Vacancy: Communities Officer
Hours of Work: 30 hours (working pattern to be agreed)
Salary: £14.84 per hour (permanent) – (£23,150.40 actual for 30 hours – FTE £27,008.80)
Base: Brian Jackson House, Huddersfield
CLOSING DATE: Monday 26th May at 5:00pm
INTERVIEWS: Week commencing 2nd June 2025
The Charity
Fresh Futures is a regional charity working with vulnerable and disadvantaged children, young people and their families, within Kirklees and surrounding areas. Our vision is that all young people have opportunities for a better life, now and in the future. We are thoughts leaders and together with partners, we deliver outcomes through four interwoven strands of activity – providing education services and facilities, building healthy relationships, promoting health and wellbeing and improving employability skills.
The Role
An exciting opportunity has become available within Fresh Futures’ Children and Family Services Team to work on our communities service. The successful candidate will play a vital role in building on our successful community work which provides support in line with community needs across the whole of Kirklees.
Why the role exists and overall responsibility
- To engage with communities, third sector organisations and businesses to facilitate the delivery of a network of community services to meet the needs of the diverse communities in Kirklees
- To coordinate Fresh Futures with partners to explore and develop innovative ways to address priority issues facing these communities
- To plan and coordinate effective community engagement to improve accessibility of services and to raise awareness and knowledge of these services to increase uptake, and to ensure target communities needs are met
Main Activities
Service development and delivery
- To delivery Fresh Futures work with relevant Council teams and other partners; proactively engaging with communities, statutory and third sector organisations to support their involvement in the needs and activities of their local communities as part of our Families Together service
- To be responsible for undertaking community engagement, networking, and information sharing
- Develop strong working relationships with new and established service contacts, partner agencies and Fresh Futures services
- To involve service users and partners in co-production of services to ensure the target communities voice is heard and services meet the community’s needs
- To report as required to Fresh Futures management, funders, and partners, on projects/programmes including progress, outcomes, finances and/or challenges
- To actively promote Fresh Futures services and volunteering opportunities in communities and at events, identifying and acting upon barriers to engagement
Team Working
- To support the activities of casual employees and volunteers
- To support and share good practice with other team members to achieve service outcomes
Administration
- To ensure accurate records that capture work undertaken, outcomes and feedback, that can contribute to the monitoring and evaluation of the service
- Ensure record keeping and monitoring is accurate, up to date and timely
Finance
- To work within budget parameters set by management for expenses related to team activities and programme/project costs
- To comply with all Fresh Futures finance procedures and systems
Partnerships
- To work with external partners and the local authority to ensure effective neighbourhood partnership working
- To work with partner organisations in the community to coproduce and evolve services to ensure they are appropriate to community need
Knowledge, training and experience required
- GCSE minimum Level 4 English and Maths, or equivalent
- Experience of working in the voluntary sector, in community and/or health organisations
- Clerical/administration and data entry experience and working with sensitive/personal data.
- Experience of service delivery within relevant organisation
- Experience of working with partners, professionals and/or agencies in supporting the development of community projects and activities
- Experience of using computer packages including word processing, databases and maintaining monitoring systems
- Ability to work across Kirklees and neighbouring areas as required
Key personal characteristics
- Reflects Fresh Futures values in their work and behaviours – caring, inclusive, approachable, empowering, trusted.
- A team player with a positive, solution focused approach
- Flexible and reliable
- Willingness to adapt and learn new skills
- Inspiring, enthusiastic and must enjoy working with people
- Ability to work on own initiative and without close supervision
Completed application forms should ideally be emailed to us at [email protected] or be posted to Christine Rhodes, Brian Jackson House, New North Parade, Huddersfield, HD1 5JP and must arrive no later the closing date and time specified.
For further information regarding the role please contact Christine Rhodes on 01484 519988 or at [email protected]