Educational Psychologist

• Flexible working across Home, Educational Settings and Civic Offices, Portsmouth.
• Newly qualified EPs who are HCPC registered will start on A4.
• We can also offer a relocation package of up to £8,000 for those successful candidates who may be eligible.
• We also welcome applications from Trainee Educational Psychologists in their third year of training.

Portsmouth City Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, and young people, and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment. It is also committed to promoting quality childcare across the City that works to improve outcomes for children.

DBS Disclosure at Enhanced level will be required prior to any offer of employment and this post is exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974.

Every post is subject to PCC and Portsmouth Safeguarding Children’s Board safer recruitment procedures.

The Educational Psychology Team

We are a team of supportive, enthusiastic and skilled educational psychologists with experience ranging from our highly valued trainees to those who have been with the service for many years – which is testament to our positive approach.

We are part of the Inclusion Service in Portsmouth City Council’s Education Department and our key purpose is to help promote all aspects of a child or young person’s development by using psychology to make a positive difference. The EP Team is held in high regard with involvement valued across a range of projects in education and social care. We operate a model of traded service which allows us to support schools directly and focus on early intervention. We also fulfil the statutory function of the Education Department and have built strong relationships with our SEN Team which enables collaborative working.

Our team tell us that we are:

‘A good place to work and a good team to work with. Amazing opportunities as a newly qualified EP. Professional views are valued from day one’.

If you have a proactive approach, the ability to work flexibly and are committed to working in co-production with families and stakeholders, we would love to hear from you. You will be certain of a warm welcome, a thorough induction and a varied and interesting role in our team.

Why Portsmouth?

• Portsmouth City Council is a needs-led Local Authority where relationships are valued as the foundation upon which the most effective and positive change can be supported.
• Portsmouth is a small, high population area. This means that there is a wide range of varied work supporting our community’s diverse needs.
• We are committed to enhancing children’s development and potential through adopting person-centred approaches in all we do.
• Our Educational Psychologists engage in interesting and varied work. We operate a growing model of traded service which allows us to support schools directly and focus on early intervention and systemic work.
• The EP Team is held in high regard with involvement valued across a range of projects (ELSA, Relational Practice, Literacy support, EBSA, Supporting children from armed forces families).
• We have excellent relationships and work collaboratively with other teams across education and inclusion including the early years, Portage, virtual school and Multi-disciplinary Neurodiversity teams.
• We have excellent links with Southampton University with EPs providing support to Trainee EPs through the academic tutor and fieldwork supervisor roles. We seek out regular opportunities to engage Trainee EPs in relevant research projects for the benefit all service users with SEND.
• We meet regularly as a team through our service meetings and our monthly Continuing Professional Development programme, shaped by the needs of the Team, with psychology and professional issues at its’ core.
• We value and commit dedicated time to fortnightly peer supervision.
• We have a well-developed induction process which enables staff to meet with key members of the Inclusion Service of which we are part and provides opportunities to get to know our more specialist provisions and attend meetings where some of the key decision-making processes happen.
• We offer a flexible working environment with excellent assistance from our business support team.
• We are currently reviewing our pay and team structure to support competitive pay and development of specialisms within the team so that there are clear routes for progression and career development for the team.
• Portsmouth city council also offers access to our Employee Assistance Programme – a 24 hour independent, free and confidential advice and support service, access to the Local Government Pension Scheme and generous employee benefits including staff discounts.

What is the role?

The post will include:

• Applying psychology through the delivery of services to a cluster of schools within Portsmouth.
• Multi-agency working to support children and families including Experts at Hand and Cluster working.
• Opportunities to engage in the development and delivery of training and workforce development across the city, for example Restorative and Attachment Aware approaches and ELSA.
• Opportunities to engage in strategic developments; for example with SEMH, and Neurodiversity and literacy difficulties.
• Opportunities to work with EPs to develop our practice and policy, always aiming to improve outcomes for children and young people.
• Contribution to the statutory assessment and monitoring and review of children with SEND.
• Autonomy to employ the evidence-based psychological practice that you feel best meets needs (e.g. dynamic and standardised assessment methods used equally across the team).
• Full working knowledge and adherence to the underlying values, principles and policy of Portsmouth Local Safeguarding Children’s Board, including integrated working responsibilities, early help and safeguarding practices.

Portsmouth Educational Psychology Team can offer you support and opportunities, whether you are at the start of your EP career of if you are looking for a new challenge or change.

You must:

• be a qualified Educational Psychologist or be in your second or third year of EP training.
• be registered with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC), or, in the case of trainee EPs, expecting to have their registration confirmed following the completion of their recognised training course.
• possess a sound base of current psychological knowledge and skills.
  have an awareness of current issues in education and psychology and be able to apply this to practice.
• have full working knowledge and adhere to the underlying values, principles and policy of Local Safeguarding Children’s Board, including integrated working responsibilities, early help and safeguarding practices.
• have good personal presentation and credibility with a range of potential client groups.
• have an insight into your own behaviour and the ability to reflect on practice (in individual and group situations with clients and colleagues).
• have the ability to work individually and as part of a team (these are equally important in this role).
• value working with people and demonstrate a relational approach, with parents, children, young people and professionals.
• possess effective consultation and negotiation skills.
• have the ability to make formal presentations to a variety of audiences.
• be able to demonstrate effective oral and written communication skills.
• have excellent self-management skills (prioritising, time management, recognising limitations, planning further professional development).
• be able to evidence growth and learning from training and prior employment experience.

You will need to demonstrate that you have the Right to Work in the UK. No post will be offered without it.

General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)

As part of any recruitment process, Portsmouth City Council collects and processes personal data relating to job applicants. Portsmouth City Council is committed to being transparent about how it collects and uses that data and to meeting its data protection obligations under the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR).

Completing and sending an application in for a vacancy is your consent for us to process your data for the purpose of recruitment.  Your data is not used in any other way and you can withdraw your consent at any point in the recruitment process and we will destroy or delete your information.

For more detailed information on what we collect, how we use, store, delete data and your rights you can access a privacy statement on our Job board.