Background:
UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security.
Within UN Women, the United Nations Trust Fund to End Violence against Women (UN Trust Fund) is the only global UN funding mechanism dedicated exclusively to providing direct grants to civil society organizations working to prevent and end all forms of violence against women and girls (EVAW/G).
It plays a critical role in fostering collaboration across governments, UN agencies, and civil society to address the root causes and consequences of violence, aligning its work with broader international policies and frameworks. The UN Trust Fund focuses on providing long-term grants to organizations that work in diverse contexts, particularly those representing marginalized groups, such as indigenous women, women living with disabilities, and women from rural or conflict-affected areas. Its investments are survivor-centered and aim to have sustainable, long-term impacts. To date, the UN Trust Fund has funded over 700 initiatives in over 140 countries and territories, significantly contributing to global efforts to end violence against women and girls.
In recent years, applications to the UN Trust Fund have revealed significant shifts in funding demand, including increasing requests related to conflict, climate shocks, technology-facilitated gender-based violence, economic insecurity, and shrinking civic space. In 2025 alone, the Trust Fund received nearly 4,000 applications requesting over USD 2 billion in funding.
As the UN Trust Fund enters its 30th anniversary year and implements its 2026–2030 Strategic Plan, one of the strategic priorities is to move toward rigorous predictive, longitudinal, and strategic analysis that can help identify where the field of ending violence against women and girls is heading—and how funding systems should respond.
Under the supervision of the Global Lead, Learning and Impact, and in close coordination with the Chief of the UN Trust Fund and relevant team members, the intern will support advanced quantitative and mixed-methods analysis of the UN Trust Fund’s demand datasets to generate strategic insights for internal decision-making and broader ecosystem learning.
Description of Responsibilities
The intern will support the UN Trust Fund’s strategic foresight and demand analysis work through the following:
1. Advanced analysis of 2025 Call for Proposals demand data
- Conduct quantitative and qualitative analysis of 2025 Call for Proposals application data
- Identify emerging thematic trends in funding demand across regions, populations, and forms of violence
- Examine trends related to areas such as conflict, displacement, climate-related shocks, shrinking civic space, legal reforms, technology-facilitated violence, and economic insecurity
- Support cleaning, coding, and structuring of quantitative and qualitative datasets for analysis
2. Macro-level trend analysis
- Explore relationships between UN Trust Fund demand data and external datasets/indices, including:
- Conflict trends
- Climate vulnerability indicators
- Civic space indices
- Gender inequality indicators
- Violence prevalence data
- Legal and policy trends affecting women’s rights
- Funding supply data
- Support the development of analytical models that examine how macro-level shifts may influence funding demand patterns
3. Longitudinal analysis of historical demand trends
- Analyze historical Trust Fund application data (up to three decades, depending on data availability and quality)
- Identify longer-term shifts in funding demand priorities, responses and risks
- Assess how funding requests have evolved over time across thematic priorities, geographies, and organizational profiles
4. Strategic products and decision support
- Develop a draft internal analytical paper summarizing key findings including future scenarios
- Prepare presentation materials for senior leadership and donor engagement
- Respond to ad hoc analytical requests from leadership related to regional trends, forms of violence, or funding demand shifts
- Support the development of recommendations for institutionalizing annual demand analysis as a recurring strategic product
5. Knowledge sharing and ecosystem learning
- Explore opportunities for methodological replication with other feminist funds, research institutions, and funding partners
- Support documentation of methodology to strengthen future cross-funder collaboration
Expected Deliverables
By the end of the internship, the intern is expected to produce:
- One analytical paper on emerging trends in EVAW/G funding demand
- One PowerPoint presentation summarizing key findings for leadership use
- A cleaned and documented dataset/codebook (as feasible)
- Methodological recommendations for future annual demand analysis
- Ad hoc analytical inputs as requested during the internship period
Learning Objectives
The intern will gain:
- Exposure to one of the largest global datasets on civil society demand related to ending violence against women and girls
- Experience applying quantitative analysis to real-world funding and policy questions
- Exposure to feminist funding architecture and global grant-making systems
- Experience working at the intersection of research, policy, and implementation within the UN system
- Deeper understanding of global trends shaping the future of EVAW/G programming
Competencies :
Core Values:
- Integrity;
- Professionalism;
- Respect for Diversity.
Core Competencies:
- Awareness and Sensitivity Regarding Gender Issues;
- Accountability;
- Creative Problem Solving;
- Effective Communication;
- Inclusive Collaboration;
- Stakeholder Engagement;
- Leading by Example.
Please visit this link for more information on UN Women’s Values and Competencies Framework:
Functional Competencies:
- Strong quantitative analysis skills
- Experience with statistical software (R, Stata, Python, or similar)
- Experience with mixed methods research preferred
- Ability to analyze large datasets
- Strong writing and presentation skills
- Ability to translate technical findings for non-technical audiences
- Interest in gender equality, feminist movements, and ending violence against women and girls
Education:
University studies in one of the following disciplines: economics, public health, public policy, sociology, gender studies, political science, development studies, statistics, data science, or related fields.
- Candidates must meet one of the following:
- Be enrolled in a graduate school programme (second university degree or equivalent, or higher);
- Be enrolled in the final academic year of a first university degree programme (minimum Bachelor's level or equivalent);
- Have graduated with a university degree and, if selected, must commence the internship within a two-year period of graduation; or
- Be enrolled in a postgraduate professional traineeship program which is part of a degree programme and undertake the internship as part of the program requirements.
Language:
- Excellent communication skills (written and oral) in English are required.
- Working knowledge of Spanish and/or French are an advantage.
Remuneration:
Interns who are not in receipt of financial support from other sources such as universities or other institutions will receive a stipend from UN Women to partially subsidize their basic living costs for the duration of the internship.
Application Information:
- Due to the high volume of applications received, UN Women can ONLY contact successful candidates. Statements : In July 2010, the United Nations General Assembly created UN Women, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women. The creation of UN Women came about as part of the UN reform agenda, bringing together resources and mandates for greater impact. It merges and builds on the important work of four previously distinct parts of the UN system (DAW, OSAGI, INSTRAW and UNIFEM), which focused exclusively on gender equality and women's empowerment. Diversity and inclusion: At UN Women, we are committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment of mutual respect. UN Women recruits, employs, trains, compensates, and promotes regardless of race, religion, color, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, ability, national origin, or any other basis covered by appropriate law. All employment is decided on the basis of qualifications, competence, integrity and organizational need. If you need any reasonable accommodation to support your participation in the recruitment and selection process, please include this information in your application. UN Women has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UN Women, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination. All selected candidates will be expected to adhere to UN Women’s policies and procedures and the standards of conduct expected of UN Women personnel and will therefore undergo rigorous reference and background checks. (Background checks will include the verification of academic credential(s) and employment history. Selected candidates may be required to provide additional information to conduct a background check.) Note: Applicants must ensure that all sections of the application form, including the sections on education and employment history, are completed. If all sections are not completed the application may be disqualified from the recruitment and selection process.
- The successful candidate will be required to provide proof of enrollment in a valid health insurance plan at the duty station of the internship, proof of school enrollment or degree, a scanned copy of their passport/national ID and a copy of a valid visa (as applicable).
