Are you passionate and committed to making a meaningful difference for families with young children experiencing barriers to moving out of poverty.

Within the UK, there is an estimated £22.7 billion a year in unclaimed welfare benefits and in Edinburgh 1 in 5 children are living in poverty.

This is an exciting opportunity for an Advice Worker to join our ‘Advice For Families’ team and deliver a high quality advice service to families in Edinburgh with pre-school children. Taking an early intervention and trauma-informed approach, the adviser will provide benefits, housing and debt advice to parents, in order to promote improved financial and social wellbeing for families.

The role will involve developing strong professional partnerships with other early years practitioners including Early Years Centres; Nurseries; Midwifery and Family Nurse Partnerships and Health Visitor teams.

Extensive in-house training and support will be provided to the successful candidate who demonstrates the right qualities for this role.

Are you?:

• Passionate and committed to making a meaningful difference for families experiencing barriers to moving out of poverty
• Able to quickly learn complex rules and legislation on Welfare Benefits, Debt and Housing.
• Enthusiastic about contributing to the delivery and development of partnership services.
• Able to build trusting professional relationships.
• Understanding of people’s journeys and the challenges they have had in their lives, and how poverty and inequality can have an impact on them.

At CHAI we offer the following:

• Extensive training programme
• Flexible working
• Access to Simply Health benefit plan
• 32 days annual leave (inclusive of public holidays)
• Enrolment to NOW Pension Scheme
• Supportive work environment
• Opportunities to improve services and make a difference.

Space is a community anchor organisation supporting people and their families in South West Edinburgh, with some of our services stretching city wide.

WE BELIEVE THAT CONNECTIONS BUILD COMMUNITIES

Space delivers 22 projects, with around 70 staff and over 200 volunteers. We deliver diverse services supporting young people, families, older people and carers amongst others.

For more information about Space and all our projects can be found on our website – spacescot.org

The Role:

Thanks to funding from the National Lottery Space is able to launch a new service for the local community in the form of a Drop-in ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) Conversation Cafe at The Broomhouse Hub. This will provide a much needed safe space in the community for individuals and families to develop their English speaking skills in an informal setting.

The drop-in café will run on Saturdays from The Broomhouse Hub, the exact time for sessions is yet to be confirmed, but is likely to be either 10am – 12pm, or 1.30pm – 3.30pm each week.

We are currently recruiting for a Facilitator to plan and deliver a programme of engaging group sessions, supporting people from minority ethnic backgrounds to participate in conversation with others in the sessions in order to practice and develop their English skills.

We are looking for someone with experience of group facilitation, who has previously supported people to learn English. A qualification such as TEFL or CELTA is not a requirement for the role but would be an advantage.

Most importantly, the right candidate for the role will have:

• an excellent command of the English language
• a minimum of one year of experience directly supporting people who are learning English as a foreign language
• experience of designing and delivering group conversation sessions in order to enable learners to develop their English skills
• group facilitation experience and an encouraging attitude to learner participation
• a sound understanding of the needs and challenges faced by people from minority ethnic backgrounds, in particular those who are living in areas of deprivation
• excellent interpersonal skills and confidence to naturally form relationships with a range of people of all ages and walks of life
• great organisational skills and be self-motivated to deliver results with minimal supervision

PVG membership required, this will be processed by Space for the successful candidate.

Established in 1984 to eradicate all forms of discrimination under the Race Relations Act 1976, CSREC works across Central Scotland, including but not limited to, Clackmannanshire, Falkirk, and Stirling Council areas.

At CSREC, we aim to reduce the negative effects of inequality and marginalisation experienced by Minority Ethnic individuals, asylum seekers, and refugees across Central Scotland, enabling them to engage with the wider public to enhance community cohesion and prevent discrimination.

In view of the nature of this post, the successful candidate will be required to join the PVG scheme.

Aims of the Post:

To deliver the key Scottish Government outcomes for the Equality & Human Rights Fund. The agreed outcomes are:

a) People have greater awareness and understanding of their human rights, and how to access them.

b) People with protected characteristics have increased access to remedies where their rights have not been upheld.

c) People with protected characteristics have increased participation in public life.

d) Public services increasingly embed equality and human rights in their strategic planning and their day-to-day functions.

Main Tasks & Responsibilities

• To provide support and advice to ethnic minority individuals and families on asylum and protection, and EU settlement scheme (restricted to OISC Level 1 advice).
• To provide support, advice, and information to individuals, families, and community groups from ethnic minority backgrounds on issues such as discrimination, employment, housing, hate crime reporting, welfare benefits, health, education, and other issues that arise. This is a busy service and casework can take up a lot of the time.
• To positively increase awareness of hate crime reporting and discrimination through undertaking presentations to relevant groups and networks across Central Scotland.
• To help engage, motivate, and support ethnic minority individuals and groups to be involved in cascading information about equality matters and the Equality Act 2010 to their own contacts and networks and take up opportunities for direct involvement in civic society.
• To assist in the preparation of written reports to management, funders, steering committees, and other bodies as required.
• To work in partnership with local groups, third sector organisation and public sector.
• To assist in the design and deliver tailored training sessions for community groups and organisations on a range of equality-related topics.
• To provide pertinent feedback and participate in team meetings and events.
• To assist in organising events to further the aims of the project and participate in events organised by partner organisations.
• To develop good working relationships with our service users, their support networks, community groups, third sector organisations, public services, and other key stakeholders.
• To ensure the service user remains at the forefront of the process, and that the values and principles that underpin community learning and development are adhered to at all times.

We are the first port of call for social entrepreneurs and our mission is to make social enterprise accessible, achievable and aspirational.

We are looking for new board members to broaden and strengthen the skills and experience of our existing board. As a board member, you will oversee our governance and financial arrangements, ensuring that we operate in line with best practice and our charitable objectives. You will play an important role in our future direction and will provide support and motivation to the board and the Chief Executive.

While we welcome applications from anyone who meets the role’s description and person specification, we particularly want to reach individuals who can demonstrate specialist knowledge, skills, and lived or learned experience in one or more of the following:

• Key public policy areas affecting Scotland
• Scottish Government, Local Authority, or other public sector knowledge, including relationships with civil servants and government officials
• Business development, corporate partnerships and diversification of income streams
• Impact measurement and evaluation frameworks

As accredited Investors in Diversity, we are committed to making our Board balanced and diverse, reflecting the people and communities we work with. Acknowledging our current board make-up and those ending their term this year, we particularly welcome applications from women and those who identify outside the gender binary, as well as people who bring a diversity of thought, mindset and background through their age (young people), sexuality, ethnicity, learning style or geography (rural/remote location).