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Are you an experienced social worker who is passionate about helping children find safe, stable and loving homes where they can thrive? If so, we'd love to hear from you.

An exciting opportunity has arisen to join our Fostering and Adoption Assessment Team as a permanent Fostering Assessment Social Worker. This is a rewarding role where you'll play a key part in identifying, assessing and supporting carers who can make a difference to children and young people across Leicestershire.

About the Role

The primary focus of this position is undertaking mainstream fostering assessments, helping to ensure that children can access high-quality care from skilled, nurturing foster families.

Alongside fostering assessments, you'll also have the opportunity to complete:

Private fostering assessments
Non-agency adoption assessments
Kinship assessments, supporting colleagues within our Kinship Assessment Team when required
Skills to Foster training

This varied role offers the chance to develop and apply your assessment skills across a range of permanence pathways, while working alongside experienced and passionate professionals.

A DBS enhanced check for a regulated activity is required for this post.

For information on our approach to the recruitment of ex-offenders, please see our policy statement.

.About You

To apply for this post, you must be able to evidence in your application how you meet the following criteria:

A Social Work degree or equivalent, e.g. CQSW, DipSW (with specialism in children’s services), and hold two years recent post-qualification experience of working in a statutory setting including Safeguarding, Court, and Pre-proceeding work.
You will need to comprehensively assess applicant carers – working with them in a way that allows for a thorough assessment (which analyses whether they meet the criteria for the assessment), but which also supports them, in a compassionate way, to learn all that they can about fostering, private fostering, or non-agency adoption, in order that they are better prepared to meet the needs of the children in their care (currently or in the future).
A proven ability to communicate thoughtfully, confidently, succinctly and with purpose, (both verbally and in writing (using Microsoft Office and database applications relevant to the department)) with children, young people, parents/carers, colleagues and other multi-agencies and professionals.
An ability to use your initiative, to be able to prioritise, and to offer flexibility in order to manage competing workloads and deadlines, and to ensure effective team working, with an ability – where necessary - to travel to locations throughout the county (and sometimes, across the country) working outside of office hours when required
An in-depth knowledge and ability to apply relevant policies appropriate legislation government guidance and best practice in all aspects of social work including LSCB procedures – with specific awareness of the Fostering Regulations and guidance, and how to undertake fostering and private fostering assessments.
An awareness of the cultural, racial, linguistic and religious background of children, young people and families and how to build this knowledge into service delivery.
Have comprehensive knowledge of the factors and influences which can impact on families and children achieving positive outcomes including child development, attachment and neglect, and parental factors such as substance misuse domestic abuse and mental health.

In addition, we also expect you to share our commitment to our values and to delivering accessible and inclusive services which meet the needs of all of our residents. You will be asked to demonstrate your understanding of these commitments as part of the selection process.

Reasonable adjustments will be considered for applicants with a disability. We are a Disability Confident Employer.

Interested in Flexible Working?

We are open to discussions about flexible working, which may include part time working, job sharing, term-time working, flexible start and finish times, and hybrid working, depending on the requirements of the role and the service. If you would like to discuss the possible flexible working options that might be applicable to this role, please contact the person named below.

For more information or an informal discussion, please contact:

Emily Moss - Team Manager

Telephone: 0116 3056502

Email: emily.moss@leics.gov.uk

How to Apply

At Leicestershire County Council we’re looking for top talent from all walks of life. Whoever you are, wherever you’re from, and whatever your background - we care about what you bring to our organisation, not just what’s on your CV. That’s why we’ve designed a recruitment process that’s fair, accessible, and focused on potential. And with benefits that support people at every age and stage of life, we make sure you can thrive - both personally and professionally.

If you share our passion to make a difference for the people of Leicestershire, we’d love to hear from you. Click the apply button to submit your application, ensuring that you upload a supporting statement that explains how you meet the criteria listed in the ‘About You’ section above. Without this information, we won’t be able to assess your suitability for the role, and your application will be rejected. For tips on how to write your statement, see the How to Apply section on our career site.

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.

If you have any technical issues when trying to apply for this post or you want to request an application pack in an alternative format, please contact our Employee Service Centre by telephoning 0300 3030222 (select option 2) or raising a ticket via our online portal: https://emss.org.uk/support.

By applying for this post, you agree to our Terms and Conditions.

About us

About Leicestershire County Council

At Leicestershire County Council, we're committed to making a real difference in people's lives. Our aim is to work with communities and partners to deliver public services that make Leicestershire the best possible place to live and work for everyone.

Our employees play a key role in supporting this goal and helping us deliver the vital services we provide to the people of Leicestershire. Whether you're starting your career or looking for your next challenge, you'll find a place with us where your ideas are valued, and your work has purpose.

For further information on what it’s like to work for us and the benefits we offer, please refer to the following:

Our Recruitment Process
Our Organisational Values
Our Employee Benefits
Working for Us

Salary range

£38,734 - £45,982 per year