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January 2022

By January 23, 2022February 9th, 2024No Comments
January 2022 

Carney’s Community Newsletter – January 2022. 

Dear Community,

Welcome to our first newsletter of the year, we are so very grateful to have your support and presence in 2022!

As we come to the end of January, how are you doing with your New Year resolutions? Have you kept up your fitness or community goals for the year so far? If you fancy a new project for 2022, to keep yourself fit AND give something back to our community, why not take up a challenge for Carney’s Community. Whether it’s entering a race for this year, or setting your own challenge, we’d love to hear from you! Here are some events you could enter, or maybe some inspiration for your next challenge.
https://www.ultrachallenge.com/
https://www.actionchallenge.com/challenges/If you decide to go ahead with a fundraising challenge for this year, please get in touch to let us know: Alex.Bowles@carneyscommunity.org

It is with great sadness that we have to say goodbye to our lead youth worker, Rory, who will be moving on from his role at the end of February.  Rory started with us at the beginning of 2018 and in that time has had a huge impact on Carney’s and the young people we support. He has mentored and keyworked 100’s of young people, who all benefited from their interactions, with many of them moving into education, employment or training. He has led our youth club, ensuring we have always been able to provide support to those most in need, even through the challenging times of the Coronavirus pandemic. He was also the first to spot the demand for bikes and initially set up the bike workshops, where we allowed young people to keep the bikes they worked on, he then progressed this into our social enterprise “Battersea Bikes” which teaches our young people bike mechanics and offers them the opportunity to work on customers bikes and earn some extra pocket money (a project that GQ magazine recently featured). He worked from our centre, but also did a lot of work in the community and would even spend one day a week at HMP Wandsworth, teaching Yoga to inmates, alongside our partners “Live Karma Yoga”. Rory will be sorely missed but the impact he has had on Carney’s will carry on for years. We also hope that this is not a farewell for ever and that he will come back in the future, in one way or another. Goodbye Rory and thank you for all your passion and work.

Our nomination video for the Community Impact Award, that we won at the London Sport Awards.

It is just over a decade since Mick Carney passed away in November 2011; we were able to honour his memory in winning The Community Impact Award at the London Sports Awards, in association with GameDay at the Guildhall for our trailblazing work, transforming countless life’s through the power of sport (particularly during the period of the pandemic).

On the 20th of January, Carney’s Community Centre hosted Aim High’s Level Up celebration event (in partnership with Responsible Business Initiative for Justice and Birdline media), which showcased the achievements of a number of young entrepreneurs that have worked with AIM High and Carney’s to overcome numerous barriers and become a huge success.

On our final session before Christmas, with the help from Nike, Mercedes, Lululemon, Boxraw, Liberty Christian Ministries and Katherine Low Settlement, we were able to provide our participants with a Christmas meal and gifts including; clothing, workout equipment and Christmas Hampers containing a Christmas meal.

We would like to thank Sophie’s Steakhouse who very kindly hosted our staff Christmas meal. This allowed our staff and volunteers some time to let their hair down and celebrate their successes, after what was a very tough year.

Thank you to Live Karma Yoga who worked with Carney’s Coaches to deliver yet another BOYO fundraiser, which involved a very well attended (both in person and virtual) fitness session, combining both boxing and yoga.

Well done to Yahye, Abdulazeez and MJ who earned a bike for their consistent engagement in the bike workshop sessions and for passing a bike mechanic skills test.

Job title: Lead Youth Worker (part time)
£28,000–35,000 per annum pro rata for 3.5 days/ week

Location: Carney’s Community centre at 30 Petworth St, Battersea, SW11 4QW. The post will also involve regular outreach and community based work.

Responsible to: CEO

Responsible for: Team of sessional youth workers and volunteers

Contract: Part time, 26.2 5 hours/ week. 3 year contract based on funding currently secured.

Benefits: Workplace pension in line with current legislation, 28 days annual leave including statutory public holidays, 3 month probationary period.

