Wesley Dalmar Child & Family

• Part-time position 2.5 days per week
• Based in Grafton
• Generous salary packaging benefits

About us

Wesley Mission is a high profile, multi-faceted Christian organisation making a real difference in the community. We work with the most disadvantaged in our community by providing over 200 services ranging from aged care, homeless services, child and family care, counselling, employment, training and education, and health services.

Our Vision is “Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can.”

About the role

Wesley Mission is seeking a Psychologist to join the Wesley Dalmar Family Preservation team. The position offers challenging and rewarding opportunities to work in the family home with children and birth parents residing in the Grafton area. Within a trauma-informed framework you will provide therapy to birth parents to address underlying psychological needs and enhance parenting capacity to prevent children moving unnecessarily into foster care.

Essential criteria

• A Degree qualification (minimum bachelor’s degree) from a recognised tertiary institution in Psychology and full registration with the Psychology Board of Australia or working towards same.
• Comprehensive understanding of the current child protection service system, policy and practice, and the needs of children in OOHC, including knowledge of:
  • Legislative requirements – Children and Young Persons (Care and Protection) Act 1998; Child Protection (Prohibited Employment) Act 1998; Ombudsman Act 1974 (Amendment); Commission for Children and Young People Act 1998; the Adoption of Children Act 2000 and other relevant legislation.
  • UN Convention on the Rights of the Child;

• Comprehensive understanding key risk factors and the effect of trauma on childhood development.
• Demonstrated psychosocial knowledge, clinical reasoning and practice skills that enhance the service’s ability to assess the social, psychological, environmental needs of complex clients within the clinical specialty area of child protection and developmental trauma
• Demonstrated ability to conduct comprehensive clinical assessments and formulate intervention plans
• Understanding of positive behaviour management techniques
• Working within a strength-based framework to increase children and young people's resilience and positive lifestyle outcomes
• Demonstrated ability to engage with children/young people/carers where there are high and complex needs and work in partnership with them to achieve their goals, using a variety of intervention strategies from a range of theoretical models
• Demonstrated high level communication (written and oral) skills, negotiation and advocacy skills
• Sound record keeping, data collection and management, statistical analysis, report writing and computer skills including an ability to concisely and accurately record all key interactions and case-notes
• Willing to work collaboratively with other internal services and external stakeholders to achieve client needs and therapeutic and developmental goals
• Current NSW driver’s licence and a willingness to travel as required

Remuneration

This role will be paid under the Social, Community, Home Care and Disability Services Industry Award 2010.

The agency provides regular supervision and support for all staff and opportunities for professional development + salary packaging.

A full Position Description is attached below.