Why this job: More than a quarter million New York City students miss a month of school every year. And one of every five students in kindergarten through fifth grade is chronically absent, missing 10 percent of the school days. Attendance is a baseline factor in determining academic success, and students are more likely to excel in school when they attend consistently. TEP works closely with students and families throughout the course of the year to ensure a 97 percent attendance rate – which is in the top 1 percent of all peer schools.

Position overview: The Student and Family Intervention Specialist will perform professional-level social work in our Middle School (5th through 8th grade) truancy intervention program, along with other behavioral support programs for students. This person is responsible for coordinating programs designed to improve school attendance and to reduce tardiness.

Position responsibilities:

Attendance Advocacy

• Track attendance and tardiness on a daily basis
• Monitor and assess psychosocial and non-psychosocial factors that might be influencing attendance and tardiness
• Conduct solution-oriented family meetings to assess obstacles, and make recommendations for eliminating poor attendance or tardiness
• Implement year-long creative intervention programming to motivate students to attend school on time and on a daily basis
• Visit students’ homes and transport students to school

In-School suspension (ISS)

• Communicate with grade level social worker, teacher and student prior to the start of ISS to review reason for suspension, length of suspension, and procedures /rules that need to be followed
• Monitor and support students in ISS room using a relational-based perspective
• Acquire academic work for students and ensure completion
• Assist with investigative process for higher level incidents
• Complete and share a daily ISS suspension report with administrators, grade level social worker, and grade level team

Bus Safety program

• Create and implement supportive intervention programming to increase safe behavior on the bus
• Train and work with teachers assigned to bus duty
• Select and train Student Bus Safety Monitors and run their (conduct) regular meetings
• Coordinate and adjust seating assignments on bus & interface with bus drivers and matrons, as needed

Qualifications:

• Master’s degree in social work, counseling, human services, or education, preferred but not required
• Spanish fluency required
• Flexibility to multi-task in a fast-paced environment is a must
• Relevant experience working with middle school students and their families, preferred
• Strength-based, patient style of communicating
• Working knowledge of the Washington Heights community, a plus
• Ability to gather and analyze data; compile and report information

Compensation and benefits: Salary is between $58,500 to $65,000 a year and is commensurate with experience.

Deadlines and notifications: TEP is currently reviewing applications on a rolling basis. Applications will be reviewed in the order that they are received. If you submit both a cover letter and resume, you will receive a response from us as to whether or not you will be invited to the next stage of the process.