Organisation
Carney’s  Community’s services are targeted at disadvantaged young people aged 11 to 30 who come from deprived backgrounds in Wandsworth, Lambeth and the surrounding areas. Our aim is to reduce offending, re-offending and anti-social behaviour in the area, whilst improving social mobility and community cohesion. We aim to build the self-discipline, self-esteem, confidence and employability of young people to reduce offending and anti-social behaviour and enable disadvantaged young people to reach their full potential. We engage young people in positive and constructive activity (including boxing) whilst providing intensive, long-term and consistent one-to-one mentoring which offers unconditional support with empathy. Overall, we believe that by empowering young people through these activities, focusing on their strengths and learning from each other, they can improve their future opportunities, and the local community.

Our home is Carney’s Community Centre, which houses a boxing gym, youth club, music studio, bike workshop, kitchen, and our offices. We run our sessions here, and also support some older participants to organise new activities and businesses of their own.

Role Overview 
As part of the Centre based team, you will be responsible for the management and supervision of a number of staff and volunteers and for the overall development of our Youth Work service. Many of our staff and volunteers are ex-participants who we are progressing onto paid work. You will support them to develop and deliver high quality work with young people, aged 11 to 30 years, through an agreed programme of work that facilitates participation. This will involve planning, delivering and evaluating a programme of youth work activities and projects in accordance with Carney’s Community policies and procedures.

Front-line youth work will be a crucial element of the role, supporting young people to engage in positive and constructive activities and creating opportunities for their personal, social and emotional development. You will be committed to ensuring that provision is accessible and relevant to the target group regardless of gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disability and social background.

A qualification in Youth Work is essential, as well as proven experience of both project-based youth work delivery and management of staff. The ability to empathise and mediate for young people is crucial. The appointed candidate will have a strong understanding of the barriers facing young people, the interplay between material disadvantage, vulnerability and social exclusion and be highly skilled in diplomacy, professional distance, demonstrating empathy, boundaries and sound judgement. They will also have a good understanding of the local area. This is a busy role where you have the ability to make a difference to young people’s lives. We’re looking for someone with the energy and enthusiasm to develop this work and engage the team to maximise our impact to the greatest number of young people.

Carney’s Community has a budget to fund this post for 3.5 days per week.  As the role involves fundraising as a core competency, if the successful applicant is able to fundraise additional money towards youth work and mentoring, there is an option to extend the hours.  Hours may also be extended subject to additional funding opportunities arising.

Carney’s Community is committed to creating a diverse environment and is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. All applicants who meet the requirements of the role will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, colour, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, disability, age, or marital status. Having said that, our community of participants is made up of over 50% black young people so we particularly encourage black applicants to apply for this role to help improve our representation on our management team to reflect the community we serve.

Job description
In this key role, the Lead Youth Worker will be required to:

Service Management

  • Run youth and community work at the Centre and in the community settings. These will include, for instance, supervising the youth work element of the boxing fitness sessions and drop in, holiday programmes, young volunteers and educational workshops

  • Liaise with youth work networks in Wandsworth (for example, Battersea Youth) and develop relationships with relevant youth-oriented agencies.

  • Partner with local organisations to provide opportunities for participants such as paid work, work experience, education &/or training opportunities.

  • Delivering and co-ordinating educational workshops for young people (either in house or using external organisations) in response to the needs identified by the young people.

  • Alongside partnerships, promote Carney’s Community in the community and on our online presence (we currently use Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube) by contributing to our social media and producing regular updates for our newsletter list.

  • Work closely with management team of facilities manager, lead coach and lead key worker to assist a wraparound delivery and identification of young people needing extra support.

  • Support the delivery of coaching and bike maintenance sessions.

  • Support the development of social enterprises and projects that are participant led.

  • Monitoring and maintaining the budget relating to youth work and mentoring

  • Purchasing and maintenance of equipment, resources and supplies, within the budget constraints, as required.

  • Develop and maintain a user group committee consisting of core youth participants.

  • Lead on monitoring and evaluation for all youth work activities.

  • Be a Designated Safeguarding Lead for the organisation, handling reports and concerns around safeguarding incidents.

Staff Management

  • Manage and annually appraise a small team of sessional youth workers both paid and volunteer.

  • Development supervision of ex-participants who have moved into the role of youth worker.

