Head of Governance, Attendance and Children Missing School

Job Description

Organisation: London Borough of Waltham Forest

Salary: PO11 £73,602 - £77,550

Contract Type: Full Time/Permanent

Working hours per week: 36 hours

Application Deadline: 06/04/2026

Proposed Interview Date(s): Tuesday 21st – Thursday 23rd April

Reference: 2056

About Us:

Bursting with culture, energy, and opportunity, the London Borough of Waltham Forest is a fantastic and exciting place to work.

We are a highly ambitious borough. Driven by culture and the innate creativity of our residents, we have developed new and innovative ways to build our communities. Our Council is relentlessly resident-focused, insight-led, digitally driven and commercially minded; a Council focused on meeting the needs of our existing and future residents.

London Borough of Waltham Forest is one of the Mayor of London’s Good Work Standard employers. This accreditation is a proof of our commitment to creating a healthy, fair and inclusive workplace. This includes fair pay and conditions, workplace well-being, skills and progression and diversity and recruitment.

The Council’s preference is for online application. However, if you have a disability and are unable to complete an online application, please email recruitment@walthamforest.gov.uk so we can arrange an alternative application method.

About the role:

The Head of Governance, Attendance and Children Missing School will provide strategic and operational leadership for the local authority services, including the traded Governor’s Service, The Attendance Team, Exclusions and CME officers and oversight of children who are electively home educated, ensuring high-quality and inclusive education for children and young people with due regard to their safeguarding and ensuring that schools exercise their statutory duties in relation to these matters.

The postholder will ensure that statutory duties and financial regulations are adhered to, and that inclusive practice is embedded across all education phases. The role will lead change, champion equity and drive inclusive practice working in partnership with young people, schools, settings, families, and external partner agencies to ensure all young people in Waltham Forest can access high quality education.

>> Click here to download the Role Profile <<

Key Responsibilities:

Manage Traded Governor Services - Ensuring that Schools have a robust Governor Services offer and that traded services follow financial regulations.

Manage Statutory Duties in relation to Exclusion and CME - Ensuring that Children are safeguarded and statutory duties are adhered to.

Oversight of Children who are Electively Home Educated - Ensuring that the Local Authority has oversight and accountability for children in Borough who are EHE.

Lead effective Partnerships and Co-production - Work collaboratively with schools and parents and the young people themselves, to ensure an authentically co-produced service.

Reporting and Quality Assurance - Ensure robust systems are in place across all services to monitor performance and evaluate impact. Write and present reports for senior board meetings, provide strategic updates to elected members and senior officers.

Qualifications and Requirements:

To be considered for this position, you should meet the following requirements:

Indicative Qualifications

• QTS
• Desirable – SENDco qualification or equivalent
• Educated to degree standard or equivalent
• Relevant professional qualification

Knowledge, Skills and Experience

• Evidence of continued professional development
• Evidence of Strategic leadership experience in education or inclusion services.
• Ability to lead complex services and drive inclusive education strategies across diverse teams and settings.
• Proven experience in leading inclusion or SEND services within a local authority or similar setting.
• Experience of managing a complex operational service, including financial budgets and resource.

Terms and conditions:

The below terms and conditions apply to this role:

Satisfactory employment references and CIFAS identity checks;

Satisfactory declaration of interest;

This role is subject to safer recruitment practices as it involves work with children and/ or vulnerable adults;

Satisfactory DBS check;

As a public authority, we must ensure that members of staff in public-facing roles are able to speak fluent English. This means that they must have a command of spoken English, with confidence and accuracy, sufficient for the effective performance of their role. This requirement does not refer to any particular English language qualifications, regional or international accents, dialects, speech impediments or the tone of conversations. It does not require staff to speak only in English.

How to Apply:

Interested candidates are invited to submit their applications online by pressing the ‘Apply’ button below. This includes a supporting statement that outlines to us how your skills and experience make you a good candidate for this vacancy.

We reserve the right to close this vacancy early if we receive sufficient applications for the role. Therefore, if you are interested, please submit your application as early as possible.

Equal Opportunity Employer:

Waltham Forest is a diverse borough where diversity is valued and is integral to both, service delivery and employment of its staff. The Council is proud of its rich mix of communities and as the largest employer in the area, it works hard to respond to the changing needs of its population. We use our statutory duties on race, gender and disability equality and best practice in respect of age, faith and sexual orientation to ensure equality of opportunity in the workplace. The Council is committed to meeting its 4 equality objectives: - Promoting equality of opportunity - Opposing all forms of discrimination, intolerance and disadvantage - Ensuring our workforce reflects the diverse communities of Waltham Forest at all levels. - Providing fair, appropriate, accessible and excellent Services to all. Respecting Diversity is a core Council value.

To support the above and reduce the risk of bias in its recruitment activities, the council is operating an anonymous shortlisting process, which hides personal information that can identify individuals until their application has been considered for shortlisting. The council also operates a scheme whereby, for jobs graded up to and including scale SO2, internal candidates are considered first. This includes those candidates who self-identify as having a disability for the purposes of the Disability Confident scheme. For more information, please refer to our recruitment and selection policy.

We are keen to support employees to balance their working life with other commitments. Therefore, wherever possible, we will consider working arrangements that suit an individual's personal circumstances whilst still meeting the needs of the Council. If you would like to discuss the possible flexible working options that might be applicable to this role, please contact the person named below or feel free to discuss this during your interview.

For more information on the benefits of working for the Council, please visit https://www.walthamforest.gov.uk/jobs-and-training/find-jobs-and-other-opportunities/working-us.

Contact Information:

If you have any questions about this vacancy or the application process, please contact Mary Jarrett mary.jarrett@walthamforest.gov.uk

If you have any technical issues when trying to apply for this post, please contact our Recruitment Team via email at recruitment@walthamforest.gov.uk.

Click here for further information on the Human Resources recruitment privacy notice.