This is a new role within our Personal Development and Welfare (PDW) team. We are looking to recruit a Pastoral Support Manager to lead our Student Hub and to support our PDW team in managing the wide range of pastoral issues that we deal with on a daily basis. We are a school that truly lives our mission statement of “learning, working and succeeding together” and the students are at the heart of what we do in our values driven school. We have the highest of aspirations for all in our school and we believe that the best possible care we can give to our students will enable them to leave us with the very best GCSE and A level grades possible. In addition to the academic, we seek to use our values to reinforce the development of the whole person. They are values which will, if routinely exemplified and embedded by staff, and when the students take responsibility for their personal development, give our young people all the skills and characteristics necessary to choose the right behaviour or action for the vast array of contexts they will be faced with in life.
Our PDW team is led by the Deputy Headteacher and Assistant Headteacher. You will be led by, and report directly to, the Deputy Headteacher and work alongside our Heads of Year and Student Support Manager to promote positive student behaviour and wellbeing. You will line manage our Senior Learning Mentor who will also be based in the Student Hub. Our Student Hub is where students who are not following their normal timetable, for reasons such as anxiety or an inability to cope in mainstream lessons, are based. The aim is to ensure that these students receive a broad and balanced curriculum which enables them to make progress in their subjects. As well as leading the Student Hub you will also be available to immediately respond to everyday student issues. These could include investigating and addressing behaviour incidents, dealing with social fallouts and providing support to distressed students.
Working with a range of students, from individuals to small groups, we are seeking someone who is proactive, resourceful and a problem solver. Someone who can deliver tough messages in an empathetic manner. Someone who is self-assured, emotionally intelligent and can build relationships. Someone who is an optimist, with a positive outlook. Someone who can handle pressurised situations. Sitting behind all of this is someone with high standards of personal and professional conduct who shares our high aspirations for the students we teach.
At Sir Graham Balfour we offer:
* A friendly, well-motivated staff, who embrace willingly a culture of professional development.
* An ever-growing reputation in the local community which has resulted in the school being consistently oversubscribed in an area where student rolls fluctuate.
* A very positive climate for learning.
* A first-rate learning environment. We are housed in buildings completed in 2002 and financed via a PFI initiative.
* Innovative 14-19 collaboration and an increasing roll at KS5.
* A commitment to inclusive practice.
Please note:
* All applicants will be submitted for an enhanced DBS check.
* Applications will only be accepted if submitted on the enclosed formal application form.
* Two references will be required, one of which must be from your most recent employer. In the case of teachers, one reference must come from your most recent headteacher.
* Once a written reference has been received, we will contact the referee by telephone to confirm the provenance of that reference.
* If shortlisted, online searches will be carried out, in order to help identify any incidents or issues that have happened and are publicly available online, which the school might want to explore with the applicant at interview.
* If shortlisted, we will request a portrait photo of you to attach to your file and to help confirm your identity.
* If appointed, the successful applicant will be informed that the appointment is subject to satisfactory completion of the following checks: the right to work in the UK, qualifications requirements, satisfactory DBS Enhanced Disclosure, the Criminal Record Self-Declaration Form, teacher prohibition and barred list checks, pre-employment medical screening and satisfactory references (if not already received).
Visits to the school are strongly recommended and can be arranged by contacting Mrs Vicki McKeen (details below).
Further details including the application form are available from the school website:, and websites. For an application pack, please access our website, or contact Mrs Vicki McKeen, Headteacher’s PA, on vmckeen@sirgrahambalfour.staffs.sch.uk or telephone 01785 223490.
The closing date for applications is: 1.30pm on Friday 12 th July 2024.
Please return completed applications to vmckeen@sirgrahambalfour.staffs.sch.uk
Shortlisting for this post will take place on Friday 12 th July 2024 and successful applicants will be contacted no later than 5pm on the same day. If you have not heard from us by this time, please assume you have not been successful on this occasion.
Interviews will take place week commencing Monday 15 th July 2024. They will include a tour around the school, tasks relating to the role and interviews for the short-listed candidates.