  • Arrange induction for new youth work staff.

  • Complete monitoring and contact sheets and oversee staff completion of the same.

  • Signing and approving Youth work time sheets.

Other duties

  • Work flexibly across the service, assisting the Chief Executive Officer of Carney’s Community as commensurate and necessary.

  • Contribute to the preparation of reports, statistics and other information as required.

  • Participate in service training and undertake training relevant to the post, identified through line management and supervision.

  • Carry out all duties in accordance with the charity’s policies and procedures, including:

    • Working with IT and associated systems.

    • Complying with relevant health and safety legislation.

    • Maintaining confidentiality and observing data protection and associated guidelines.

    • Understanding and complying with our environmental policies.

    • Being committed to ensuring that provision is accessible and relevant to the target group regardless of gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disability and/or social background.

    • Safeguarding of children and vulnerable adults.

  • Carry out any other reasonable duties and responsibilities within the overall function, commensurate with the grading and level of responsibilities of the post.

In the event that further funding is secured to increase the hours of the post, there would be an opportunity to increase the mentoring caseload, expand youth and community work and assist in any new contracted work secured.

Person Specification
Essential

  • Suitable recognised qualifications. Youth and Community Qualifications (minimum Level 2, Level 3 preferable) or equivalent qualification and/or a proven track record of successfully working with children and young adults including offenders or those at risk of offending or those deemed to be vulnerable.

  • Experience of management and providing support, direction and motivation to staff.

  • Contemporary appreciation and understanding of safeguarding issues, including practical experience.

  • Good verbal and written communication skills.

  • Excellent people skills. You will be a strong negotiator, able to set clear boundaries and ready to offer mediation in the event of any differences and disputes between individuals or groups.

  • Good working knowledge of IT systems, including MS Word, Excel and databases.

  • Excellent organisational and administrative skills. The ability to work under pressure, with minimal supervision and to prioritise a varied (and sometimes conflicting) workload.

  • An ability to work unsupervised. A resourceful, pro-active approach with a high level of initiative. Capacity to analyse problems and identify solutions.

  • A confident and assertive personality, combined with an aptitude to carry out duties with good humour, tact and diplomacy.

  • A track record of being punctual and reliable. Proven ability to be compassionately present for young people with complex needs.

  • Evidenced flexibility and the dexterity to work as part of a team.

  • Able to manage challenging individuals and difficult situations, calmly and effectively.

  • Able to work flexible hours including evenings and weekends as required.

  • Clear commitment to the aims and objectives of Carney’s Community.

Desirable

  • Risk management and health and safety experience

  • Previous involvement with vulnerable, hard to reach and disadvantaged children and young adults.

  • Knowledge of both health and safety and first aid. (Training in current regulations and practice will be offered to the successful applicant).

  • Experience of setting up and maintaining computerised and manual administrative systems.

Terms and Conditions  
Hours: This is a part time post, 3.5 days per week. There will be some fixed hours and others are flexible to fit around the changing needs of the organisation. Fixed hours: Monday and Wednesday from 3:30-8:30pm and Thursday 4:30-8:30 plus flexible 12.5 hours for fortnightly management and team meetings, supervision and payroll.
Contract: This is a one-year contract subject to a three month probationary period.
Salary: £28,000 -35,000 per annum pro rata for 3.5 days/ week.
Pension: We will offer a workplace pension in line with the current legislation.
Annual Leave: 28 days including statutory public holidays pro rata for days worked.
This post is offered subject to an enhanced DBS check, references and right-to-work checks.

Application Process: Your application should be made using the form provided here, please also include a covering letter. CVs will not be considered.

Please send these to: alex.bowles@carneyscommunity.org
Closing date: 18/02/2022.

Job title: Lead Key worker
£28-35,000 per annum

Location: Carney’s Community centre at 30 Petworth St, Battersea, SW11 4QW. The post will also involve working in the community so some local travel will be required.

Responsible to: CEO

Responsible for: Key work program and Key workers

Contract: Full time, 37.5 hours/ week. 3 year contract based on funding currently secured.

Benefits: Workplace pension in line with current legislation, 28 days annual leave including statutory public holidays, 3 month probationary period.

