Specialist Children's and Young Persons Advisor

This role is part of the Wiltshire Project which provides individual and family support to domestic abuse for victims and their children.

Working with children and young people, the team will focus on delivering timely and high quality, trauma informed support to children who have been the victims of domestic abuse.

This is a fixed term position to November 2025.

This exciting post will be working with children who have experienced or been affected by domestic abuse. Focusing on standard and medium risk cases, this role will provide practical and emotional support to children and young people, with an emphasis on early intervention and awareness raising.

In addition, there will be the opportunity to work with the team and manager to develop and deliver new group work provision for young people.

Key tasks and responsibilities include:

·       To provide high quality, specialist support to children who have lived in a domestically abusive family.

·       Enabling young people to access statutory and other services where appropriate.

·       Managing a caseload and working proactively to support young people and their families.

·       To deliver educational, time-bound, 1 to 1 support sessions for children and young people.

·       Provide specialist support to child victims, with a focus on empowering young people to make informed decisions.

·       Ensure that children and young people have a thorough understanding of what constitutes a ‘healthy relationship’.

·       Undertake risk assessments and implement robust safety management plans.

·       Give practical and emotional support to children affected by domestic abuse.

·       Work closely with multi-agency partners and the wider Wiltshire team to ensure that we maintain a focus on risk management and safeguarding.

·       Work with your team and manager to develop early intervention resources.

·       Engaging with and supporting the MARAC and MASH process, to ensure that the voice of victims is heard.

This role will be based in our Trowbridge office, with a requirement to travel across Wiltshire. FearFree supports staff to work flexibly, with an ability to work in a hybrid fashion, both at home and in the office.

Key responsibilities:

• Manage a caseload of low to high-risk children and young people, predominantly through face to face appointments but also utilising virtual technologies.
• Complete an initial assessment of the child’s needs so that you can identify and plan the support needed to address issues and prevent any problems from escalating.
• Assess, manage, and review risks to service users, colleagues and self, according to agreed procedures.
• Assess the needs of the child and devise appropriate support and safety plans with due regard to the dynamic nature of risk.
• Work with colleagues, health and social care professionals and multi-agency networks to evaluate caseload needs and the progress that has been made.
• Work directly and proactively with children and young people to help them to understand the impact that Domestic Abuse has had on them.
• Ensure personal safety and that of service users and other staff at all times.
• Respond to emergencies and crises with a focus on the child’s wellbeing and safeguarding.
• Plan and implement activities to promote self-awareness, confidence, and participation for children.
• Provide person centred, trauma informed support to all your cases, to empower the young person to make informed choices.
• Enable service users to participate in the design, delivery, and evaluation of services.
• Work effectively in partnership with multiple statutory and voluntary agencies to enhance service delivery, safety, and safeguarding.
• Respond to a child’s individual learning needs and style, adapting practice as necessary.
• Work closely with schools and education establishments to ensure support offered to service users is appropriate, planned and coordinated.
• Keeping the child’s voice central to all support and decision making wherever possible: taking the time to talk through and work with the individual child’s understanding around safeguarding and why we need to share certain things.
•  Act as duty officer for Wiltshire, responding to incoming calls, logging referrals, and making assigned outgoing calls, according to the duty rota. Duty shifts will be 9 – 5 in the Trowbridge Office.
• To understand and work effectively within a multi-agency framework, consisting of the MARAC and local partnership responses to domestic abuse, to reduce the risk for service users and their families.
• Accompany service users, when needed, to other relevant agencies and support them in their interactions with these agencies.
• To work alongside colleagues to deliver a whole family approach.
• Be proactive with your line manager to carry out periodic case reviews.
• Respect and value the diversity of the community in which the services work in and recognise the needs and concerns of a diverse range of survivors ensuring the service is accessible to all.

Groups and Activities:

• Work with the Childrens and Families Team Manager to develop and deliver, a group work intervention for young people.
• Assist with recruiting children and young people to be involved in the development of groups or activities, providing them with on-going support.
• Run groups for children and young people following a planned programme.

General:

• Work at all times in accordance with the requirements of the Lone Working Policy and Procedure.
• Attend and contribute to team meetings.
• Update written and computerised records with accurate and clear information.
• Contribute to effective team working with a flexible and pro-active approach, including cover for other team members’ holidays and sickness.
• Undertake agreed training and keep updated on changes in legislation, policy and best practice.
•  To support additional duties at your team managers discretion.

Responsibilities:

• Appropriately manage highly confidential information relating to vulnerable people.
• Ensure security of data, especially sensitive personal data, in line with the information security policy.
• Work within FearFree’s Policies and Procedures at all times.
• Be mindful of responsibilities in respect of health and safety.  In particular:
• Co-operate at all times with management in the implementation of and adherence to health and safety policy and procedures;
• Take reasonable care for your own safety and for the safety of others who may foreseeably be affected by your actions at work;
• Not intentionally or recklessly interfere with or misuse anything provided for the purpose of health and safety at work;
• Report all health and safety concerns to line managers;
• Assist with the completion of the risk assessment programme.

For a full job description/person specification and to apply, please follow the link provided on this website. The closing date for this role is 22/12/2024. However, we reserve the right to close this earlier if sufficient applications are received before then - early applications are therefore encouraged.   

FearFree is committed to encouraging equality and diversity in the workplace.  We strive to be a diverse and inclusive place to work where we can all be ourselves and individual differences are recognised and valued.