Senior Practitioner

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**Senior Practitioner: Integrated Adolescent Service**

Do you want to work in an Outstanding Local Authority? Ofsted have recently awarded Kent with an Outstanding rating in recognition of the service we provide to our children. Ofsted were impressed with the Adolescent Service responses and support to children at risk of contextualised harm. We are now looking for social workers who can lend their skills and experience to help us build on our successes.

The Integrated Adolescent Service recognises that adolescents should be given a bespoke offer of support. We want professionals capable of bringing understanding and emotional intelligence to everything they do. The service promotes a practice philosophy which seeks to empower young people and their families, building on individual strengths, and helping them to develop strategies which support them to understand, manage and respond to the difficulties they face.

Our practitioners need to be resilient and persistent; be solution-focussed; look past challenging behaviours; build positive relationships with adolescents and their carers, and to inspire young people to reach their potential. We want practitioners who really cares about adolescents and who understands the impact of trauma, and how to respond to contextual harm.

Two posts are available in the Adolescent Social Work Team (AST) in South Kent, based in Ashford and covering 3 districts: Ashford, Folkestone and Dover.

Our generous retention package is up to **£5,000 per annum, after a qualifying period**. In addition, employees will receive a car allowance of **£2000** **per annum**. In specific circumstances a relocation package and golden hello payment is available to qualifying applicants. Successful applicants will receive a salary in the range of **£43,216 - £49,323**.

**About us**:
AST sit within an Integrated Adolescent Service which includes Youth Justice, Early Help, Inclusion & Attendance, Children’s Centres and Youth Services. We offer co-working and co-location opportunities, and we have excellent relationships with key partners including Housing, Education, Health and the Police.

AST offers intensive social work support to adolescents and their families to manage complex situations including extra familial harm and family conflict.

Your role will involve building up trust with hard-to-reach young people, empowering them and their families to develop effective long-term solutions to manage their family relationships and develop strategies to overcome the risks that adolescents face during this phase of their life. Where it is not safe for young people to remain living at home, we will continue to work with them and their families as well as their wider network to identify suitable safe alternatives.

This role is a unique role which will provide you with experience in working across the areas of assessment, children in need, child protection, contextual harm, Court work and rehabilitation home. We believe that this will provide you with a wide spectrum of skills and we are committed to putting in place personalized development plans with our workers to enable them to feel valued and supported in their career development.

We have invested heavily in our core offer to staff, including evidenced based training in case formulation, contextual safeguarding and trauma-informed approaches. We also offer clinical supervision to practitioners and managers to enhance how we support our workforce. Alongside this we promote flexible working, a good package of annual leave and employee support in recognition that all staff do a valuable job, and we wish to promote their wellbeing.

**About you**:
With a degree in social work - CQSW, DipSW or equivalent - you must be Social Work England registered and should have proven post-qualification experiences of working with children and families. You will need an interest in working with children who have experienced adverse life events, or trauma. You will need an in-depth understanding of Children’s social work legislation, along with a willingness to learn and develop as a practitioner.

You will have excellent opportunities for professional development whilst managing a varied caseload working with adolescents and their families. We’ll support you to consolidate your skills and knowledge, assisting you to develop areas of specialist practice, including trauma-informed practice and contextual safeguarding. As a role model for good practice and champion for your area of expertise, you’ll set performance expectations, striking a balance between support and oversight. As well as coaching and mentoring less experienced staff, you’ll have the opportunity to act as a Practice Assessor for ASYE and student social workers.

You’ll share your knowledge and experience with the team in several ways, including assisted fieldwork, case audits and reviews. In addition, you’ll contribute to working groups and multi-agency forums to develop