Birmingham City Council - Senior Educational Psychologists (2 posts)

About Us
We are seeking new members to our collaborative leadership team following retirement and expansion to our service structure to meet the high demand for our professional services through effective and quality delivery. Children and young people are at the heart of everything we do. We are passionate about applying psychology and evidence-based practice to support the city’s ambitious thriving outcomes for our young population. We need innovative, committed and experienced leaders to join us with our endeavours in supporting change.

Role Overview
The service is undergoing service redesign. We are currently based in 4 area teams serving the 10 localities in the city. We require a senior educational psychologist to lead the East Area EP Team as team manager in providing core and traded services as well as negotiated specialism lead that relates to our priorities in our service delivery plan. Our new additional senior EP post will currently have a focus in leading and supporting workforce development across the service as well as contributing to strategic local area partnership workforce learning and training initiatives. Key responsibilities will include maintenance and development for our CPD programme, the service lead for our Trainee EP placements and supporting the leadership team with the onboarding, coordination and deployment with our growing team of associates EPs.

We are looking for experienced practitioners who can apply psychology at a systems level, leading psychological initiatives, continuing to enhance the practice of our areas teams and working collaboratively with services and professionals across the city. You will support service planning, policy matters, quality assurance, working collaboratively with a range of partners in the delivery of our service including our statutory obligations. The roles will involve line management and psychological supervision of specialist senior EPs and qualified EPs. Alongside the leadership and management responsibilities, you will provide generic work for up to 10% of your time: delivering a psychology service through consultation.

Benefits
The post will support career advancement and professional development. You will be joining one of the largest educational services in the country working with friendly, reflective and supportive colleagues.

The Educational Psychology Service has an excellent reputation and has a strong commitment to inclusive practice, quality improvement, research and development. We are engaged in a variety of initiatives such as ‘SCERTS’, ELSA, VIG, VERP, MeLSA, Trauma Informed Attachment Aware Schools and Restorative Practice. Our leadership team secure opportunities to join strategic projects across the Local Area SEND Partnership and other areas of joint working in the local area.

We are not a prescriptive service and value the diversity of approach each of our psychologists at all levels. There are flexible working hours and hybrid working options. Professional development opportunities and regular supervision and support from the Principal EP and peers.

Applicants must be HCPC registered Educational Psychologists with at least 3 years’ experience as qualified EPs who can demonstrate relevant experience through their existing and past roles of leadership within their practice, and through supervision of others.

For any informal enquires please contact: Dr Pauline Bromfield, Head of Service/Principal Educational Psychologist, Pauline.Bromfield@birmingham.gov.uk

Please upload an up-to-date CV and Personal Statement via the attachments part of your application. The Personal Statement should outline how you meet the essential criteria for the role through your personal qualities, skills and experience and include your motivation for applying to the post. Note the Personal Statement should be no more than 1500 words. Unfortunately, we cannot consider any applications without a CV and Personal Statement attached.

Birmingham City Council is an accredited Disability Confident Leader employer, and we are committed to employing, retaining and developing all of our people.

We are dedicated to supporting internal mobility and the development of our people. As such, applications from internal employees and those under S118 will be given priority and reviewed before external applications are considered.

We want to ensure your recruitment journey with us is a positive and equitable one, so please let us know if there are any reasonable adjustments, additional support, accessibility needs, or if there is any way in which we can support you through your application.

We welcome applications from people with caring responsibilities and flexible working options will be considered.

A Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check will be undertaken.

Proof of Right to work in the UK will be required for all applicants in accordance with UK Home Office requirements, before any employment offer can be confirmed.

We strive to advertise all roles for a minimum of two weeks. However, due to high application volumes vacancies may close earlier than the stated deadline. We encourage you to submit your application without delay to ensure consideration.