, written approval is required from GIZ before any bookings are made. In any case, all travel tickets purchased by the contractor need to be refundable.
Workshops, training
The contractor implements the following workshops/study trips/training courses:
Short course program running over 2 months (as a minimum)
The training venues will be directly procured by GIZ and do not need to be included in the costing. The same applies to travel costs for participants and participant stipends / meals, which shall not be included in the bid.
Flexible remuneration
The service provider may use an amount of up to RWF 3,000,000 for acquiring additional experts if necessary and with approval of GIZ.
Other costs
The service provider must include in their proposal any costs of up to RWF 2,000,000 associated with or arising from the activities that they are required to fulfil, for the period of the contract, including:
costs for conducting research and focus groups, including any gratuity / stipend / day costs (e.g., lunch, transportation) payable to the participants
costs for marketing campaigns (printing and advertisements) and printing of course material
costs for internet bundles for course participants
Inputs of GIZ or other actors
GIZ and/or other actors are expected to make the following available:
Training venue
Provision of 2 staff from UR to co-create and facilitate the course and ensure the integration into the UR curriculum
Requirements on the format of the bid
The structure of the bid must correspond to the structure of the ToR. In particular, the detailed structure of the concept (Chapter 4) is to be organised in accordance with the positively weighted criteria in the assessment grid (not with zero). It must be legible (font size 11 or larger) and clearly formulated. The bid is drawn up in English.
The complete bid shall not exceed 10 pages (excluding CVs).
The CVs of the personnel proposed in accordance with Chapter 5 of the ToR must be submitted using the format specified in the terms and conditions for application. The CVs shall not exceed 4 pages. The CVs must clearly show the position and job the proposed person held in the reference project and for how long. The CVs can also be submitted in English.
If one of the maximum page lengths is exceeded, the content appearing after the cut-off point will not be included in the assessment.
Please calculate your price bid based exactly on the aforementioned costing requirements. In the contract the contractor has no claim to fully exhaust the days/travel/workshops/ budgets. The number of days/travel/workshops and the budget amount shall be agreed in the contract as ‘up to’ amounts. The specifications for pricing are defined in the price schedule.
Submission of offer
The Expression of Interest should contain the following:
Technical Proposal:
Technical proposal with a brief description of why you would be considered as the most suitable for the assignment, relevant expertise, and a detailed, clear methodology, on how will be your approach to complete the assignment
CVs of the experts proposed in accordance with the terms of reference.
Company registration certificate (RDB)
VAT registration certificate
Latest tax clearance certificate
Proof of successful completion of related assignments.
Financial Proposal: indicates the all-inclusive total contract price, supported by a breakdown of all costs. The costs must be in RWF and VAT excluded.
Please submit electronically your EoI (technical & Financial offer) in 2 separated emails and should be in PDF files to this email: RW_Quotation@giz.de until latest 13th October 2022
Please you must write on each email subject this sentence: 83421404 -Technical/financial offer, without this sentence, your offer may not be considered.
Hard copies are not allowed this time
GIZ reserves all rights
List of abbreviations
AVB General Terms and Conditions of Contract (AVB) for supplying services and work 2018
GIZ Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit
UR University of Rwanda
HEC Higher Education Council
DSSD Digital Solutions for Sustainable Development
MT Machine Translation
AI Artificial Intelligence
ML Machine Learning
ToRs Terms of reference
Background
The Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH is a federally owned international cooperation enterprise for sustainable development with worldwide operations. GIZ has worked in Rwanda for over 30 years. The primary objectives between the Government of Rwanda and the Great Lakes Region and the Federal Republic of Germany are poverty reduction and promotion of sustainable development. To achieve these objectives, GIZ Rwanda is active in the sectors of Decentralization and Good Governance, Economic Development and Employment Promotion, Energy and ICT (Information and Communications Technology), Natural Resources, Peace and Security and Sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV).
Context
About the GIZ Digital Transformation Center Rwanda
The Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH is a federally owned international cooperation enterprise for sustainable development with worldwide operations. GIZ has worked in Rwanda for over 30 years. The primary objectives between the Government of Rwanda and the Federal Republic of Germany are poverty reduction and promotion of sustainable development. To achieve these objectives, GIZ Rwanda is active in the sectors of Decentralization and Good Governance, Economic Development and Employment Promotion, Energy, and ICT (Information and Communications Technology).
The program "Digital Solutions for Sustainable Development" (DSSD) aims to promote the development of digital solutions, digital inclusion and professional ICT skills and capacities. In 2019, DSSD opened the Digital Transformation Center as a hub for innovation and collaboration among public and private sector, academia, and civil society. Over time, other projects such as FAIR Forward, Make-IT in Africa, Africa Cloud, and the Support Program to the Smart Africa Secretariat joined the Digital Transformation Center.
About the Digital Transformation Center’s AI Hub
One of the focus areas of the Digital Transformation Center is Artificial Intelligence. Against this background, the AI Hub Rwanda has been founded, bundling all AI initiatives implemented by GIZ in Rwanda. It comprises two projects, the global FAIR Forward program as well as the component for Machine Translation of the DSSD program. The vision of the AI Hub Rwanda is to co-create a vibrant and inclusive ecosystem in Rwanda harnessing the benefits of open and ethical AI for sustainable development. Our mission is empowering our partners through providing open AI training data, capacity building, and development of ethical policy frameworks towards building community-driven AI solutions.