Organisation
Carney’s Community’s services are targeted at disadvantaged young people aged 11 to 30 who come from deprived backgrounds in Wandsworth, Lambeth and the surrounding areas. Our aim is to reduce offending, re-offending and anti-social behaviour in the area, whilst improving social mobility and community cohesion. We aim to build the self-discipline, self-esteem, confidence and employability of young people to reduce offending and anti-social behaviour and enable disadvantaged young people to reach their full potential. We engage young people in positive and constructive activity (including boxing) whilst providing intensive, long-term and consistent one-to-one mentoring which offers unconditional support with empathy. Overall, we believe that by empowering young people through these activities, focusing on their strengths and learning from each other, they can improve their future opportunities, and the local community.

Our home is Carney’s Community Centre, which houses a boxing gym, youth club, music studio, bike workshop, kitchen, and our offices. We run our sessions here, and also support some older participants to organise new activities and businesses of their own.

Role Overview
As part of the Carney’s team, your role will be to lead on and oversee all key work activity at Carney’s Community. This includes one to one, group work and supervision of a small team of key workers.  You will work closely with the CEO to develop, manage and deliver these services.

You will provide advice, practical support and befriending to a caseload of participants, aged 11-30, who are at risk of offending or social exclusion; to encourage and enable them to participate in Carney’s Community’s personal development opportunities and to access the wider services and support they may need in order to give them the best chances of being “the best they can be”.

This will involve supporting young people to engage in positive and constructive activities, attend YOT/Probation appointments and creating opportunities for their personal, social and emotional development. You will arrange workshops for young people on appropriate topics like employability skills e.g. CV building and interview skills. You will be committed to ensuring that provision is accessible and relevant to the target group regardless of gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disability and social background.

The person who takes on this role, will also work to develop systems and training to support the team of key workers. You will work to develop the staff team to support them to build key work skills. Our current goal is to increase our capacity and approach to key work, to develop the staff team’s capabilities in this area and build on the support we offer to those most in need.

It is essential that the candidate has proven experience of project based youth/key work delivery. The ability to empathise and mediate for young people is crucial. The appointed candidate will have a strong understanding of the local area, barriers facing young people, the interplay between material disadvantage, vulnerability and social exclusion and be highly skilled in diplomacy, professional distance, demonstrating empathy, boundaries and sound judgement.

Carney’s Community is committed to creating a diverse environment and is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. All applicants who meet the requirements of the role will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, colour, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, disability, age, or marital status. Having said that, our community of participants is made up of over 50% black young people so we particularly encourage black applicants to apply for this role to help improve our representation on our management team to reflect the community we serve.

Job Description:
This role has overall responsibility for all key work and the key working function at Carney’s Community.

Management

  • Manage a small team of key workers.

  • Undertake regular supervision meetings, annual appraisals and create development plans with each team member.

  • Recruitment, induction, development and training of staff

  • Ensure staff work within policies and procedures for the organisation

  • Developing programmes and oversight of delivery through the staff team

  • Budget oversight for key work

  • Responsible for all monitoring and evaluation activity required for key work

  • Report to trustees on progress

  • Contribute to strategic development of Carney’s Community

Individual work with participants

  • Develop effective one-to-one working relationships with an identified group of at risk participants, their families/carers and provide intensive, individual support and mentoring.  This may involve outreach and a range of other youth work strategies to engage the interest of young people and families;

  • Work with each participant through their Personal Development Plans to identify barriers to their achievement and personal development and set individual goals to support learning or personal development targets and action plans, monitor reviews and celebrate progress towards these targets;

  • Keep in regular contact with the identified participants, through arranged appointments and informally, and provide ongoing advice, practical support and encouragement to enable them to participate in positive and constructive activities and a range of informal learning and personal development opportunities. This will involve taking on the role of the lead professional for a certain number of young people on the caseload;

  • Research and provide participants with information on the range of learning, training and career options and support available to them, referring to other services and specialists where needed;

  • Support participants as they move between school, college and work; oversee off-site learning for those at risk of dropping out or under achieving, be a source of support over issues that arise from participants learning outside main stream education;

  • Link young people to appropriate organisations according to their individual needs and accompany them on visits to interviews and events;

  • Take appropriate actions to negotiate with and advocate for the participants to overcome barriers and achieve individual goals;

  • Carry out home visits and provide information and advice to the families of the identified participants;

  • Maintain accurate, up to date records of case work, record and monitor participant’s progress and outcomes and supply information to relevant partners, and input into Carney’s database, Views.

