Student Intervention Officer- Maternity Cover

Advert

Student Intervention Officer- Maternity Cover

Applications are invited to provide maternity cover for the role of Student Intervention Officer based in Counselling and Wellbeing. The role is available for 9 months and applications for internal secondments will be welcomed.

Our Student Intervention Team will facilitate the identification, investigation, and assessment of students where there is concern for their wellbeing or disruptive behaviour. The team (currently 4 members) facilitate and monitor interventions for students who may be struggling emotionally or psychologically, or who present a risk to health or wellbeing to themselves or those around them.

The Student Intervention Officer’s enable us to improve the student and staff experience through investigation, assessment and management for appropriate and proportionate interventions. this team  also deliver training, consultancy and assistance to University staff, especially academic staff, promoting confidence and empowering others to raise issues and support students appropriately. 

Engaging positively with subject matter experts, academic staff and external partners will be important, as will working collaboratively to support both our students and staff who are responding to presenting situations. Developing and maturing partnerships with external agencies and services will be particularly instrumental in securing referral pathways to support outside the capability of the services offered by the University. 

The post is full-time, 35 hours per week, and fixed term until December 2024 to cover for an existing member of staff on maternity leave.

Salary: £39,347 - £44,263 per annum (Grade 6)

Cardiff University offers many excellent benefits, including 37 days annual leave (plus bank holidays), pro rata for part time staff, local pension scheme, a cycle to work scheme and other travel initiatives, annual increments up the pay scale, and more. It is an exciting and vibrant place to work, with many different challenges and is a proud Living Wage supporter.

Date Advertised: 25 March 2024

Closing date: 10 April 2024

Cardiff University is committed to supporting and promoting equality and diversity and to creating an inclusive working environment. We believe this can be achieved through attracting, developing, and retaining a diverse range of staff from many different backgrounds who have the ambition to create a University which seeks to fulfil our social, cultural and economic obligation to Cardiff, Wales, and the world. In supporting our employees to achieve a balance between their work and their personal lives, we will also consider proposals for flexible working or job share arrangements.

Job Description

Job Duties

• Lead the identification, investigation, and risk-assessment, using recognised assessment tools, to respond appropriately to student incidents or issues where they fall within inclusion criteria of Student Intervention.
• Provide professional direction, advice, and guidance on the management of vulnerable students and those in crisis to staff across academic schools, professional services, and the community, working with others to balance the safety and wellbeing of the subject student and the wider University community.
• Enhance and improve the proactive identification of at-risk students in partnership with Academic Schools and in accordance with student context, circumstance, and trends.
• Investigate, collate, and document information on individual students’ context or circumstances of an event or incident, either one that has occurred or emerging, to inform decision on most appropriate course of action to mitigate risk.
• Promote a culture across the University of managing risk, by identifying and reporting concern where there are incidents or observed changes in student behaviour. 
• Enable early prevention of avertible student mental health incidents through early identification and co-ordinating a professional multi-disciplinary approach and response to students presenting at risk to themselves or whose behaviour presents risk or is disruptive to the University community. 
• Establish and sustain productive partnerships with key contacts, developing relationships with the University’s Academic Schools, professional services and external statutory and community services and agencies.
• Collaborate with others to design and develop relevant training materials, aligned where appropriate with existing practices (including but not limited to frameworks for suicide awareness and safety, professional boundaries, violence and abuse and Mental Health) and disseminate them to colleagues across the University and community agencies.
• Lead student case management and co-ordination, ensuring appropriate and proportionate response in accordance with University policies, in particular the Intervention to Support Policy and Procedure.
• Plan and implement service evaluation activity on a regular and ongoing basis to support continuous improvement of the service.
• Review, audit, develop and promote reporting mechanisms and referral pathways, developing procedures and policies ensuring they are fit-for-purpose and integrated within Student Life procedures and processes.
• Lead frequent multi-disciplinary student intervention case meetings, providing direction, recommendations and case updates while drawing from community expertise.  Take responsibility for co-ordinating agreed next steps or actions where appropriate. 

General Duties 

• Ensure that appropriate levels of confidentiality are upheld in accordance with the University data protection policy and the Student Life confidentiality statement.
• Abide by mandatory University policies on Information Security, Health, Safety & Environment and Equality and Diversity including how the work environment could impact on own or others dignity, productivity, and morale.
• Perform other duties occasionally which are not included above, but which will be consistent with the role

Person Specification

Important notice:

• It is the University’s policy to use the person specification as a key tool for short-listing. Candidates should evidence that they meet ALL of the essential criteria as well as, where relevant, the desirable.
• As part of the application process you will be asked to provide this evidence via a supporting statement.
• Please ensure that the evidence you are providing corresponds with the numbered criteria outlined below.
• Your application will be considered based on the information you provide under each element.

When attaching the supporting statement to your application profile, please ensure that you name it with the vacancy reference number, e.g. Supporting Statement for 18011BR.

Essential Criteria

Qualifications and Education

Relevant degree/NVQ 4 or equivalent professional membership. Professional mental health experience in roles such as social work, policing, mental health nursing, occupational therapy, psychology or therapy or intervention.

Knowledge, Skills, and Experience

Ability to demonstrate professional knowledge within risk management and threat assessment including familiarity with safeguarding.

Substantial experience of working within an organisational setting as part of a team to give direction, recommendations, and advice to varying stakeholders as required.

Experience and ability to design and deliver effective training on professional boundaries, suicide awareness and prevention.

Customer Service, Communication and Team Working

Ability to communicate conceptually detailed and complex information effectively and professionally with a wide range of people.

Evidence of ability to explore stakeholders’ needs and use quantitative and qualitative data to ensure a quality service is delivered.

Ability to work autonomously and as part of a team, to effectively support vulnerable students at crisis.

Proven ability to network and influence to contribute to long term developments.

Planning, Analysis and Problem solving

Evidence of ability to solve expansive problems using initiative and creativity, identifying, and proposing practical solutions and resolving problems with range of potential outcomes.

Evidence of ability to work unsupervised to deadlines, planning and setting priorities for own work and that of others and monitoring progress.

Desirable Criteria

Experience of working with statutory healthcare services such as NHS Crisis Teams or Community Mental Health Teams.

Worked in a service where agreed targets in place demonstrating outcomes and these KPIs are monitored.

Fluency in Welsh, written and oral.

Job Category

Management & Executive