Job Description

Passionate about the mental health and wellbeing of children and young people? National conversation increasingly focuses on young people's mental health, now is the time to be at the forefront of the development of these services. We are excited to be recruiting a Senior Education Mental Health Practitioner to work in an innovative service in Suffolk: the Mental Health Support Team (MHST). MHSTs are based within education settings, ensuring children and young people receive faster access to earlier mental health support. You will be one of the key senior clinicians in this service.



This vacancy is in our West Suffolk MHST, based in Bury St Edmunds. We have additional vacancies in the East Suffolk team, based in Ipswich, please see the relevant advert for details.



We encourage applicants from nursing, social work, occupational therapy, psychotherapy, experienced (two years post-qualified) EMHPs, PWPs, and CWPs. This list is not exhaustive: If you have the relevant qualifications, experience and skills in children and adolescent mental health we encourage you to have a conversation with us and consider applying.



In this role you will support and provide a high-quality service to children and young people (and their families) experiencing mild to moderate mental health difficulties, through early intervention and offering the right support at the right time. You will work across a range of education settings.



You will be responsible for supervision of Education Mental Health Practitioners (EMHPs), through their training and beyond, and direct delivery of evidence-based interventions to support children and young people referred to the service. You will need to utilise skills and knowledge of CBT and child and adolescent mental health practice. You will also implement whole school/colleg approaches to mental health through collaboration and coproduction with the school/college community.



As part of the role, you will undertake the year-long Postgraduate Certificate in Supervision of Low Intensity CBT with Children & Young People. The course is deivered by the University of East Anglia (UEA), the taught element of which consists of mostly online teaching with six teaching days delivered in-person at the UEA in Norwich. The course also involves self-directed study days and supervised practice in the MHST.



Here at NSFT we pride ourselves on being a welcoming, talented, friendly and supportive team who like nothing better than sharing experiences and learning from each other. In addition to ongoing training and development opportunities, we are committed to providing an environment in which you can thrive.



Why work for us? We have challenges as a Trust, but we have ambitious aspirations, are pushing ahead with exciting transformation work and we need dedicated individuals to support us on our journey. We have strong, established professional networks coupled with an exceptional leadership team who will ensure you are truly cared for and cared about.



Why Norfolk and Suffolk? The people here are warm and welcoming, you'll never be far from the beautiful coastline or Broads National Park. We're an hour and a half away from London and have an international airport in Norwich too. Our villages, towns and cities are packed full of history, independent cafes, shops and theatres. We have excellent shopping, eating out, top ranking schooling and affordable house prices too.



A job in the Suffolk MHSTs will inevitably be challenging and demanding at times, but it will also be immensely rewarding and provide you with great opportunities to make a genuine difference to the lives of others. You will join a team that has developed a caring, creative and hard-working environment; your ideas about how this new service continues to develop and grow will be highly valued.



There is a big emphasis within the team around CPD and we will ensure that you continue to access training and supervision to develop your own practice and further your career ambitions.



Please note that you would need to be available to start in the post from the 5th January to ensure you do not miss any of the course.



We would welcome any informal conversations about these roles. Please do contact us for more information.



Interviews are anticipated to take place in the week commencing the 13th October.



For further details regarding the role, please see attached job description and person specification.