Research Intern

Research Intern (Part Time, Remote)

December 2019 onwards for ~40 flexible hours

Systematic review of the evidence base for ambassador-driven interventions to increase uptake of immunisation

Suvita is a recently established charity aiming to improve the uptake of immunisation in India. We were incubated by Charity Entrepreneurship and our choice of intervention emerged from research conducted by Charity Entrepreneurship and by us, aiming to identify a high-impact intervention which could be delivered by a new charity. The research focused on criteria such as cost-effectiveness, strength of evidence base, tractability and scalability.

Suvita plans to harness a network of volunteer immunisation ambassadors to share timely, accurate and trustworthy information with new parents about local immunisation clinics. This intervention was recently tested in Haryana, India in a randomised controlled trial conducted by senior economists from MIT's Poverty Action Lab, including this year's Nobel Laureates Abhijeet Banerjee and Esther Duflo. They found that carefully selected immunisation ambassadors increased the number of children vaccinated by an impressive 22%.

While Suvita's method is based on rigorous, recent, local evidence produced by internationally recognised experts, we want to understand better the broader evidence base underpinning the ambassador intervention. This will highlight which conditions from our Theory of Change (ToC) can reasonably be assumed to be in place and which conditions must be incorporated into our monitoring and evaluation systems to ensure that they are happening in practice.

The intern will undertake a systematic literature review to summarise the existing evidence base for ambassador-driven interventions aiming to improve immunisation uptake. The review may extend to cover other health-promoting behaviours depending on preliminary findings. The final output will be a Google Sheet linked to our ToC, organising the literature on this topic and comparing the strengths of evidence for different elements of the ToC. This may be accompanied by a short summary document describing the broad patterns identified.

Support and Supervision

In general, we expect the research process (~40 hours) to be largely self-directed with minimal support and supervision required. We will spend approximately four hours working with the researcher early on to develop a formal search strategy and to clarify the methodology and required outcomes. We will then have 30min Skype calls on a regular basis (likely around fortnightly depending on the researcher's availability of weekly hours) to discuss progress.

Who Are We Looking For

We expect you to be:

• Highly self-motivated; comfortable working remotely with low support and supervision
• Passionate about designing and following a systematic research approach
• Conscientious, analytical and attentive to detail
• Able to become knowledgeable about a topic quickly and to use technical terms fluently
• An excellent writer who can explain and summarise research findings succinctly
• Committed to completing the research to an excellent standard

We do not require someone with extensive experience or qualifications in the field of global health or in research.

What We Offer

• The opportunity to improve Suvita's impact by using evidence to inform our decision-making - this role will be particularly high-leverage given that we are a new organisation with big ambition
• Intellectual challenge
• A fun, passionate team who care about helping you to do good with your subsequent career (we are generally happy to make an introduction or write a reference)
• A flexible work schedule

Other details

We anticipate that the internship will be voluntary (unpaid) but exceptions may be made depending on the candidate's circumstances.

If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to us at View email address on click.appcast.io.

To apply, fill out this form. All applications received by the end of Sunday 1st December are guaranteed consideration; applications received after this date may not be considered if we have already found a suitable candidate.