Designated Safeguarding Lead

Those Huge Small Victories

For children with complex, challenging needs, the level of care and education must go above and beyond and that’s what drives us here at Witherslack Group. With our high staff-to-child ratio and in-house clinical teams, we’re proud to have won a reputation for excellence. Our aspirational homes, schools and ethos help us achieve the best possible outcomes. In short, we’re enhancing life opportunities. Our Designated Safeguarding Leads are a huge part of making sure our children and young people’s needs are fully recognised and comprehensively met.

Get out what you put in

You will work as part of the Leadership Team and report directly to the Head Teacher for this crucial role. You will have the opportunity to collaborate with other members of the Witherslack Group team in different locations to enable you to progress and develop your skills and knowledge.

As a Designated Safeguarding Lead you will take responsibility for safeguarding within the school, this means that on a daily basis you will be liaising with statutory and non-statutory agencies, parents/carers and staff on matters of wellbeing , child protection and safeguarding and will be a great source of support, advice and expertise in the team.

One of the best environments in SEND

Lavender Lodge school resides within an 18th Century building in the heart of Mitcham. Our pupils come from many different boroughs to attend our school and are lucky to experience ‘a life changing love of learning.’ We are proud of our pupils and our dedicated team and pupils leave us with a sense of achievement. We were recently recognised as Good by Ofsted.

Skill set requirements –

• Must have worked with pupils who are autistic and have previous experience of this
• Needs to be able to communicate in a variety of ways as 70% of our pupils are non-verbal e.g. can use Makaton, picture display symbols – we use PEC’s and PODD, have experience working with non -verbal pupils
• Have worked with pupils who display challenging behaviour but would have the will and desire to support pupils to manage their behaviour and also for you to work to understand the function of the behaviour
• Be flexible to work with pupils from 4 through to 11 years old
• Be able to think outside the box in regards to delivering lessons. We have lots of tools to help support this, but our pupils need a bespoke and accessible curriculum

Have an awareness of autism strategies such as TEACCH, attention autism and use of PODD and be able to use these in practise

What we do for you

We know you’re going to do great things. For your hard work and commitment, we reward you with the best salary and benefits package in the education sector. With us, you’ll get to bring learning to life and make a genuine difference to the lives of our young people – plus you’ll get:

• Training: A full induction and on the job training
• Holiday: You’ll work hard at WG, so you’ll be rewarded with full school holidays
• Flexible benefits: meaning you can increase/decrease benefits such as life insurance – check out our benefits here
• Wellbeing: a host of wellbeing tools and advice including employee assistance
• Medical cover so you can claim back the cost of things like an opticians or dentist appointment and a host of high-street discounts
• Beautiful working environments with the very best facilities – check out our schools here
• A recommend a friend scheme that offers a £2,000 bonus every time
• Contributory pension scheme – matched up to 5%

Bring your whole-self to work

Our young people and their families come from all walks of life, diverse backgrounds and with different needs – and our workforce reflects that diversity, so that our teams can engage, encourage and inspire our young people to be themselves. As well as having at least 3 years’ experience in a Designated Safeguarding Lead role, we will also look for:

• Comprehensive portfolio of CPD related to Safeguarding and Child Protection.
• Outstanding interpersonal and problem resolution skills.
• A genuinely empathetic approach is also essential
• Full UK driving licence

Interested in joining us?

Our young people deserve the best possible future and we feel the same about our teams. You deserve to have the career you want, with a purpose-led employer, in an environment that allows you to be yourself.

The Witherslack Group is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of its young people. This post is subject to an enhanced DBS check (we will cover the cost) and an online search. We are an equal opportunities employer welcoming applications from all sections of the community.

For a full job description and person specification, please see the attached document.

Special Education / Careers in Care / Careers in Special Education / Working with Children / SEMH / SEN / ASD