61 Social Services / Housing jobs in Alexandria, West Dunbartonshire

Who are we?

Kibble is Scotland’s specialist provider of services for at risk children and young people. By providing a range of integrated services, we help build positive futures for children and young people aged 5 plus, with complex social, emotional, and educational needs.

Job Purpose:

The post involves direct working with young people who, because of adversity or trauma, are unable to remain at home and who, at the instruction of a Children’s Hearing or a Court, must be accommodated by Kibble.

We seek people who have a strong commitment to caring for children/ young people, who understand developmental trauma, and who are resilient, reflective and patient. You should be able to practice in a trauma informed way. You will be able to provide children/ young people with a sense of safety and connectedness and teach coping skills in the face of complex challenging behaviour.

Following social pedagogical principles, our children/ young people need opportunities to problem solve and experiment with taking risks to challenge themselves physically and mentally. We recognise the powerful healing and developmental role of play in children’s/ young people lives. Therefore, we are very keen to have people on board who are in touch with their inner child and are willing to be creative about and fully involved in, outdoor play, messy play, risky play, and the range of play opportunities we provide for our children/ young people.

This post will offer the successful candidate stability, with guaranteed hours, and the benefit of varied work. It is ideally suited to someone who has flexibility throughout the working week and weekends to work both early and back shifts. The varied shift pattern provides opportunity for the successful candidate to interact with a range of different employees and children and young people at Kibble.

Main Duties:

The direct work with children and young people follows a general pattern that must be tailored to the needs and requirements for each individual. This pattern involves 3 main areas.

The Care Programme

The Child and Youth Care Worker will:

• Have direct responsibility for the care and development of a number of children and young people. Each child or young person will have a placement programme involving social and educational targets, which will be regularly reviewed.
• Require to liaise with all relevant members of the multi-disciplinary team within Kibble to ensure a mutual understanding of these targets and to monitor and facilitate their achievement.
• Require to liaise with the area team social worker to ensure that there is both a mutual understanding of the care plan including social and educational targets and a linkage between these targets and the tasks being undertaken by the social worker.
• Meet with the parent(s) or other relative(s) of the child or young person to ensure that family contact is continuing, to seek their co-operation in achieving social and educational targets, to ensure that home leave is viable and is supported.

Recording and Reporting

• The Child and Youth Care Worker is responsible for ensuring that the placement plan for the child or young person is recorded in the format required by the organisation.
• The Child and Youth Care Worker is responsible for ensuring that the reports required by the Reporter to the Children’s Panel or the Clerk of the Court or the Procurator Fiscal and the area team social worker are provided within the required timescales.

Worker Profile

The Child and Youth Care Worker will be able to:

• Relate to children and young people in a way that promotes their trust and involvement in meeting the requirements of the Children’s Hearing or Court and the social and educational targets of the care plan.
• Respond positively and calmly to challenging behaviour.
• Understand the dynamics of relationships between the young people in the house and in the community, ensuring that action is taken to stop bullying, prevent isolation, avoid unhelpful friendships or pressure for engaging in risk taking behaviours.
• Establish relationships with young people within which incidents of physical, emotional or mental abuse can be revealed.
• Understand the roles and responsibilities of all individuals, groups and organisations that are involved in the care of the young people both within and outwith the organisation.
• Work unsupervised and on own initiative.
• Co-work with representatives from other agencies e.g. social work, educational psychologist, psychiatrist. The co-working will involve objective and clear representation of the needs and progress of the child or young person as well as the policies, procedures and practices of the Centre.
• Display a knowledge and understanding of the relevant legislation. In addition, the Child and Youth Care Worker will understand the stages of human growth and development, the causes and outcomes of challenging behaviour and the dynamics of inter-personal relationships.
• Manage and motivate self in forming and sustaining relationships with children and young people, in working with internal and external colleagues and in undertaking administrative and allied duties.

What qualification and experience are we looking for?

• HNC in Social Care, SVQ Level 3 in Care or equivalent or the ability to undertake the HNC and SVQ Level 3 Social Care.
• Experience of working with children and young people or providing care/support to vulnerable people is desirable.
• Experience of working within the social care sector is desirable.
• Experience of working within residential childcare is desirable.
• Be willing to work in any service across the Kibble Group including the Safe Centre (Secure Care) or Community Based Services.
• Residential Childcare is regulated work and if successful you will be required to register with the SSSC, who are the workforce regulator, within their applied timeframes. Preference will be given to those candidates who are already eligible for unconditional registration.
• Possess a full driving licence and be willing and able to drive school transport is desirable.

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