Overview
Go back Gloucestershire Health and Care NHS Foundation Trust
Speech and Language Therapy Assistant - ELSEC
The closing date is 20 October 2025
Fixed Term contract opportunity for up to 8 months
We are looking for someone passionate about Speech and Language Therapy to join our exciting team, focused on understanding and improving speech and language skills in the early years. The Assistant role is central to delivering support in settings.
You will bring experience and understanding of working with children in the early years who may have communication needs. We will support you with a framework of training and supervision to ensure you become a skilled support worker in Speech and Language Therapy.
Gloucestershire has been identified as a pathfinder site for the Early Language Support for Every Child (ELSEC) programme. The new team consisting of Speech and Language Therapists and Assistants takes on development and roll out of universal and targeted support for Children in identified settings across Gloucestershire. You will work closely with parents, early years education staff, Health Visitors and more to build a lasting legacy of knowledge and support for our communities.
Gloucestershire also has a large team of children\'s SALTs and Assistants, and there will be opportunities for joint working across the team. You can access regular whole team meetings and training in a range of clinical areas. On top of this we provide excellent clinical supervision. Though there will be some lone working, there are shared bases where people can meet and work together.
About us
We have a skilled and dedicated workforce of over 5000 colleagues working in a diverse range of services over 55 sites and within people\'s homes. We strive to enable a welcoming workplace culture that builds and celebrates civility, inclusivity and diversity, while providing a sense of belonging and trust.
Annual staff surveys, regular Pulse surveys and other engagement opportunities provide our people with lots of opportunity to tell us about their experiences of working with us. In the latest staff survey, 61% of colleagues gave us their views. It was great to hear that:
* 72% of colleagues would recommend the Trust as a place to work, ranking us 1st for Provider Trusts in the South West region on this question.
* 76% would recommend the standard of care provided in our services if a friend or relative needed treatment, also ranking us 1st in the South West region.
* 81% said that care of patients and service users is the Trust\'s priority, compared with an average in comparable NHS Trusts in England of 64%.
This high-level overview shows we are in a healthy position, with higher scores than average for comparable organisations, alongside a great response rate, indicating good staff engagement. However, we also know we have plenty of room for improvement in many areas. To that end, we continue to prioritise and invest in our commitment to genuinely becoming a Great Place to Work with consistent top-quartile performance in the annual staff survey and Pulse surveys.
Main duties of the job
* To contribute to information gathering and screening process through observation and joint evaluation of a child\'s communication needs aged 2 - 5.
* To make appropriate clinical decisions following assessment, with support from the supervising speech and language therapist and to contribute to onward referrals for children needing support from the core Speech and Language Therapy Service.
* To contribute to the development of communication environment plans to support developing communication friendly settings across the county.
* To participate in training of teaching staff, parents and other professionals as required.
* To deliver therapy treatment programmes as designed by the therapists without direct supervision, but with appropriate instruction and monitoring. This could include teaching other carers, supervising individual or group activities.
* To provide accessible verbal and written clinical advice about speech and language therapy intervention to parents/carers, child and education settings.
* To prepare therapy materials and bespoke IT generated communication resources identified by the Speech and Language Therapist.
* To undertake as directed administrative tasks, e.g. scanning, photocopying, filing, registration of patients, co-ordinating appointments.
Knowledge
* Awareness of typical child development
* Awareness and experience applying SLCN strategies in early years
Qualifications
* Recognised Childcare qualification
* Further training in SLCN field (e.g. SLT training packages)
Experience
* Evidence of experience in early years
* Experience of working within an MDT
* Experience of working with children with SLCN
Disclosure and Notes
This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.
Employer
Gloucestershire Health and Care NHS Foundation Trust
Location
Countywide community settings to be confirmed
Salary
£27,485 to £30,162 a year, per annum, pro rata
Contract
Fixed term
Duration
8 months
Working pattern
Full-time
Reference
327-25-843
Job locations
Countywide community settings to be confirmed
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