Specifically, we are working in 3 key areas:
Open data, models and use cases for Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Machine Learning for Earth Observation (ML4EO): We facilitate the creation and open provision of non-discriminatory and inclusive training data and open-source AI applications. Open access to African language data is a key priority to enable the development of AI-based voice interaction in local languages to empower marginalized groups.
Capacity building: We aim to strengthen the capacities of local actors (local developers, universities, companies and start-ups, governments, as well as civil society) in the development and application of artificial intelligence. For this purpose, we offer "on-the-job" training as well as specific training formats and fellowships.
AI policy: We advocate for value-based AI that is rooted in human rights, international principles such as accountability, robustness, security and safety, transparency of decision-making, fairness, and privacy, drawing on European experiences such as the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Therefore, the project supports the development of effective political and regulatory frameworks as well as policy dialogues at the national and regional level to promote AI adoption for sustainable development and inclusive growth in Rwanda.
About the University of Rwanda’s College of Arts and Social Sciences, School of Arts and Languages
University of Rwanda’s College of Arts and Social Sciences, School of Arts and Languages is one of the four schools of the College whose programmes are very useful to the society. Its graduates are contributing greatly to the development of the country in different areas: languages and communication, translation, and interpreting, editing, publishing, international relations, education, tourism, etc. The demand for more graduates is still high to contribute to MICE (meetings, incentives, conferences, and exhibitions), library and book publishing and communication industries in Rwanda. Within the School, two options, i.e., Translation & Interpreting and Linguistics & Literature can well be involved in the machine translation project. Indeed, modules of translation, linguistics, computers and translation, computational linguistics which are key in the project are offered. There are general and specialized translation combinations: English-Kinyarwanda and vice versa. Academic staff, students and alumni in areas of Translation & Interpreting and Linguistics & Literature will be mobilised to be on-board.
About the Machine Translation component
In the area of machine translation, the project aims to “improve the preconditions for the use of machine translation in the public sector and in the digital ecosystem.”
To achieve this, the project is focusing on the following areas:
In the first area of action, the measure supports local actors (especially young developers) to collect baseline data in the form of translations (parallel text corpora) as well as to develop a prototype model for machine translation Kinyarwanda-English.
In a second area of action, the measure strengthens the capacities of local actors (local developers, universities, companies, governments, and civil society) in the development and application of machine translation. For this purpose, the measure offers "on-the-job" training as well as specific training formats.
The third area of action builds on the previous action areas to first identify and elaborate use cases (such as the translation of digital services or applications) based on the capacities built with local actors. The measure then supports these local actors in implementing the use cases.
In line with the second action area, the DSSD program has partnered with the School of Arts and Languages of the College of Arts and Social Sciences at the University of Rwanda to design and develop a short course on “Fundamentals of Natural Language Processing with a Focus on Machine Translation for Linguists” to augment local capacity in the natural language processing subfield of AI. To this end, DSSD requires the services of a contractor with applied pedagogical experience to co-develop, implement, facilitate roll-out, and evaluate the efficacy of a short course on the application of natural language processing in translation and other conversational applications.
Goals and Objectives:
Machine learning (ML) techniques often work better when the algorithms are provided with pointers to what is relevant about a dataset, rather than just massive amounts of data.
When discussing natural language, these pointers often come in the form of annotations—metadata that provides additional information about the text. However, in order to teach a computer effectively, it’s important to give it the right data, and for it to have enough data to learn from.
The purpose of this assignment is to upskill linguists, translators, interpreters, and other students from the School of Arts and Languages in the field of natural language processing for machine translation and conversational AI. To provide practical hands-on modules that will equip graduates of the short course with knowledge to contribute and maintain to the linguistic facets and functions of the human language technology pipeline.
The specific goals and objectives are the following:
Develop and pilot a stand-alone training program on the fundamentals of natural language processing for machine learning with a focus on machine translation for linguists in Rwanda. The training program should supplement participants’ existing knowledge in computer-assisted translation and enable them to contribute to the various stages of machine translation processes i.e., content curation, post-editing.
Curate a curriculum of instructional content free of charge for participants and prepare all resources in a way that can then be used to design an Open Educational Resource (OER), enabling future cohorts of the short course to continuously access the educational material at no expense.
Once successfully piloted, provide support and advisory to integrate the course into the professional training programme of the University of Rwanda.
Target Group:
In relation to the partner institution’s student demographic, the short course should be designed and developed for the key user group:
18 – 40-year-old, seeking either to upskill, reskill, or acquire practical hands-on experience in linguistic annotation
Applicants to the program should have educational or professional background in any domain of applied linguistics or traditional and/or computer-assisted translation and have a strong interest in human language technology. Additionally, participants should have knowledge of basic ICT skills; information literacy, processing and presenting information, and online communication and collaboration.