Group work and work with partner agencies 

  • Network with a wide range of specialist organisations and agencies e.g. education providers, health and specialist services, Youth Offending Team, probation and voluntary and community groups;

  • In collaboration with other Carney’s staff, link key worked participants into group activities during holiday and after school/ college hours.

  • Work with partner agencies to ensure effective targeting and referrals of participants to the programme; set up approaches to involve the hard-to-reach including liaison with estate and community based workers and outreach direct to young people;

  • Help monitor and evaluate the success of the programme, providing written reports when required;

  • Create methods through which people participating in the programme can effectively and fully take part in the design, delivery and evaluation of the programme.

General duties

  • Attend regular supervision and team meetings as agreed with line manager

  • Carry out all duties in accordance with Carney’s Community’s Equal Opportunities policy, actively promoting equality and seeking to prevent and overcome disadvantage and discrimination.

  • Work flexibly across the service, assisting the CEO as commensurate and necessary.

  • Use information technology to research information, produce reports and correspondence, keep statistics and oversee all administrative arrangements required

  • Ensure that legislation relating to the health safety and protection of young people, staff and the general public is complied with at all times

  • Maintain appropriate boundaries and confidentiality with participants, staff and volunteers.

  • Attend training events and undertake other professional development

  • To be fully aware of and understand the duties and responsibilities arising from the Children Act 2004 and Working Together in relation to child protection and safeguarding children and young people as this applies to your role within the organisation.

  • To also be fully aware of the principles of safeguarding as they apply to vulnerable adults in relation to your work role.

  • To ensure that your line manager is made aware and kept fully informed of any concerns which you may have in relation to safeguarding and/or child protection

    • In this role, close attention must be paid to requirements of data protection and safeguarding.

    • Work within the policies and processes set out by Carney’s Community.

    • Any other tasks that are requested of you by the CEO which reasonably fit within your capabilities and broad role description.

Person Specification
Essential

  • Clear commitment to the aims and objectives of Carney’s Community.

  • Experience of managing a team of staff, including experience of providing support, direction and motivation to staff.

  • A proven track record of successfully working with vulnerable youth and young adults including offenders or those at risk of offending or those deemed to be vulnerable.

  • Contemporary understanding of safeguarding issues – both in theory and in practice.

  • Excellent people skills. You will be a strong negotiator, able to set clear boundaries and ready to offer mediation in a variety of settings.

  • Good working knowledge of IT systems (including Word and Excel)

  • Excellent organisational and administrative skills.

  • The ability to work under pressure, with minimal supervision and to prioritise a varied and demanding workload.

  • A resourceful, pro-active approach with a high level of initiative. Capacity to analyse problems and identify solutions.

  • A confident and assertive personality, with an aptitude to work with humour, tact and diplomacy.

  • A track record of being punctual and reliable. Proven ability to be compassionately present for young people with complex needs.

  • Suitable level 4 or degree level qualifications (e.g. Social Work, Youth and Community)

  • Able to work flexible hours including some evening and weekend work.

Desirable

  • Risk management and health and safety experience

  • Knowledge of both health and safety and first aid. (Training in current regulations and practice will be offered to the successful applicant).

Terms and Conditions  
Hours: This is a full time post, 37.5 hours/ week.
Contract: This is a three-year contract subject to a three month probationary period.
Salary: £28,000 -35,000 per annum.
Pension: We will offer a workplace pension in line with the current legislation.
Annual Leave: 28 days including statutory public holidays pro rata for days worked.
This post is offered subject to an enhanced DBS check, references and right-to-work checks.

Application Process: Your application using the form provided here, please also include a covering letter. CVs will not be considered.

Please send these to: alex.bowles@carneyscommunity.org
Closing date: 18/02/2022.