Employer – KIDS

Agreement – Permanent Hours

Location – KIDS Orchard Centre, Lye By-pass, Lye, Stourbridge DY9 8HA (As a base)

Working hours – Flexible working

Salary – £11.44 per hour (£12.82 incl. holiday pay)

The good stuff/benefits:

• Mileage covered through expenses
• Hourly rate enhanced to cover any holiday taken or accrued if not taken
• Life assurance
• Employer Pension contribution
• Flexible hours to provide an ideal balance between work life and private life
• Discounts galore with over 200 retailers and brands via Perkbox
• Recommend a friend referral scheme with financial reward
• Employee Assistance Programme (EAP). Helps to deal with personal and professional problems that could be affecting your home life or work life, health and general wellbeing. The confidential employee benefit provides expert advice and compassionate guidance 24/7

Based in the local community you will provide some time out to our young people aged 5-18 who have an EHCP. The focus is to give our young people a 2 hour break every week or a 4 hour break every fortnight. You will be there to take our young people out for a ‘jolly’. The activities undertaken are chosen by the family and young person and can include:

• Swimming
• Soft play
• Parks
• Shopping
• Cinema
• Trampoline Parks
• Social groups

The young people supported range from mild learning disabilities to physical disabilities to PMLD. Some of our young people have communication difficulties, can demonstrate challenging behaviour and/or require some level of personal care. Based on their needs the young person will either be allocated 1 team member or 2.

For 1:1 short breaks the worker must have a valid driver’s licence and have class 1 business insurance.

For 2:1 short breaks, driving is desired, but not essential.

The role will involve collecting the child from their home address in a staff vehicle, you’ll work flexibly and arrange the breaks directly with the family at a time and day to suit everyone. All breaks occur either after school, evenings or weekends, except for during school holidays when these can be more flexible.

You can support just one family or can support multiple families. For each family supported, you are guaranteed 4 hours work a fortnight, although there is no obligation to work these. Should you have other commitments i.e. family events, holidays etc. then the work can be rearranged for another week.

Skills: 

• Experience of working with children/young people or adults with disabilities
• An understanding of special educational needs and disabilities
• Possess a fun attitude and enjoy a busy workplace. Training will be given
• Great communication skills, including active listening 
• Positive attitude with the ability to be flexible, adaptable and empathetic
• Patience, Acceptance, Sensitivity, Reliability, Integrity and Resilience

It is essential to have/working towards a level 2 qualification in working with children and young people, or equivalent.

To apply for this position please ‘hit’ the Apply button

We welcome applications from disabled people or people with lived experience of disability. We demonstrate our willingness to make reasonable adjustments to enable disabled candidates/staff to access and participate in the recruitment process (for example we make our adverts accessible, and where required/requested, will make application forms available in alternative formats, i.e. large print).  Kids encourages applications from disabled people by offering any disabled person who meets the person specification an interview.

If required, support is provided to disabled applicants to complete an application form. Hiring managers are directed to the in-house Careers team to understand what support we can provide.  

KIDS is committed to safeguarding and promoting the wellbeing of all those who come into contact with our services. Our colleagues are trained to recognise and respond to safeguarding concerns. We work closely with families and other agencies to take all reasonable steps to minimise the risk of harm to children, young people and adults. 

To fulfil our commitment to those we work with we observe safer recruitment and selection procedures and nurture a safeguarding culture which is open and transparent, where all concerns in relation to our people can be identified and spoken about openly and are dealt with promptly and appropriately. By identifying concerning, problematic or inappropriate behaviour early we aim to minimise the risk of abuse.

Please note KIDS Safer Recruitment procedures will include a DBS check and a staff suitability declaration where applicable.

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion

We work to ensure that all of the Kids team:

• are committed to equality of opportunity, treatment and behaviour
• have equal access to employment, promotion and development
• have equal access to services
• have their needs considered as we develop services

This means that equality and human rights are:

• embedded in our business planning
• fully considered within our structures
• part of the personal development of all staff