Content:
Theoretical and computational linguistics are focused on unravelling the deeper nature of language and capturing the computational properties of linguistic structures. Natural Language Processing (NLP) attempts to adopt these insights and algorithms and turn them into functioning, high-performance programs that can impact the ways we interact with computers using language. Working with language technologies requires data, large amounts of textual or speech data depending on the task.
However, it is not enough to simply provide a computer with a large amount of data and expect it to learn to speak—the data has to be prepared in such a way that the computer can more easily find patterns and inferences. This is usually done by adding relevant metadata to a dataset. Any metadata tag used to markup elements of the dataset is called an annotation over the input. However, in order for the algorithms to learn efficiently and effectively, the annotation done on the data must be accurate, and relevant to the task the machine is being asked to perform. For this reason, the discipline of language annotation is a critical link in developing intelligent human language technologies.
For linguists, e.g. translators and interpreters, this poses an opportunity to drive this development and benefit from new language technology but also a challenge if capacities are lacking to partake in it.
This course is supposed to help them realize the opportunities and meet the challenges that specifically linguists encounter in this field. Participants of the short course shall be enabled to partake in the business value-chain and applied academic realm of human language technologies. Any approach to do so has to be application-oriented and consider the strengths and skills a linguistic education such as in translation and interpreting has to offer in the area of NLP and machine translation. Furthermore, the specific conditions of linguistic education and practice in Rwanda must be taken into consideration.
Contents of this short course may involve: introduction to language as data, the value of language data (both speech and text), introduction to corpus linguistics, introduction to natural language processing including neural machine translation, principles of language annotation, and guidelines for computer-assisted collection/curation of good training data/language corpora. Subjects on data collection should be complemented by practically oriented beginner classes in data visualisation geared towards demonstrating the linguistics theories known to the target group, specifically in areas of morphology, syntax, and semantics
Essentially, this project intends to empower linguists to recognize the value of their work, enabling the Rwandan linguistic community to see they are data owners and gaining insight into the commercial use of such data. Practical projects should focus on dataset creation and annotation while focusing less on technical subjects in natural language processing.
Pilot program:
In a first step, GIZ together with UR intend to implement a pilot of the short course to assess the curriculum’s efficacy before integrating it into the professional development programme of UR’s School of Art and Languages.
In principle, the pilot program will be run in cooperation with UR’s colleges interested to take up the short course in their professional training program or short curriculum offers if it proves successful i.e., the College of Arts and Social Sciences (School of Arts and Languages) and the College of Sciences and Technology (School of Information and Communication Technology).
In cooperation with the University of Rwanda’s School of Art and Languages, the contractor will be provided 2 co-contractors (lecturers) to act as support and mentees during the curriculum development and implementation phases of the course. The co-contractors will always be present to assess and learn of the methods applied during instruction of the course at their campus. Additionally, they will be available to provide input and support along
One of this program’s key objectives is to extend the target group’s linguistic know-how into the computational subject of machine translation, while inadvertently introducing concepts in linguistic mediation of text to other participants with more technical background owing to the cross-disciplinary composition of involved college representatives.
The pilot course shall have the following characteristics:
The course should be developed in a blended learning format which includes in-person and virtual elements. If COVID-19 restrictions return, there should be an option to adapt it to a purely virtual format.
The course shall be implemented as a professional development training course. The exact period (around 2-3 months), times and days the course is conducted (e.g. block lectures) and the location (Kigali or Huye) shall be defined in accordance to research on the target group and in close coordination with GIZ and UR.
Up to 30 participants shall be trained who will be selected based on an open application process.
Tasks to be performed by the contractor
Against the above-mentioned background, GIZ would like to contract a consulting firm that leads the design, development, and implementation of a pilot short course on Natural Language Processing for Machine Learning with a focus on Machine Translation for Linguists such as Translators and Interpreters in Rwanda.
The service provider is responsible for the design, creation, planning, organization and implementation of the short course curriculum and the associated logistics required in delivering the program successfully, as well as evaluation, and knowledge transfer, as defined in these TORs.
In order to ensure sustainability and knowledge transfer, the bidder is required to closely collaborate with staff of the University of Rwanda’s College of Arts and Social Sciences, both for curriculum development and course implementation. UR will make a team of 1-2 lecturers available for this (based on a separate contract with GIZ).
Specifically, the contractor is required to implement the following work packages:
Work package A: Scoping and creating the curriculum content
Scoping:
In a first step, the service provider is required to conduct scoping activities to gain further insights for the design and implementation of the short course. These scoping activities would include, but not be limited to:
Conducting end-user surveys and focus group discussions to ensure the planned training programme is fruitful to end users in its content as well as in its logistics (timing. Focus groups and user surveys must encompass (i) equal number of women and men; and (ii) participants from both tertiary education and applied / professional linguistics-related contexts such as translation or interpreting.
Collaborating with the University of Rwanda to understand existing courses and training offers related to the course, as well as existing skills and knowledge of target groups, and identify gaps that the new course is supposed to fill.
Conducting thorough research on internationally recognized credentials building the curriculum on state-of-the-art science, best practices and applied tools of the industry.
Conducting research on existing programs and their applicability in the economic sector, optimal study/training times and collaboration options for gaining practical work experience by participants, i.e., applying acquired skills in live environment.
