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AGE UK NORTHUMBERLAND

‘Making a Difference’

Home Care Attendants

We are a leading provider of personal, social and domestic support for older people across Northumberland. We aim to provide high quality, person-centred services to older people, ensuring they receive the support they need to continue to live as independently as possible in their own homes.

We currently have several opportunities for both full and part time vacancies and are seeking caring and professional individuals to work in our services across in Ashington, Bedlington, Morpeth, Alnwick, Amble and the surrounding areas in Northumberland.

As a Home Care Attendant you would be providing professional day-to-day and night-time care and support for older people with a variety of needs. Our Home Care Attendant’s are chosen for their caring and respectful approach to older people along with their dependability and willingness to match their valuable life experience.  No previous experience is required as full training will be offered – what is important is that you have a caring disposition and a real desire to make a difference to peoples’ lives.

The nature of this work means that applicants must be willing to routinely work outside normal office hours, including evenings and week-ends.

We offer excellent training and continued development including an opportunity to study towards a QCF Diploma in Health and Social Care. 

Hours: 20 - 40 hours per week

Salary: up to £7.75 per hour + mileage + holidays

If you are as passionate as we are about delivering high quality care and support we would love to hear from you. To find out more and apply, please download the application pack from our website: http://www.ageuk.org.uk/northumberland/ or call 0845 140 0088 to request an application pack.

Community Care article

All aspiring social workers should start off in social care'

Sector leaders have hit back at the narrowing focus on aspiring social workers' academic ability, arguing that the most important thing the future workforce can do is gain relevant frontline experience.

Anyone considering a career in social work should go into social care first, an influential director of adult services has said.

Addressing an audience of frontline professionals and sector leaders at the Social Worker of the Year Awards 2012 on Friday, Jo Cleary, executive director of adults and community services at Lambeth Council and co-chair of the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services' (Adass) workforce development network, said: " I do want people to go into social care first, before they come into social work. I want them to have some experience of the frontline.

"Social care is a growth industry; it’s one of the only growth industries. There’s a lot we can be doing to promote social care possibilities - and then people might choose to become social workers at a further point in their career."

Cleary, who sits on the transition board of the College of Social Work and represented Adass on the Social Work Reform Board, spoke out during a discussion about the best way to train aspiring social workers, during which concerns were raised about the growing emphasis on attracting academically gifted graduates into the profession.

Cleary argued that people coming into social work directly from a frontline social care position, e.g. through grow your own schemes, were "the leaders of the future".

Her comments have been backed by the British Association of Social Workers, whose professional officer Joe Godden agreed that social workers should first work in social care or a field closely related, such as housing, education or parts of healthcare.

"It used to be that one couldn’t get on a social work degree unless one had relevant experience," he said. "Most universities still take the view that students should have relevant experience before embarking on the degree, but in my view there should have to be very good reason why someone hadn’t had social care or related experience, paid or not."

Hilary Tompsett, chair of the Joint University Council’s social work education committee, said universities and colleges still expected all potential students to have relevant experience; however, this did not necessarily have to be as a frontline care worker.

“We used to require six months of experience for entry onto the undergraduate degree, but that excluded people straight out of school; now we look for relevant and meaningful experience, as a carer, service user, voluntary worker, that students could draw upon,” she said.

Monday 3rd December 2012

Hi

Thanks for all your hard work this year...and I look forward to seeing you next year.

Remember if you need any help over the break with your work- I am here till the 21st December and return on the 2nd of January. 

HAVE A HAPPY CHRISTMAS AND A PROSPEROUS NEW YEAR!!

Tracy