Chesterfield & Derby, Derbyshire.

Circa £33,500 plus on call £700 on call allowance. (For delivery of a foster carer helpline, evenings, occasional weekends and bank holidays)

Permanent Full Time 37 hours per week.

Giving children and young people the foundations, they need to thrive.

The role

Action for Children were commissioned by Derbyshire and Derby City Councils and Derby and Derbyshire Clinical Commissioning Group earlier this year to deliver an innovative new service from the 1st September. The service aims to improve placement stability for looked after children and to reduce the number of children whose emotional needs are met outside the area by delivering therapeutic interventions locally, close to where they live.

Support will focus on children in care with the most complex needs and with significant adverse childhood experiences, including those with sexually harmful behaviours. The service will use trauma informed practice and attachment theory and provide a range of evidence-based therapies including Dyadic Developmental Psychotherapy, Theraplay, PACE and systemic therapy.

Provision will include a new intensive "wraparound" programme for foster carers and young people. This will train and support carers to develop the skills and knowledge to provide therapeutic care for children with complex needs some of whom will be returning from specialist placements or stepping down from residential care.

The service will provide individual, group, and family based therapeutic interventions and host regular consultation and reflective practice sessions for residential and social care teams. Training will also be provided for foster carers, social workers, and other professionals.

The service will operate from 9am to 7pm as children and carers require and directly support children placed within 25 miles of the Derby/Derbyshire border.

As this is a new service training will be provided in key therapeutic interventions including, DDP, Theraplay and trauma informed practice and attachment theory. There will also be the opportunity for staff to develop areas of specialism.

We are particularly interested in applicants with experience in the assessment and treatment of children and young people with sexually harmful behaviours and who would wish to specialise in this area.

You will make a difference by:

- by working therapeutically with children and young people, parents and foster carers, supported by a Clinical Psychologist. This will include, but not be limited to, trauma informed approaches, Dyadic Developmental Psychotherapy and Theraplay.

-Providing Consultations and Reflective Practice sessions for residential carer staff, foster carers and other social care professionals.

-Providing training in therapeutic approaches for foster carers and social care professionals

- Participating in an out of hours helpline for foster carers operating 365 days a year from 8am-10pm.

You will need:

-A professional qualification in Health/Social Care, Teaching or equivalent.

-Significant experience of working therapeutically with children.

-Experience of working with children and young people with complex needs.

-Good communication skills, both written and spoken.

-Flexibility around contributing to a foster carer helpline.

-Car user preferable as the role will involve travelling.

The way we work

We work to make sure every child and young person has the love, support and opportunity they need to reach their potential. If you share the same vision, we want you to join our team. Have a look at our behaviours and values to understand more about the way we work here.

Rewards

We want our employees to feel valued and rewarded for the vital work they do. When you work with us, we'll recognise your efforts with generous annual leave, a comprehensive employer-matched pension scheme and a range of deals and discounts on our dedicated benefits portal. Find out more about our exclusive Action for Children benefits here.

For safe and happy childhoods

At Action for Children, we protect and support children and young people, providing practical and emotional care and support, ensuring their voices are heard, and campaigning to bring lasting improvements to their lives. Last year, we helped more than 387,000 children and families across the UK.

For more information, please contact Anne Marie Wilson anne-marie.wilson'actionforchildren.org.uk

We are committed to safer recruitment practices to protect our service users; therefore, all applicants are expected to have an understanding of and commitment to safeguarding best-practice.

Action for Children is passionate about promoting equality, valuing diversity and working inclusively. We welcome applications from all suitably qualified persons particularly people with Disabilities and Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic applicants, as these groups are currently under-represented in our workforce.