Kick-off workshop
The service provider will organize and conduct a physical (or hybrid) kick-off workshop with GIZ, UR, and government stakeholders where relevant (Rwanda Basic Education Board, Ministry of Education) to launch the curriculum development process for the short course depending on identified gaps and needs from the foundational scoping phase.
Training Program Framework (TPF):
Develop a TPF in close coordination with the GIZ and UR team. The TPF should include at minimum:
Results of scoping activities
Detailed definition of the target group and their needs for training. This shall be based on target group identified jointly with UR and GIZ.
Training objectives
Formats of the training and each session
Full curriculum including the training content that will be taught
Training materials and exercises in professional design
Timeline of the training as well as the curriculum spread over this period
Marketing strategy
Didactics:
The service provider shall develop a written strategy on how knowledge building of participants would be most effectively achieved. This strategy should include at a minimum:
Methodology for conducting the course instruction, including format, presentation, interaction, collaboration, and communication styles
Tools (online and offline) utilised for implementing knowledge transfer (course instruction)
Method for measuring the effectiveness of the short course
The course should be highly engaging and fun for the participants
The teaching format should encompass blended learning to include ICT based elements in order to provide students with the learning experience to meet the demands and expectations of the market.
All modules shall be highly practice oriented to develop professional skills in accordance with current market demands. Each module shall include learning / knowledge transfer formats and practical activities as well as discussion and interaction among participants.
Work package B: Implementing the curriculum and facilitating pilot course roll out
Engagement with short-term experts for course development and implementation
The service provider will procure all experts and trainers required to develop the curriculum, teach and/or transfer the knowledge to participants, as outlined in the approved curriculum (see short-term expert pool).
The service provider will oversee, manage, and coordinate with all identified experts and trainers to ensure the training program runs smoothly. This management of experts will include remuneration for professional services rendered, work allocation, experts’ days and replacement of experts / trainers due to any force majeure.
The relationship management with experts will include (but is not limited to) reaching out to experts during the pre-scoping mission, coordinating for training program (curriculum) input, course roll out management (i.e., guest lecturing, etc.) and disaster recovery management (finding suitable alternatives where experts are unavailable).
Recruitment campaign and call for applications
The service provider shall conduct a marketing campaign for not longer than 2 (two) weeks, based on the marketing strategy developed in work package A. All activities of the campaign need to be approved by GIZ.
Develop and conduct call for applications to participate in the training, which shall be publicised on at least 3 different appropriate online platforms (including social media platforms).
The call for applications must be designed together with GIZ and UR – School of Art and Languages and will include the number of participants which the program will accept, any pre-selection and/or minimum criteria required by the participant to apply as well as the format and platform which participants must use to ensure an eligible application.
The service provider must ensure that all eligible applications received are reviewed, align with the pre-selection criteria which will be determined by the service provider in close coordination with UR – School of Art and Languages and GIZ, and then only suitable candidates are selected, duly informed and fully processed in to participate in the training.
The contractor shall ensure that at least 40 applications aligning with the pre-selection criteria are received. The selection process shall be designed and executed along measurable and explainable criteria in alignment with UR and GIZ.
The contractor shall ensure that at least 40% of the trainees are women, preferably 50% or more.
Draft at least 2 blog posts over the duration of the course, highlighting the impact of the training programme.
Participant preparation
The service provider is required to contact successful applicants to the program in writing and provide them with all required next steps for their journey in the program both regionally and nationally. This will be the start of the support process for the participants.
A maximum of 3 (three) attempts must be made at contacting successful applicants (in writing and telephonically, combined) after which affording the applicant a period of 1 (one) week to respond, the next successful, eligible applicant must be contacted by the service provider.
Training implementation
The service provider shall implement and facilitate of the short course program as a professional development training course. The exact period (around 2-3 months), times and days the course is conducted (e.g. block lectures) and the location (Kigali or Huye) shall be defined in accordance to research on the target group and in close coordination with GIZ and UR.
The training and knowledge transfer will be implemented in the manner and format, utilising the tools and methodologies as outlined in the approved training program framework. The service provider may not deviate from approved process, unless by agreement with GIZ.
Access to required infrastructure and resources
The service provider shall procure, provide and maintain all resources (including personnel), communication channels, platforms, services, tools, hardware, software and infrastructure necessary for design, development and delivery of this project.
Communication and collaboration with participants and partners
The service provider is responsible for all communication with participants and partners before, during and after the scoping, design and implementation of the training, in coordination with GIZ and UR – School of Art and Languages.
The communication with participants would specifically include, but is not limited to:
Coordinating written and verbal correspondence, queries and feedback in respect of the application process as well as training and post training evaluation as detailed in this TOR
Organising meetings, workshops and other forms of engagement required for the course design and development, course training and implementation, and post training evaluation and support
Sharing pre-work and post work content, assignment and test feedback, group work information and planning, course material and other relevant information.
