Spartans Community Foundation is a charity and social enterprise in North Edinburgh, focusing on community engagement and participation and delivering social impact through the power of people and sport.

You can find out more about the organisation at spartanscf.com

Spartans Community Foundation is a charity and social enterprise in North Edinburgh. We aspire to be a valued organisation that helps to improve the quality of people’s lives in a meaningful way, with love, compassion and dignity at the heart of our approach. We change lives through the power of sport and people.

We are “here for good”.

The Spartans Community Foundation operates from a £1.4 million purpose-built Education & Youth Work space, creating exciting opportunities to expand our impact and support even more children and young people across North Edinburgh.

We are seeking to recruit an enthusiastic, motivated, and experienced individual to join our vibrant and dedicated youth work team. This is an exciting opportunity for someone with a broad range of skills, knowledge, and practical experience who is passionate about supporting and empowering young people. The successful candidate will bring energy, creativity, and a strong commitment to delivering high-quality youth work, while working collaboratively within a supportive and dynamic team environment. We are looking for someone who can build positive relationships, engage effectively with young people from diverse backgrounds, and contribute meaningfully to the continued growth and development of our services and programmes.

Job Purpose:

Deliver and develop a high-quality face to face youth work service aimed at meeting the needs of children & young people through informal activity-based sessions within youth clubs and primary schools.

The successful candidates will work with children and young people aged 7 -16 years from across our North Edinburgh community.

Key Responsibilities

• To develop relationships with young people based on mutual trust & respect (Building the Bridge of Trust).
• To deliver direct face to face work with young people in existing & new youth work provision.
• To encourage the involvement of young people in the planning and evaluation of programmes.
• To assist with service development by contributing to planning, delivery, and monitoring.
• To develop reflective practice and attend supervision as required.
• To assist in the development of programmes that promote equal opportunities and inclusive environments.
• To deliver a range of fun, engaging activities suitable for various age ranges.
• To use a wide range of resources to effectively engage with all young people.
• To ensure health and safety is always maintained to the required standards.
• To carry out any other duties as required, including the possibility of residential trips, holiday programmes as required.
• To deliver youth work sessions both 1-1 and small groups within a local primary school. (Shadowing/training available re this)
• To engage in partnership working to deliver collaborative youth work.

Skills Required

• Experience of working with & developing trusting relationships with children & young people aged 7-25 years old.
• Ability to communicate effectively with young people and the ability to motivate and engage them positively.
• Experience of working with & developing trusting relationships with hard-to-reach young people.
• Experience of delivering & developing youth work in a variety of settings.
• Ability to work effectively as part of a team and on your own initiative with minimum supervision.
• Knowledge of issues facing young people within our community.
• Understanding of child protection issues and willing to undergo further training.
• An understanding of the needs of socially excluded young people.
• A high level of professionalism in the workplace, including maintaining confidentiality at all times.
• Reliability & good time keeping.

Key Competencies:

• Productivity - Plans work carefully, makes effective use of time available, reprioritising as necessary, consistently delivers work of high quality on time, makes timely decisions, and approaches tasks in a systematic manner.
• Adaptability - Is open to latest ideas and suggestions, suggests new and innovative ways of working, show a positive approach to change, demonstrates a flexible approach when dealing with other, and keeps calm when faced with unexpected problems.
• Taking Action - Demonstrates a keen sense of ownership for work, shows resilience when working under pressure, consistently strives to meet targets, rises to meet tough challenges, and attempts to solve problems before seeking help (adopting a can-do mindset).
• Delivering Customer Impact - Understands customer needs, responds quickly to changing customer needs and/or anticipates customer needs, identifies ways to improve customer service, takes responsibility for sorting out customer problems, and keeps customers informed of developments.
• Working with Others (internal & external) - Collaborates effectively with others, develops positive relationships with others, actively takes part in team activities, is supportive of colleagues, builds trust, and treats everyone as an individual (honours uniqueness).
• Communicates with a Presence - Is always present with others, manages personal FOE factor, listens to understand others and checks for understanding around their MAP of the world, communicates key and relevant information to others, talks with enthusiasm and confidence, and adapts communication style depending on who they are talking to.
• Contributes with Authenticity - Tries to conduct work in an ethical and fair way, acts with integrity, willing to be vulnerable and fail, to take calculated risks, speaks openly and honestly about problems and challenges, and aspires to be a positive role-model – adopts a ‘big heart, small head’ approach.
• Always Learning - Spots and takes opportunities to develop own skills and knowledge, evaluates the impact of actions and initiatives (e.g., composes win/learn/change reviews), takes time to self-reflect on own behaviours and effectiveness, applies new knowledge and skills to be more effective and shares own learning with colleagues.

