Programme and Curriculum Coordinator

About the Avicenna Foundation

The Avicenna Foundation is a scholarship and leadership development organisation committed to advancing the potential of young British Muslims. Through a comprehensive four-year programme combining financial support, coaching, mentoring, Tarbiyyah, and career development, we invest in scholars who have the drive and values to become the next generation of leaders across public life, policy, and civic society. We are a small, ambitious team working at the intersection of faith, education, and social change, and we take seriously the responsibility that comes with that. We are not interested in maintaining the status quo. The Avicenna Foundation exists to develop principled, ambitious leaders who will shape institutions, influence public life, and redefine what leadership looks like for the next generation of British Muslims.

The Role and Opportunity

The Programme and Curriculum Coordinator brings the Avicenna curriculum to life. Every keynote, every retreat, every project strand, every insight session that a scholar experiences flows through this role. It demands someone who is not only organised and delivery-focused but who understands that getting the content right matters, because the scholars going through this programme are exceptional young people who deserve exceptional experiences. We are looking for someone who is energised by excellence and who understands that leadership development should challenge scholars intellectually, professionally, and personally. The right candidate will think beyond logistics and contribute actively to creating experiences that broaden horizons, raise ambition, and prepare scholars to lead in complex and influential spaces.

Role Overview

The Programme and Curriculum Coordinator is responsible for the planning and delivery of all structured programme content across the four-year scholar journey. This role ensures that leadership keynotes, soft skills sessions, scholar projects, and retreats are delivered to a consistently high standard, on time and in line with the curriculum framework. The postholder manages external contributors including speakers, facilitators, and retreat providers, and ensures the programme calendar is coherent and accessible to scholars with competing demands on their time. The postholder will continuously evaluate and strengthen programme quality, ensuring scholars are exposed to ideas, environments, and opportunities that expand their sense of what is possible.

Key Responsibilities

• Curriculum Delivery
  • Own the programme delivery matrix across all four cohort years, ensuring each component, including keynote sessions, soft skills workshops, and leadership development sessions, is scheduled, resourced, and delivered.
  • Manage external speakers, facilitators, and session leads, including briefing, logistics, and post-session evaluation.
  • Ensure curriculum themes across each year align with the Leadership, Career, and Ethics Pyramid framework and the Tarbiyyah curriculum.
• Scholar Projects
  • Coordinate the four project strands across the programme: Leading Self, Leading Communities, Leading Change, and Leading Legacy.
  • Brief scholars on project requirements, manage submission timelines, and liaise with coaches and mentors to ensure project work is integrated into the wider development journey.
• Retreats and Residentials
  • Lead the logistical planning and delivery of all retreats, including the annual summer overseas residential (Spain, Bosnia, Turkey, Qatar across Years 1 to 4) and winter cross-cohort residential.
  • Coordinate Tarbiyyah sessions within each retreat in partnership with the Scholar Development Coordinator.
  • Manage supplier relationships, travel logistics, risk assessments, and scholar communication for all residential activity.
• Career and Insights
  • Schedule and coordinate Career and Insights sessions across all cohorts, covering sectors including law, civil service, consulting, journalism, and the third sector, with a minimum of three sessions per scholar per year.
  • Liaise with external partners to source and confirm insight opportunities, including work shadowing, internships, and employer engagement events.
• Programme Innovation and Standards
  • Proactively identify opportunities to strengthen and evolve the curriculum, introducing new ideas, speakers, partnerships, and experiences that challenge and inspire scholars.
  • Ensure programme content reflects excellence, intellectual rigour, and relevance to contemporary leadership challenges.
  • Contribute to building a culture of high standards, curiosity, initiative, and reflective leadership across all programme activity.

Person Specification

• Proven experience of coordinating programme delivery across multiple workstreams, ideally within an educational, leadership development, or third sector context.
• Strong organisational and project management skills, with the ability to manage competing deadlines and dependencies.
• Experience of managing external contributors and supplier relationships.
• Confident communicator, able to brief and support a diverse range of speakers, facilitators, and scholars.
• Creative and forward-thinking, with the ability to improve programmes rather than simply maintain them.
• High standards for quality, detail, and scholar experience.
• Interested in leadership formation, social impact, and developing the next generation of changemakers.
• Comfortable operating in an ambitious organisation where adaptability, ownership, and initiative are expected.
• Willingness to travel domestically and internationally for programme delivery.
• Committed to the mission and values of the Avicenna Foundation.

We are particularly interested in candidates who are proactive, thoughtful, and willing to challenge conventional approaches in pursuit of better outcomes for scholars and the wider community. Successful candidates will be motivated by building something exceptional, not simply maintaining existing processes.