Establish a communication platform on which learners can engage each other as well as trainers, in real time, during the training period (including outside of the training hours and on weekends or holidays for the participants themselves) as well as during the support period, e.g., WhatsApp, Slack
The communication with partners would include, but is not limited to:
Managing queries from media and third parties, including reasonable response times in close coordination with GIZ
Facilitating the marketing component of the training program, including engaging with media outlets and third parties to ensure a successful marketing campaign as well as fielding questions from the public
Engaging and responding to all queries, feedback and correspondence, including attendance of in-person and/or or online meetings, workshops and engagements in the course and scope of this project, including pre and post training scoping and evaluation.
The service provider must maintain open lines of communication and ensure that they are available for engagement on at least one written electronic channel and where possible one telecommunications channel (i.e., mobile/ telephone), during ordinary business hours for participants and partners during the training and for any post training support, where provided.
Work package C: Certification, post training evaluation and reporting
Participant certificates:
The contractor shall manage the certification process of the trainees. Certificates shall be designed based on GIZ design guidelines.
Post training review and participant assessment:
The service provider shall conduct a written evaluation process of the training after the completion of the pilot. The post training evaluation should contain feedback from students on trainers and third parties (guest lecturers), including qualitative feedback on content, level of complexity, professional applicability, methodology, ease of understanding and recommendation of the course, at a minimum.
Based on the evaluation, the service provider shall suggest potential amendments and changes to the content, structure and format of the training programme for potential future cohorts and/or the integration of the course into UR’s curriculum.
Evaluation process after 4 months:
The service provider shall conduct one engagement exercise (individually or collectively) with the participants, to evaluate whether all participants have applied the acquired knowledge in their professional context (public sector, private sector or academia) within 4 months after the training and can prove this with a practical example (e.g.,Spotting and naming typical errors in a given machine-translated text, actively contributing to data collection/curation for parallel datasets used by translation models).
Reporting:
The service provider will provide a written interim and final report for the project.
Interim Report
This report will be provided midway through the program, and will detail, at a minimum:
General remarks regarding the training process implementation
Participant engagement level and ease of participant understanding of content
Any logistical difficulties experienced in rolling out the course
Any envisaged aspects that should be considered, or elements that may affect program roll-out
Final Report
The service provider will provide a final, combined, report after conclusion of the training program and evaluation process.
The report shall be provided in pdf or other suitable format, including statistics, images, tables, infographics and other tools and methodology to efficiently convey the information required.
The report must be provided by no later than one calendar month after the conclusion of the evaluation process.
This report will contain information of the service provider’s efforts in formulating and implementing the following service requirements, including, but not limited to:
Assessment and evaluation of the AI training landscape (pre-training)
Design process of the curriculum (design concepts, experts engaged and thought process utilised)
Selection process of participants (what criteria was used and why, including disaggregated data on gender)
Training of the participants as well as remarks regarding the training process (including participant engagement level, ease of participant understanding, methodology that worked well and what did not work well, which participants excelled and who did not – disaggregated by gender, field of expertise and age)
Post training evaluation content
Work package D: Knowledge transfer and integration into the School of Arts and Languages’ professional training program
After completion of the pilot phase of the short course implementation, the service provider shall initiate necessary steps for handover of curricular content to the instructors from the School of Arts and Languages for continuation of the short course as part of their training program.
Co-design and preparation of course materials to be published as an open educational resource
Identify a methodology or make recommendations to implement the curriculum or adopt the training as an open educational resource (OER), which enables this training to be sustained, as either:
All or part of an existing curriculum (of a university, institute, or education body)
Run as a stand-alone program run by UR – School of Art and Languages or other entity
Prepare modules of the short course such that an Open Educational Resource can be created from them on a freely accessible platform e.g., Atingi
Provide a well-documented open access repository of all “open educational resources” and other reading, research, and publications used and recommended for this training
Develop replication kit for the partner institution
Compile a course replication kit and trainer guidelines for this pilot short course instruction, for GIZ and UR
This shall include, at a minimum:
a document of methodology and teaching format through appropriate means for online / offline knowledge transfer, including, inter alia:
which experts and third parties were used and for what purposes
tasks undertaken by trainers during training implementation
reliance placed on trainer by students
observations and recommendations for conducting training, enabling knowledge retention by participants
implicit and tacit knowledge sharing tips and tools
Capacity building for co-contractor on application of replication kit and trainer guidelines: Support local co-contractor(s) from the institution of School of Art and Languages on how to adopt and apply documentation provided in the knowledge transfer.
Support and advise to the University of Rwanda on integration of the course in their academic offer e.g., professional development program
A hand over to UR – School of Art and Languages or other partners
The service provider, working collaboratively with the interdisciplinary team of lecturers especially co-contractors, will support and advise the integration of the course into the curriculum (e.g., Professional training program) of the College’s School of Art and Languages.
Certain milestones, as laid out in the table below, are to be achieved by certain dates during the contract term, and at particular locations:
Milestone
Deadline/place
Scoping
2 weeks after start of contract
Kick-off workshop with UR and GIZ
2 weeks after start of contract
First draft – Training program framework
4 weeks after start of contract
Final – Training program framework
6 weeks after start of contract
Call for applications launched
6 weeks after start of contract
Course participants selected
8 weeks after start of contract
Course pilot kick-off
10 weeks after start of contract
Interim report
12 weeks after start of contract
Course pilot conclusion
18 weeks after start of contract
Post training review and evaluation
20 weeks after start of contract
Knowledge retention strategy finalised
22 weeks after start of contract
Advisory for course integration into academic program completed
24 weeks after start of contract
Evaluation process completed
33 weeks after start of contract
Final report
34 weeks after start of contract
Period of assignment: From, November 1st, 2022, until June 30th, 2023
Concept
In the bid, the bidder is required to show how the objectives defined in Chapter 1 are to be achieved, if applicable under consideration of further specific method-related requirements (technical-methodological concept). In addition, the bidder must describe the project management system for service provision.
