Youth Justice Support Officer

An exciting opportunity has arisen within the West Sussex Youth Justice Service for a Youth Justice Support Officer in the Restorative Justice Team, based in Horsham. The Restorative Justice Team give victims of youth crime a voice and create opportunities for children involved in the youth justice system to repair the harm caused by their offending behaviour.

As a Youth Justice Support Officer, you will be responsible for delivering reparation projects as well as planning and delivering Unpaid Work programmes for young people in the community. You will also be responsible for supervising children assessed as presenting a low to medium risk of re-offending and serious harm, who are subject to Out of Court Disposals and statutory Court Orders., We are particularly interested in hearing from Social Workers interested in joining our Family Safeguarding Teams. These teams work with children and families at the point in their journey where there are safeguarding concerns and act to reduce those risks. They play a key role in child protection, child in need cases and working with families to keep children safe.

The Family Safeguarding Teams undertake meaningful, transparent direct work with children and their families ensuring the most positive outcomes and our diverse practice teams work within a nurturing environment where successes are celebrated and individuals within the team are supported to grow and develop.

There are 6 service teams working geographically, with each managed by a Service Manager. They in turn support 4 to 5 practice teams led by Team Managers. We have a Court Progression Officer leading on our improvement plan for our children within the public law outline. There is a cohort of approximately 1958 children that our Family Safeguarding Teams support ,from pre-birth to 18 years, and children subject to child protection plans and within the public law outline. Some child in need work is undertaken as children step down from child protection planning and transition on to our universal or Early Help service.

If you are passionate about delivering excellent social work and making a difference, have a look at some of the exciting opportunities we currently have in Children's Services.

You will have a passion for and resilience to working with complex children. Knowledge or skills of practical tasks such as gardening, building, painting/decorating or use of tools would also be beneficial for this role as well as a love for working outside There may be times that you are required to support the young person to deliver direct reparation to the person harmed by their behaviour and so an understanding of restorative processes is desirable. You will need good assessment skills, as well as the ability to use creative and effective supervisory techniques, to engage children and their families and then enable them to develop long term sustainable change and promote best outcomes. The ability to form positive and constructive relationships with vulnerable children will be crucial, to enable them to develop resilience, achieve their potential and contribute positively to their community.,

• Good interpersonal and communication skills, including the ability to explain information to others and use advisory, negotiation and persuasion skills to influence the actions of others.


• Good literacy, numeracy and sound IT skills, to write reports to a high standard and present information clearly, concisely and accurately in ways that promote understanding.


• Able to research, assess, analyse and interpret information and data from varying sources in order to interpret and plan over the medium term to make judgements based on the needs of the client.


• Good organisational skills and the ability to prioritise your workload to effectively respond to unanticipated problems.


• Able to act in an appropriate manner, with discretion, whilst hearing confidential, sensitive or disturbing information., 4 GCSE's with A-C passes including English and Maths, or equivalent qualification or experience demonstrating that level of numeracy and literacy.


• At least one year's previous experience of working with challenging children and young people (e.g. CYPS, police, probation, schools, criminal justice, youth work).


• Experience of carrying out assessments and writing reports.


• Previous experience of working in a criminal justice setting e.g., Youth Offending Team, Probation, Police (Desirable)


• Experience of case management (Desirable)


• Experience of working in a multi-agency setting (Desirable)


• Experience of using CVYJ (Youth Offending Service databases) (Desirable)


• Experience of outside project / practical skills, e.g. gardening, painting, woodwork, low level building (Desirable for Restorative Justice and Communities Team YJSO)


• You will need to be able to travel independently around the county, including to areas that may not be easily accessible by public transport. Pool cars available.
  
  West Sussex Youth Justice Service (YJS) is a high performing multi-agency statutory partnership which provides services before and after Court to meet the statutory requirements of the youth justice system. Its primary aim is to prevent offending and reduce reoffending by children. The service works in partnership with a variety of agencies to ensure children are offered appropriate intervention to address their risks, meet their needs and build on their strengths. The service also seeks to repair the harm caused to victims and communities by addressing the root causes of offending and reoffending by children., West Sussex County Council


Children First in West Sussex

West Sussex is a beautiful county located on the South Coast of England. Within easy reach of sandy beaches and rolling hills, West Sussex also boasts a perfect balance of cosmopolitan towns such as Crawley and Horsham, and flourishing market towns like Chichester. West Sussex has so much to offer and is a wonderful place to live, work and play.

At West Sussex County Council, we see the workplace as an environment where people can be themselves, perform to the best of their ability and achieve their potential to deliver services to our residents living in West Sussex. Our staff are our greatest asset and we are committed to the employment, retention and career development of talented individuals.

Social work is a challenging career, and we recognise that to achieve excellent outcomes for our residents, our people need to feel supported, developed, and recognised. Our Social Workers change lives, supporting children and families from the very start and at every step of the way. Our social work teams are based at offices across Chichester, Bognor, Worthing, Horsham, Crawley and Burgess Hill.

As an employer we recognise that it is our employees that are central to everything we do. We aim to create a supportive and dynamic working environment where employees can achieve their full potential, achieve a healthy work-life balance and are rewarded for the work they do. For a full list of the benefits offered to you as a West Sussex County Council employee, you can find this at our Rewards and Benefits page.