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Education Welfare Officer
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Staffordshire County Council
As an Education Welfare Officer, you’ll be on the frontline of supporting children, families, and schools.
You'll work in partnership with schools, families, the community and the Local Authority assessing for and proceeding with statutory action when all other routes of support have been exhausted. With a strong safeguarding focus, you’ll identify barriers to attendance, offer practical solutions, and help fulfil statutory duties that keep children safe and engaged in learning.
Every child deserves the chance to thrive in school. Our Attendance & Inclusion Team champions this mission, ensuring children across Staffordshire can access a positive, consistent education.
We have 4 opportunities across Central and District locations available:
- 4 x 37 hours permanent contract
Please indicate your preference of District on your application form.
These roles are not term time only.
In all roles you will directly influence the wellbeing, safety, and educational outcomes of children and young people.
Main Responsibilities
You will:
- Support statutory action to improve irregular attendance, including issuing penalty notices, facilitating consultation meetings, and preparing cases for court under the Education Act 1996 and Children Act 1989.
- Contribute to key statutory duties around Elective Home Education, Children Missing Education, School Attendance Orders and Section 19.
- Hold targeted support meetings to help schools boost attendance and tackle persistent absence.
- Present at termly district meetings to share best practice with schools across Staffordshire.
- Play an active role in safeguarding—contributing to child protection and child in need plans, and working closely with Early Help partners.
- Manage duties relating to child entertainment and employment licences.
- Maintain accurate records and produce high-quality assessments and reports.
- Grow your expertise in specialist areas of practice.
The Ideal Candidate
The minimum criteria that will be used to shortlist for this role will be:
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- Significant experience in education, welfare work, or direct support with children and families.
- A minimum NVQ Level 3 (or equivalent) in working with children and families.
- Confident understanding of education legislation, safeguarding and multi-agency collaboration.
You will bring:
- Empathy and insight into challenges such as mental health, substance misuse, domestic abuse or poverty, and how these impact attendance.
- Excellent organisation and communication skills to manage your own caseload and produce clear, accurate reports.
- The ability to work both independently under pressure and collaboratively as part of a team.
- A commitment to equality, inclusion, and children’s wellbeing.
- Strong IT skills and confidence maintaining detailed professional records.
- Previous experience of attendance preferred but not essential
In your application form, please evidence how you meet the shortlisting criteria in the person specification and that you have an understanding of a Education Welfare Officers role.
If you want to speak to a current Education Welfare Officer to talk more about the role, please do get in touch with Keith Mellor or Hayley Tonks via email keith.mellor1@staffordshire.gov.uk / Hayley.Tonks@staffordshire.gov.uk
Interviews will be held on Friday 6th November at Staffordshire Place 1.
For information, please note that there is currently an ongoing review within Children and Families to realign individual teams and the wider team’s ways of working. As a result, this role may be affected by the review. For further information, please speak to the hiring manager.
Our Recruitment Process
We anonymise applications during shortlisting to ensure only relevant information is considered. Please complete your application fully, especially the supporting statement, to highlight what you’ll bring to the role.
Please note: The minimum essential criteria in the ideal section detailed above will be used if you are applying under one of our Interview Guarantee Schemes.
About Staffordshire County Council
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We are no ordinary county council:
Our Values
The core of who we are as an organisation. Just like we all have personal values that shape our thoughts and behaviour, organisational values drive how we think and act collectively.
Our values were created and shaped by colleague feedback and national best practice and they sit at the heart of People Strategy:
- We have a real sense of community spirit that brings our people together. This feeling of belonging means we are all connected to what we do and take pride in the difference we make every day for Staffordshire people.
- We are ambitious and our sights are set firmly on a better future.
Our benefits
We recognise that it is our employees that are central to everything we do. We aim to create a supportive working environment where employees can achieve their full potential and achieve a healthy work-life balance.
In addition to your salary, as a member of staff, you will have access to Our rewards and benefits - Careers at Staffordshire
Our recruitment process
As an Authority we are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people/vulnerable adults and expect all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.
Staffordshire County Council is an equal opportunities organisation and Disability Confident employer. We encourage applications from all background and communities
As part of our commitment as a Disability Confident employer, a Gold Award Armed Forces employer and our commitment to supporting care leavers - we offer a guaranteed interview as long as your application meets the minimum criteria for the post.
As you’ll know safeguarding and promoting the welfare of our children and young people/vulnerable adults is important to us and that’s why this position is subject to a criminal record check from the Disclosure and Barring Service. If applicable you should disclose details of unspent and unfiltered spent reprimands, formal warnings, cautions and convictions in your application form.
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