Technical-methodological concept
Strategy: The bidder is required to consider the tasks to be performed with reference to the objectives of the services put out to tender (see Chapter 1). Following this, the bidder presents and justifies the strategy with which it intends to provide the services for which it is responsible (see Chapter 2). This should include high-level draft of the curriculum as well as learning and facilitation methodology.
The bidder is required to present the actors relevant for the services for which it is responsible and describe the cooperation with them. A specific focus shall be put on the cooperation with the GIZ team and the University of Rwanda, School of Arts and Languages.
The bidder is required to describe the key processes for the services for which it is responsible and create a schedule that describes how the services according to Chapter 2 are to be provided. In particular, the bidder is required to describe the necessary work steps. The bidder is required to draw up a deliberate and realistic Gantt chart with explanatory notes on risks of delays and failures as well as proper mitigating and reactive measures.
Learning and innovation
The bidder is required to describe how they ensure the sustainability of the programme specifically on:
Preparing the resources of this programme available such that an Open Educational Resource (OER) can be easily created from them,
Providing a methodical strategy describing the approach applied towards capacity building for the University of Rwanda’s School of Arts Languages (learning and innovation).
Project management of the contractor
The bidder is required to explain its approach for coordination with the GIZ project. GIZ will provide one contact person for the contractor. The explanations of the bidder shall consider the following minimum standards to be met by the contractor:
The provision of at least one contact person for GIZ
The existence of substitution management
Daily availability by phone (on workdays)
Response to emails within 24 hours
Weekly availability for a physical or virtual meeting
Weekly progress reporting (verbal or written)
The submission of quality assured deliverables at least three workdays before the approval is due to be made (all deliverables need the approval from GIZ)
Personnel concept
The bidder is required to provide personnel who are suited to filling the positions described, based on their CVs (see Chapter 5), the range of tasks involved and the required qualifications.
The below specified qualifications represent the requirements to reach the maximum number of points, so they represent maximum qualifications, not minimum qualifications.
Roles may be staffed with more than one person to share responsibilities towards fulfilling the assigned work packages.
Project Lead
Tasks of the team leader
Overall responsibility for the advisory packages of the contractor (quality and deadlines)
Coordinating and ensuring communication with GIZ, partners and others involved in the project
Personnel management, identifying the need for short-term assignments within the available budget, as well as planning and steering assignments and supporting local and international short-term experts
Regular reporting in accordance with deadlines
Providing team leadership and advisory to curriculum development and course implementation
Lead advisory on replication kit and integration of course into UR curriculum
Qualifications of the team leader
Education/training (2.1.1): Bachelors’ or Masters’ qualification in education, IT, or other relevant fields.
Language (2.1.2): Good business language skills in English
General professional experience (2.1.3): 5 years of professional experience in educational / capacity development sector
Specific professional experience (2.1.4):
5 years in developing and implementing professional training programs
3 years of experience in the area of digital skills education / training
Leadership/management experience (2.1.5): 2 years direct supervisory/management experience working with cross-functional teams.
Regional experience (2.1.6): 3 years professional experience with projects in Africa.
Development Cooperation (DC) experience (2.1.7): Experience with at least 2 international development cooperation projects
Other (2.1.8): Experience with agile and state-of-the art facilitation methodologies, didactic principles for improving learning results such as co-construction of learning and online collaboration tools
Expert 1: Curriculum Development Expert – Lead trainer
Tasks of expert 1
Lead and coordinate curriculum development efforts of the project team, including assisting with the field research, focus group coordination and adaption of the feedback into course design, the curriculum and trainings materials developed.
Coordinate with technical experts of GIZ, third parties, partners and trainers in the curriculum development and course material composition, as well as follow up questions and queries that may arise throughout the project and training implementation.
Closely work with co-contractors from the UR School of Arts and Languages.
Ensuring that a comprehensive situational analysis is conducted to inform the new curriculum is up to date and relevant for local audiences.
Provide technical inputs and feedbacks to curricula guidelines, manuals, templates, and other relevant documents to be developed and ensure the course material adhere to national training guidelines and qualification standards.
Qualifications of expert 1
Education/training (2.2.1): Master’s degree in education or another relevant field.
Language (2.2.2): Good business language skills in English.
General professional experience (2.2.3): 5 years’ professional experience in the educational / training sector, preferably at a tertiary institution.
Specific professional experience (2.2.4):
5 years’ experience in developing curricula for digital skills (either in an academic or professional training context) plus knowledge of state-of-the-art learning and training methodology and didactical principles.
Applied experience working with human language technologies or other fields in linguistics.
