Manager, Academics

Bridge Nigeria

Bridge (or Bridge International Academies) partners with parents and communities to create powerful, transformative schools that guarantee that all pupils, regardless of their parents’ income, education or the language they speak at home, are supported in realising their full potential, and can enjoy a gateway to success. 

We create ‘community schools’ that provide life-changing education which transforms lives and opens the door to a successful future for our pupils. We do this by delivering academic excellence through accelerated learning, leadership skills development and providing a caring environment that supports growth. We empower a network of committed, trained and prepared teachers while leveraging technology. Our pedagogical techniques also are advanced and in line with best practice, and we deploy world class lessons to develop the most effective teacher training and support techniques, all with the aim of creating a truly pupil-centred classroom.

Since opening our first schools in Ijegun and Ikorodu, Lagos in 2015, our pupils have continued to exceed expectations and excel. Pupils at Bridge Nigeria have consistently achieved top performance in the National Common Entrance Examinations, receiving merit scholarships at Lead-Forte Gate College and winning places at some of the top secondary schools in the country, including King’s and Queen’s Colleges.

In Bridge, we believe that quality education has the power to transform the future of Nigeria’s youth. In joining us, you will become part of a team of dynamic and passionate Nigerians who are taking concrete action to help ensure a better future for all of Nigeria.

Academics Group

The objective of Academics is to drive student achievement. To do so, we must know what is happening minute-by-minute for the typical child. The student’s daily experience, and thus the path to achievement, emerges from their relationship with the teachers and the content that is delivered in the classroom. Our team is collaboratively organised around these levers. We develop rigorous content pitched at the right level for students to be delivered by a teacher who is prepared to succeed in the classroom. Our Instructional Design department builds the content; our Leadership & Development department trains teachers and school leaders using scientifically-proven techniques; our Learning Innovation department looks at cutting-edge research to generate breakthrough learning gains. Underpinning all of this is the work of the independent Measurement and Evaluation group, which provides Academics with an empirical orientation toward improving that daily experience and, in turn, driving achievement.

About the Role

The Academic Manager for Bridge Nigeria will ultimately be responsible for educational outcomes across schools.

The Academic Manager will design, lead, and improve all academic decisions, policies, and initiatives for the Bridge Nigeria programme. This work will require collaboration across key functional areas such as content creation, printed teaching and learning materials, and teacher training. The Academic Manager will also work with schools and civil society to understand the effectiveness of Bridge Nigeria and incessantly work to iterate and improve.This work will be codified in a yearly academic plan including all policies for all facets of Academics, which the Academic Manager owns. 

The academic plan is a dynamic document. First and foremost, the Academic Manager is responsible for the creation, maintenance, implementation, and ongoing iteration of the academic plan to ensure that it optimises learning across elements of the school experience (for students, teachers, head teachers, and community stakeholders. The Academic Manager also works to ensure that academic plan is understood both within the Bridge Nigeria team. This includes defending Bridge Nigeria structured pedagogy approach and educating fellow staff members and school communities on the programme’s philosophy around targeted instruction aligned to true learning levels. Buy-in for the academic plan among all internal and external stakeholders - driven by a clear understanding of the plan’s logic and value - is critical to ensure that the academic programme and policies are implemented effectively.

Within the Bridge Nigeria team, the Academic Manager will work with all departments to ensure that the academic plan is being implemented with fidelity and that the programme more broadly is being delivered in a way that maximises students’ opportunity to learn. This means obsessing over the details of implementation. Are teachers delivering lessons consistently and as intended? Are books being used properly? Are policies being enacted in practice as they are outlined in writing? The Academic Manager questions and validates every assumption using strong primary source data. This requires working through different departments and teams in order to define the key questions around implementation, collect and analyse data, and define the details of any required improvement plan. 

What You Will Do

• Advocate for learning outcomes and serving as the Bridge Nigeria academic expert for other departments
• Lead creation, execution, and interdepartmental coordination of the core academic systems and policies in the programme through creation, implementation, maintenance, and iteration of the Academic Plan
• Provide feedback to the Instructional Design team, in order to improve learning outcomes and culturally contextualise what is taught in Lagos and Osun
• Conduct necessary market and regulatory research to inform instructional systems and policies (timetable, teacher specialty configurations, academic calendar, retention policies, exam policy, placement policy)
• Regularly review of data on academic performance and school health to validate current approaches, improve day-to-day implementation, and prepare justification for future changes
• Manage the Academics team based in your programme, including but not limited to the Academic Officer who is in schools daily, doing observations of lessons.
• Report to the Managing Director

What You Should Have

• The Academic Manager must be a data-driven individual with experience developing and managing cultures of high performance and high expectations. You must be a great academic leader who understands exceptional instruction and can motivate and support others in realising a vision of academic excellence.  Ideal candidates have worked in organisations with one or more of the following characteristics: 
• a proven track record of generating large learning gains at scale
• structured pedagogy.
• targeted instruction based on the level of the learner, especially in literacy and/or numeracy
  
  
• In addition, the Academic Manager must:
• Be bought into structured pedagogy.
• Be able to think about what works at a single school and also what works at one thousand schools
• Be a self-starter and problem-solver, who thinks three and four steps ahead.
• Be hard working and collaborative, with the tenacity to plough through challenges and an appreciation for teamwork toward achieving a shared vision.
• Be a fast learner and someone who is able to flourish in fast paced, dynamic, and sometimes ambiguous environments
• Be both detailed and results-oriented, driven by the data that will allow us to know what is working and what isn’t working for kids. 
• Have strong project management skills and excellent organisational skills, with keen attention to detail and ability to follow up systematically on a broad set of initiatives and decisions
• Be an effective, articulate communicator who can represent NewGlobe to external audiences.
• Be humble and ready to “roll up your sleeves” to get things done
  
  
• Education and Qualification:
• Bachelor’s degree in Education or related field; graduate degrees preferred
• At least 5 years of work experience, including in a leadership or management position
• Experience working with Secondary schools as a teacher, school leader, or as part of a project 
• Strong understanding of instructional design and instructional quality, including effective literacy and numeracy teaching and learning materials

You’re also

• A detailed doer – You have a track record of getting things done. You’re organized and responsive. You take ownership of every idea you touch and execute it to a fine level of detail, setting targets, engaging others, and doing whatever it takes to get the job done. You can multi-task dozens of such projects at once and never lose sight of the details. Likely, you have some experience in a start-up or other rapid-growth company.
• A creative problem-solver – Growing any business from scratch comes with massive and constant challenges. On top of that, Bridge works in often fragile, sometimes volatile low-resource communities and with complex government systems. You need to be flexible and ready to get everything done effectively, quickly, and affordably with the materials at hand.
• A relentless advocate – The children we serve and teachers we empower never leave your mind. You know them, get them, have shared a meal with them (or would be happy to in the future). You would never shrink back from shaking a parent’s hand or picking up a crying child, no matter what the person was wearing or looked like. Every decision you make considers their benefit, experience, and value.
• A malleable learner – You believe you can always do better. You welcome constructive criticism and provide it freely to others. You know you only get better tomorrow when others point out where you’ve missed things or failed today.
• A data-driven decision-maker – When making decisions, you don’t rely on your intuition alone. You collect data, you analyze it and make decisions with clear justifications.
• A curious investigator – You ask why a lot. You don’t just take what you see and accept it. You wonder why it is that way, and are aware that the world we see is created by human choices and actions – and it could be different. You wonder, and see the world as wonderful even when you want to change a part of it that is unjust.