Job Description:

Job Title: SEMH Behaviour Mentor / Pastoral Keyworker (Youth Justice, Care & Sports Transfer)

Location: Blackpool & The Fylde Coast, Lancashire (FY postcodes)

Contract Type: Full-Time, Temporary-to-Permanent

Trade 12-Hour Shifts, Night Shifts, and Erratic Rotas for Structured School Hours

Are you working in children's residential care (RSW), youth justice, family crisis work, or community sports coaching, feeling tired of late shifts, waking nights, or fragmented contracts?

Your ability to de-escalate crisis situations, connect with deregulated teenagers, and maintain emotional calm under pressure is needed directly in the classroom.

We are recruiting Pastoral Keyworkers and SEMH Behaviour Mentors to join our specialist Alternative Provision (AP) and SEMH hubs across Blackpool. You will work with Key Stage 3 and Key Stage 4 learners (ages 11-16) who face significant barriers to education, including trauma, adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), school exclusion, and complex neurodiversity (ADHD, ASC, PDA).

Why Transfer Into Alternative Provision?

• Balanced, Daytime Hours: 8:30 AM - 3:30 PM, Monday to Friday. Every evening, weekend, and school holiday is yours.

• Direct Skill Transfer: You already know how to handle conflict, de-escalate heightened emotions, and co-regulate young people. You don't need a teaching degree; you need life experience and emotional resilience.

• Micro-Ratios: Work in 1:1 intervention sessions or micro-groups of 3 to 6 pupils alongside an experienced teacher and dedicated pastoral team.

• Career Growth: Fast-track route through an agency temp-to-perm transition into permanent educational pastoral roles, safeguarding, or school behaviour management.

Key Responsibilities

• Emotional De-Escalation & Co-Regulation: Identify triggers early, manage physical/verbal deregulation, and apply therapeutic, low-arousal interventions to maintain safe spaces.

• Keyworker Mentoring: Act as the dedicated keyworker for a small caseload of students, monitoring daily attendance, emotional check-ins, and individual behaviour plans (IBPs).

• Positive Re-Engagement: Support students inside small-group classrooms, workshop environments, sports interventions, and practical off-site learning sessions.

• Restorative Practice: Lead reflective post-incident discussions and repair sessions to rebuild trust between pupils and staff.

• Multi-Agency Logging: Record behavioural logs, pastoral concerns, and safeguarding entries on school tracking software (e.g., CPOMS).

Who We Are Looking For

• Backgrounds That Excel:

  • Children's Residential Care: Former or current RSWs, Senior Residential Support Workers, or Children's Home Keyworkers.

  • Youth Justice & Outreach: Youth offending team (YOT) workers, youth club leaders, antisocial behaviour intervention staff, or family support workers.

  • Sports & Fitness Coaching: Community sports coaches, personal trainers, or martial arts instructors skilled at channelling negative energy into physical discipline and team focus.

• Personal Attributes: Unshakeable patience, authentic empathy, clear boundaries, and the ability to hold a non-defensive stance during crisis moments.

• Qualifications & Training: Level 3 Children & Young People's Workforce, Sports Coaching awards, or Criminology/Youth Work degrees are valued, but real-world relational ability matters most. Training in Team-Teach, MAPA/CPI, or PRICE is highly advantageous (training provided).

• Vetting: Must hold or be willing to process an Enhanced Child Workforce DBS registered on the Update Service.

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