Leadership/management experience (2.2.5): -
Regional experience (2.2.6): -
Development Cooperation (DC) experience (2.2.7): -
Other (2.2.8):
Experts 2: International linguistic engineer – Assistant trainer
Tasks of expert 2
Monitor and organize linguistically oriented tasks in close cooperation with expert 3 in the curriculum development and support expert 1 with domain-specific knowledge.
Closely work with expert 3 to adapt language-specific knowledge to Kinyarwanda
Design and lead classroom-based or online, technology-enabled learning interventions.
Prepare and assess data labeling/annotation test sets used in class
Monitor and moderate discussion forums for any online and offline engagement and encourage curiosity, dialogue and engagement from participants
Qualifications of expert 2
Education/training (2.3.1): Bachelor’s or master's degree in computational linguistics, applied linguistics or relevant field
Language (2.3.2): Proficiency in English
General professional experience (2.3.3): 4 years of professional experience working in applied and/or computational linguistics
Specific professional experience (2.3.4):
3 years of experience in Natural Language Processing
Previous experience working with language data (such as research, analysis, translation, review, annotation) for low-resource languages
Applied knowledge of structural aspects of languages (morphology, syntax, semantics)
Leadership/management experience (2.3.5): -
Regional experience (2.3.6): -
Development Cooperation (DC) experience (2.3.7): -
Other (2.3.8): -
Experts 3: Kinyarwanda linguistic engineer – Assistant trainer
Tasks of expert 3
Organize linguistically oriented tasks in the curriculum development in close cooperation with expert 2 and support expert 1 with domain-specific knowledge.
Closely work with expert 2 to adapt language-specific knowledge to Kinyarwanda.
Closely work with co-contractors from the UR School of Arts and Languages.
Monitor that curriculum content is designed and course is implemented in consideration of established local competences.
Design and lead classroom-based or online, technology-enabled learning interventions.
Prepare and assess data labeling/annotation test sets used in class
Monitor and moderate discussion forums for any online and offline engagement and encourage curiosity, dialogue and engagement from participants
Qualifications of expert 3
Education/training (2.3.1): Bachelor’s or master's degree in computational linguistics, applied linguistics or relevant field
Language (2.3.2): Proficiency in both English and Kinyarwanda
General professional experience (2.3.3): 3 years of professional experience working in the field of linguistics
Specific professional experience (2.3.4):
2 years of experience using digital tools in applied and/or computational linguistics
Previous experience working with Kinyarwanda language data (such as research, analysis, translation, review, annotation)
Applied knowledge of structural aspects of Kinyarwanda language (morphology, syntax, semantics)
Leadership/management experience (2.3.5): -
Regional experience (2.3.6): 2 years of professional experience in Rwanda
Development Cooperation (DC) experience (2.3.7): -
Other (2.3.8): -
Expert 4: Admin and Communication Expert
Tasks of expert 4
Coordinate communication and correspondence, amongst participants, partners, GIZ and third parties, including administrative support to participants and GIZ, through effectively maintaining and coordinating calendars, scheduling appointments and meetings, making travel arrangements and accommodations for participants as may be required throughout the project
Contribute to the dissemination of online information (Web page, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, etc.)
Collaborate with partner marketing team and GIZ to promote the training program per require media campaigns
Assist with program application process for participants, including background research
Provide tactical support to participants onsite and/or remotely and act as liaison between participants, partners, GIZ and third parties
Organize, compile, and submit support documentation on during and on completion of project, including interim and final reports, statistics and information as may be required
Coordinate training logistics to schedule and plan for training sessions
Qualifications of expert 4
Education/training (2.4.1): Bachelor's in Business Administration, Communications, or other relevant fields
Language (2.4.2): Good business language skills in English and Kinyarwanda
General professional experience (2.4.3): 4 years of media or other communications experience
Specific professional experience (2.4.4): 3 years of experience organizing events and / or trainings, including participant management, logistics, and communications
Leadership/management experience (2.4.5): -
Regional experience (2.4.6): 2 years professional experience in Rwanda
Development Cooperation (DC) experience (2.4.7): -
Other (2.4.8): Experience in organizing both physical and virtual events, workshops, and trainings
Soft skills of team members
In addition to their specialist qualifications, the following qualifications are required of team members:
Team skills to work effectively in a cross-disciplinary group
Analytical thinking to evaluate student performance data, teaching strategies, and curriculum materials
Communication skills to clearly explain any changes in curriculum or instruction to teachers and department faculty
Sociocultural competence
Efficient, partner- and client-focused working methods
Interdisciplinary thinking
Costing requirements
Assignment of personnel
The total number of expert days allocated to this assignment is 244 days for the contractor.
The calculated expert days as distributed among the work packages are as shown:
Work packages
Contractor days
WP 1: Scoping and creating the curriculum content
96
WP 2: Implementing the curriculum and facilitating course roll out
109.5
WP 3: Certification, post training evaluation, and reporting
15.5
WP 4: Knowledge transfer and Integration
23
Total
244
Travel
Travel expenses budget: Up to RWF 12,140,000 (only applies to companies and experts based outside of Rwanda)
The above-mentioned fixed, unalterable travel-expenses budget for all trips abroad and locally in Rwanda for all experts is specified in the price schedule. The bidder should include a clear overview of planned travel by international experts in the proposal. The budget contains the following travel expenses:
Per-diem allowances and accommodation allowances
Flights and other transport costs
Ancillary travel costs (visa, transportation etc.)
