Responsibilities

• As the School and Community Engagement Lead, you will be responsible for increasing awareness, participation, and engagement with Wigan Youth Zone across the borough.
• Acting as an ambassador for the organisation, you will build and strengthen relationships with schools, community groups, local organisations, and key stakeholders to ensure that more young people can access the opportunities, support, and experiences available through Wigan Youth Zone.
• You will work closely with schools to promote our services, deliver engaging presentations and activities, and create effective pathways for young people to become involved in our programmes.
• You will also represent Wigan Youth Zone at community events, festivals, and local initiatives, delivering activities and engaging with young people and families to raise awareness of the Youth Zone and its offer.
• A key focus of the role will be increasing attendance and participation in our Universal Access Youth Sessions, ensuring that young people from all backgrounds and communities feel welcomed, included, and inspired to get involved.
• Through proactive outreach, relationship building, and partnership working, you will help us reach new audiences and strengthen our presence throughout Wigan Borough.
• This is a varied and dynamic role that will involve spending significant time within schools and communities, developing new opportunities for engagement, gathering feedback from young people and stakeholders, and working collaboratively with colleagues to ensure our programmes meet the needs of local young people.
• One day you can be at an assembly at 8am and the next evening you might be running an activity on our evening session.
• There will be an expectation to work frequent Saturdays due to the number of community events that take place on Saturdays but you will work take a day off during the week in replacement.

Requirements

• Knowledge of the issues affecting young people and an ability to work with challenging behaviour
• Understanding of the principles of working with children and young people
• Knowledge of health and safety, diversity awareness and safeguarding best practice and how these relate to children and young people
• Delivery of activities within an equality framework
• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills, with the ability to engage effectively with young people, families, schools, community groups, and partner organisations - Essential
• Experience of working with young people - Desirable
• Strong presentation and facilitation skills, with confidence delivering assemblies, workshops, and activities to groups of varying sizes - Essential
• Ability to build, maintain, and develop positive professional relationships and partnerships – Essential
• Strong organisational and time management skills, with the ability to manage multiple priorities and deadlines - Essential
• Experience of promoting services, programmes, or opportunities to a range of audiences. – Essential

Preferred

• Level 2 Youth Work- Desirable
• Level 3 Youth Work – Desirable
• Youth Work Degree - Desirable
• Experience of working with young people - Desirable
• Ability to analyse participation and engagement data to identify trends and opportunities - Desirable
• Experience of community engagement, outreach, partnership working, or stakeholder engagement - Desirable
• Understanding of the issues, opportunities, and challenges affecting young people today - Desirable
• Understanding of equality, diversity, inclusion, and barriers to participation - Essential

Benefits

• 33 days annual leave (including bank holidays) pro rata. Plus additional leave for length of service
• Birthdays off
• Gym access
• Cycle to work scheme
• Training and CPD including first aid, safeguarding and health and safety
• Career development opportunities
• Strong team culture
• Workplace pension
• Free eye tests
• Discounted to £2 access to holiday club for staff.