Early Years SEND Advisor

About the job

Salary: £33,143 – £36,363 a year plus £963 essential car user allowance
Hours per week: 37
Contract type: Permanent

As an Early Years SEND Advisor, you will work directly with young children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) and their families to ensure they receive timely, coordinated, and effective support. You will undertake professional assessments and develop family support plans in partnership with parents and carers, ensuring the voice of the child is central to all decision-making.

You will carry out regular direct work with children and families within the community and in family homes, managing risk appropriately and in line with Luton Borough Council policies and procedures. Working within a multi-agency framework, you will co-produce and co-deliver support alongside partner agencies, using agreed working arrangements with families to meet identified needs.

The role involves developing and delivering targeted interventions to support families with areas such as parenting skills, building confidence, managing challenging behaviour, supporting child development, and addressing parental mental health needs. You will also develop specialist expertise in an agreed area of family support to enhance service delivery.

You will take a lead role in coordinating multi-agency responses for children in need, ensuring effective planning, implementation, and review of interventions. This includes organising and chairing multi-agency meetings, negotiating resources, and consulting with professional colleagues and service users to ensure outcomes are met.

You will complete professional assessments of need and risk in line with Department of Health guidance and Luton Council criteria for disabled children in need. Accurate case recording, data collection, and report writing are essential, including the preparation of case reports and witness statements for court when required.

Throughout your work, you will promote anti-discriminatory practice, equality, and the empowerment of service users, ensuring that changing circumstances and newly identified needs are responded to promptly through regular review and reflective practice.

Please note this role does not attract sponsorship.

About you

You will have experience working with disabled children and with children who have a wide range of needs and abilities. You are confident in making sound professional judgements within a multi-disciplinary setting and are able to manage complex cases involving vulnerability and risk with minimal supervision.

You will be an effective communicator, able to engage sensitively and clearly with children, families, and a wide range of professionals, both verbally and in writing. You are able to maintain high-quality case records and produce clear, concise reports and professional correspondence, using IT systems confidently for case recording and information management.

You will be able to work both independently and as part of a team, sharing expertise and contributing positively to service development. You are organised and resilient, able to work to strict deadlines and targets, and capable of influencing service delivery through the identification of gaps and unmet needs.

You will have experience of chairing multi-disciplinary meetings, negotiating resources, and coordinating support across agencies. You are able to undertake statutory duties under the Children Act 1989 and manage crisis interventions effectively, while adhering to health and safety policies and procedures.

You will demonstrate a strong understanding of equality and diversity issues and a commitment to anti-discriminatory practice. You will also have knowledge and understanding of child development and family dynamics, enabling you to work effectively with children and families in a strengths-based and inclusive way.

You will hold a minimum Level 3 qualification in childcare, social care, counselling, youth work, education, or have equivalent relevant experience. You must be able to visit children and families in their own homes on a regular basis and work outside normal office hours on occasion to meet service needs.

This is a public facing role so you’ll need to show off your fluency in speaking and writing English.

About us

Our ambitiousLuton 2040 Vision– that no-one in Luton will have to live in poverty – is at the heart of everything we do. We recognise that our people are remarkable, talented, committed and passionate about serving our residents.

The people of Luton depend heavily on this council – and that means our workforce! Are you ready to realise the remarkable and help us deliver our vision?

We welcome applications from all sections of the community and are committed to developing a workforce that reflects the diversity of our borough

Application Process

Because of the nature of this job, it will be necessary for the appropriate level of criminal record disclosure to be undertaken. This post is exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 and therefore applicants are required to declare all unspent cautions and convictions; and also any adult cautions (simple or conditional), and spent convictions that are not protected as defined by the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (as amended in 2020). A person’s criminal record will not in itself prevent a person from being appointed to this post. Applicants will not be refused posts because of offences which are not relevant to, and do not place them at or make them a risk in, the role for which they are applying. However in the event of the employment being taken up, any failure to disclose such offence, as detailed above, will result in dismissal or disciplinary action by the Authority.

On occasions, we may close a vacancy early due to a very high number of applications being received.

Benefits

We offer a range of excellent staff benefits which include:

- From 25 to 32 days’ annual leave: linked to length of service and grade
- Buying annual leave scheme: buy up to 20 days additional annual leave
- Career Pathways: step up in your career or move into a specialist area
- Pension scheme: with generous employer contributions of up to 20.2 per cent (at July 2023) and 3x salary death in service grant
- Generous relocation package: up to £8,000 (subject to eligibility)
- Employee Assistance Programme: a free, 24/7 confidential counselling and wellbeing support service available to all employees, their partner or spouse and dependent children over 16 still living at home
- Work/life balance: flexible working options including working from home where possible. We welcome requests for flexible working arrangements including part-time hours and alternative working patterns
- Training and support: unlimited access to development courses, mentoring and support and clear career pathways
- Staff offers: includes discounts on your MOT, gym and fitness, restaurants and salons
- Arriva Travel Club: great value savings on local bus travel

How to apply

We understand that job applications take time and effort, but a high-quality application shows that you are professional with a good attention to detail. The recruiting manager may receive a number of applications for each job advertised so you want yours to stand out!

Our ‘How to apply' page has more tips to help with your application: How to apply

Available documents

Attached documents are available under links. Clicking a document link will initialize its download.

• download: PREF103408 202511 L6 Family Worker Children with Disabilities.docx
• download: Luton_Values_Flyer.pdf