The costs are reimbursed in accordance with the country table in the travel expenses guidelines of the BMF circular on travel expense reimbursement (available at: https://www.bundesfinanzministerium.de) as a lump sum (per-diem allowances and accommodation allowances up to the highest rates under tax law for the country in question) or on submission of documentary proof (accommodation costs which exceed this up to an appropriate amount, the cost of flights and other forms of transport). All travel must be agreed in advance by the officer responsible for the project. Travel expenses must be kept as low as possible.
In case travel and other restrictions related to the COVID-19 pandemic do not allow physical workshops when a workshop is planned, the workshop will need to be organized as a virtual workshop. If this or other reasons lead to a workshop being run virtually then for this workshop travel costs cannot be claimed. Therefore, written approval is required from GIZ before any bookings are made. In any case, all travel tickets purchased by the contractor need to be refundable.
Workshops, training
The contractor implements the following workshops/study trips/training courses:
Short course program running over 2 months (as a minimum)
The training venues will be directly procured by GIZ and do not need to be included in the costing. The same applies to travel costs for participants and participant stipends / meals, which shall not be included in the bid.
Flexible remuneration
The service provider may use an amount of up to RWF 3,000,000 for acquiring additional experts if necessary and with approval of GIZ.
Other costs
The service provider must include in their proposal any costs of up to RWF 2,000,000 associated with or arising from the activities that they are required to fulfil, for the period of the contract, including:
costs for conducting research and focus groups, including any gratuity / stipend / day costs (e.g., lunch, transportation) payable to the participants
costs for marketing campaigns (printing and advertisements) and printing of course material
costs for internet bundles for course participants
Inputs of GIZ or other actors
GIZ and/or other actors are expected to make the following available:
Training venue
Provision of 2 staff from UR to co-create and facilitate the course and ensure the integration into the UR curriculum
Requirements on the format of the bid
The structure of the bid must correspond to the structure of the ToR. In particular, the detailed structure of the concept (Chapter 4) is to be organised in accordance with the positively weighted criteria in the assessment grid (not with zero). It must be legible (font size 11 or larger) and clearly formulated. The bid is drawn up in English.
The complete bid shall not exceed 10 pages (excluding CVs).
The CVs of the personnel proposed in accordance with Chapter 5 of the ToR must be submitted using the format specified in the terms and conditions for application. The CVs shall not exceed 4 pages. The CVs must clearly show the position and job the proposed person held in the reference project and for how long. The CVs can also be submitted in English.
If one of the maximum page lengths is exceeded, the content appearing after the cut-off point will not be included in the assessment.
Please calculate your price bid based exactly on the aforementioned costing requirements. In the contract the contractor has no claim to fully exhaust the days/travel/workshops/ budgets. The number of days/travel/workshops and the budget amount shall be agreed in the contract as ‘up to’ amounts. The specifications for pricing are defined in the price schedule.
Submission of offer
The Expression of Interest should contain the following:
Technical Proposal:
Technical proposal with a brief description of why you would be considered as the most suitable for the assignment, relevant expertise, and a detailed, clear methodology, on how will be your approach to complete the assignment
CVs of the experts proposed in accordance with the terms of reference.
Company registration certificate (RDB)
VAT registration certificate
Latest tax clearance certificate
Proof of successful completion of related assignments.
Financial Proposal: indicates the all-inclusive total contract price, supported by a breakdown of all costs. The costs must be in RWF and VAT excluded.
Please submit electronically your EoI (technical & Financial offer) in 2 separated emails and should be in PDF files to this email: RW_Quotation@giz.de until latest 13th October 2022
Please you must write on each email subject this sentence: 83421404 -Technical/financial offer, without this sentence, your offer may not be considered.
Hard copies are not allowed this time
GIZ reserves all rights
List of abbreviations
AVB General Terms and Conditions of Contract (AVB) for supplying services and work 2018
GIZ Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit
UR University of Rwanda
HEC Higher Education Council
DSSD Digital Solutions for Sustainable Development
MT Machine Translation
AI Artificial Intelligence
ML Machine Learning
ToRs Terms of reference
Job Info
Job Category: Consultant/ Contractual jobs in Rwanda
Job Type: Full-time
Deadline of this Job: 13 October 2022
Duty Station: Rwanda
Posted: 29-09-2022
No of Jobs: 1
Start Publishing: 29-09-2022
Stop Publishing (Put date of 2030): 29-09-2056
Apply Now
Notification Board
Join a Focused Community on job search to uncover both advertised and non-advertised jobs that you may not be aware of. A jobs WhatsApp Group Community can ensure that you know the opportunities happening around you and a jobs Facebook Group Community provides an opportunity to discuss with employers who need to fill urgent position. Click the links to join. You can view previously sent Email Alerts here incase you missed them and Subscribe so that you never miss out.
Caution: Never Pay Money in a Recruitment Process.
Some smart scams can trick you into paying for Psychometric Tests.