Working Requirements

• 37.5 hours per week
• Staff development and training events as required.
• Working pattern is Monday – Friday which will include evening work.

Responsible to:Senior Youth Worker

Liaises with: All Foundation employees, customers, partners and volunteers

Benefits

• Living Wage Employer
• Health Assured Employee Assistance Programme
• Staff uniform (Macron Kit Allowance)
• On-site parking
• Company pension scheme
• 30 days annual leave plus, Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Years Day as public holidays.
• Training and Development opportunities.
• Free access for employees’ children to Football Development Department holiday and football programmes.

Scottish FA Extra Time Project Outline

The Scottish FA seek to use the power of football to help support and strengthen its clubs and the communities they serve. As part of the ongoing partnership between the Scottish FA and the Scottish Government, the Scottish FA Extra Time Programme aims to provide after school and holiday activity clubs for primary school aged children.

The programme is available to football clubs, trusts and foundations and will look to develop an understanding of how organised activities for children, and wider engagement with local support services, can improve life outcomes, particularly for those families on low incomes.

Scottish FA Extra Time Project Principles

• An increased accessibility to organised children’s activities for targeted families.
• A better understanding of the role that organised children's activities can play in providing food/tackling food insecurities.
• More parents and carers from targeted families can sustain and/or increase their working hours, and/or improve their employment circumstances, take up training, studying or facilitate respite opportunities.
• A way to measure improved mental health and wellbeing for children, parents, and carers.
• A better understanding of additional impacts and outcomes that are realised because of providing targeted families and communities with access to funded organised activities.
• Engagement with parents, carers, and communities to increase community involvement and the numbers of children and families participating in grassroots clubs and organisations.

Key Responsibilities

• To engage and build relationships with parents, carers, and communities to increase community involvement and the numbers of children and families participating in grassroots clubs and organisations.
• To provide direct support and/or therapeutic work with children, young people and families, which may include, group work, family work, and individual work.
• To maintain communication with families of the children and young people we are engaging with via the ASC’s and to promote their involvement in the Extra Time project.
• To plan and deliver workshop sessions for low-income families and provide relevant support where necessary.
• To maintain accurate and detailed records of all sessions.
• To develop and implement evaluation tools to measure the impact of both funding and project aims versus results.
• To develop and maintain effective communication links with local schools, Head Teachers, and SFA Southeast Region members of staff plus any other relevant parties both within and out with North Edinburgh.
• To develop strategic partnerships and links with social sector organisations providing services to children and young people, including low-income families.
• Support Extra Time Youth & Community Coaches to deliver afterschool sessions in line with Foundation policies and procedures.
• To ensure SCF policies and procedures are following risk assessments and lone working policies are being followed.
• To develop, maintain and share a working knowledge of local and national strategies for the future development of football, sport in general, education and health initiatives.

Full job description can be downloaded below.

Help change young lives through the power of the sea. Ocean Youth Trust Scotland is a youth development charity that uses sailing to help young people build confidence, resilience, and teamwork skills through life-changing experiences at sea.

We are looking for an organised and proactive Administrative Assistant to support the day-to-day running of our operations. This is a varied and rewarding role within a small, supportive team, where you’ll play a key part in coordinating volunteers, supporting training and compliance, and helping deliver safe and impactful voyages.

If you’re someone who enjoys working in a purposeful environment and wants to make a real difference behind the scenes, we’d love to hear from you.

We’re looking for an enthusiastic and skilled worker to lead the delivery of our North Edinburgh Futures programme — a new early intervention project offering safe, engaging, co designed youth work for 10–15 year olds during evenings and weekends.

You will:

• Plan & deliver high quality youth work sessions, workshops & trips
• Lead & support a team of sessional youth workers
• Build positive relationships with young people & families
• Reduce barriers to participation and promote inclusion
• Strengthen partnerships with schools, organisations & specialist providers
• Maintain accurate monitoring records & support reporting to funders
• Promote safeguarding, trauma informed practice & reflective learning
• Work flexibly, including evenings & weekends

You need:

• Minimum 4 years’ experience working with young people in a youth work or related setting
• Experience planning, delivering and evaluating group activities
• Strong safeguarding knowledge and confidence supporting staff
• Excellent communication and relationship building skills
• Ability to work both independently and as part of a wider team
• Understanding of trauma informed, inclusive practice
• Social media confidence
• Experience supporting staff/volunteers (desirable)
• Driving licence or willingness to gain minibus training (desirable)