Attendance & Emotionally Based School Avoidance Officer
The Westleigh School, Leigh, Lancashire, WN7 5NL14 days remaining to apply
Job start date
6 October 2025
Closing date
20 October 2025 at 9am
Date listed
6 October 2025
Job details
Job role
- Administration, HR, data and finance
Visa sponsorship
- Visas cannot be sponsored
Working pattern
- Full time
Contract type
- Fixed term
Full-time equivalent salary
- Grade 6 – SCP 20 – 24 - £26,409 - £29,093 FTE
Attendance & Emotionally Based School Avoidance Officer job summary
The Westleigh School is seeking a compassionate, proactive and highly motivated Attendance and Emotionally Based School Avoidance (EBSA) Officer to join our pastoral team. This is an exciting opportunity to make a real difference in the lives of children and young people by supporting them to re-engage with education and reach their full potential.
This post is offered on a fixed-term contract until 31st August 2025, with the potential for the role to become permanent.
The successful candidate will work closely with pupils, families, and professionals to understand and address barriers to school attendance — particularly where these are linked to emotional well-being or anxiety. You will lead on strategies that promote inclusion, improve attendance, and ensure that every child feels safe, supported, and ready to learn.
Key Responsibilities:
- Work directly with pupils experiencing emotionally based school avoidance (EBSA), providing individualised support and tailored re-engagement plans.
- Develop trusting relationships with families to understand the root causes of absence and to build confidence in returning to education.
- Collaborate with teaching staff, pastoral teams, SENCOs, and external agencies to design and deliver targeted interventions.
- Monitor attendance data, identify patterns of concern, and implement early help strategies.
- Provide training and guidance to staff on understanding and responding to EBSA.
- Promote a positive attendance culture across the school community.
Our ethos is ‘Aspiring and Achieving Together’. Whilst we are committed to ensuring that every student makes excellent progress, this concept stretches well beyond academic performance. We firmly believe that every aspect of school should equip learners to be successful in all areas of their lives, both now and for their future. Indeed, every single decision or action taken improves the life chances of all our learners. This is underpinned by ensuring The Westleigh school is a safe, nurturing and happy environment: put simply, The Westleigh School is a great place to learn and a great place to work.
Uniting with The Shaw Education Trust brings with it new opportunities and a wealth of resources to supplement our mission to improve outcomes for all our students. Colleagues will have access to a large range of well-established training opportunities, such as a fully funded L5 Instructional Coaching qualification or Accelerated Leadership training, for those aspiring to Middle Leadership. Outstanding teachers will also achieve Trust Professional Advocate designation, which provides exciting opportunities to support colleagues within both The Westleigh School and across other SET schools to share best practice. With this brings the opportunity to engage in the cross-trust peer review and Trust CPD programme.
All candidates are required to provide a supporting statement on the formal application forms which states clearly your reasons for applying, skills and experience for this position.
Join Shaw Education Trust – Support, Teach, Lead… Make the Remarkable Happen.
At Shaw Education Trust, we believe every role holds the power to transform a life. Whether you're supporting behind the scenes, inspiring in the classroom, or leading with vision, you’ll be part of something extraordinary.
We are a dynamic and growing family of Primary, Secondary, and Special Schools, proudly serving communities from Birmingham to Bury. Our mission is to unlock opportunity for every young person—whatever their background, ability, or starting point.
Our people are our greatest asset, and we are deeply committed to their growth. Through high-quality training, apprenticeships, talent acceleration, and research opportunities, we empower our staff to thrive as skilled, confident professionals and we champion wellbeing, value every voice, and create a culture where you feel supported, motivated, and inspired to make a real difference.
You will join a collaborative network of schools where shared expertise and professional community fuel success. Every academy in our Trust has an equal voice, and every colleague plays a vital part in shaping tailored learning experiences that raise aspirations and build brighter futures.
At the heart of our work is a deep respect for the children and young adults we serve—our “precious cargo.” We are proud to "exactly like nothing else” and bridge the gap between education and the wider world, preparing every student for further education, employment, or training in inclusive environments where integrity, equality, and opportunity thrive.
If you have the heart, passion, and drive to help shape lives and create futures filled with promise, we would love you to join our incredible team.
Support. Teach. Lead. Belong. Thrive.
Together, let’s make the remarkable happen.
In our secondary schools, we pride ourselves on our innovative approach to curriculum design, to ensure all our schools have breadth and ambition for all students, regardless of their starting points and barriers. Standard curriculum models don’t always engage all students, so we constantly seek to innovate and provide better opportunities to develop both knowledge and skills for life. We want our students to believe their curriculum is bold, exciting, purposeful, and ultimately leads to something meaningful for them. Some examples of our innovation include moving towards an extended school day, to provide a world class enrichment programme and more opportunities for essential skills like reading and cultural capital. We are also introducing vocational and technical pathways, which run through the normal school curriculum but attract support from leading employers and universities to develops work-readiness in our students, so that they can progress onto T Levels and apprenticeships.
Shaw Education Trust offer the following employee benefits with your Teaching or Support Staff employment:
- An excellent Local Government Pension Scheme (Support Staff)/Teachers Pension (Teaching Staff)
- Support Staff only based on working full time, all year - Generous holiday entitlement from your first day of employment (37 days holiday rising to 39 days after 5 years’ service including Bank Holidays)
- Access to Medicash Health & Wellbeing Plan: Enjoy health services designed to support your well-being.
- Free DiscountForTeachers Scheme for all staff (Support and Teaching), Exclusive discounts to save money with a wide selection of discounts and exclusive offers from hundreds of the biggest brands.
- Free Eye Tests
- Cycle to work scheme
- Access to our Institute of Education and fantastic opportunities to help you grow, contribute and flourish in your role and in the Trust.
We know our people are the key to our success and so we’re committed to ensuring the employment experience at Shaw Education Trust is a rewarding one.
Colleagues within the Trust benefit from: Access to a full range of courses both in-house and professionally accredited. These courses include a variety of the National Professional Qualifications and the Early Carer Teacher Programme delivered by Shaw Education Trust as a delivery partner for Ambition Institute.
- Experienced leadership and subject-specific support.
- Guidance from former HMIs and serving Ofsted Inspectors within the Trust.
- Access to the Trust’s Institute of Education and SCITT.
- Opportunities to work with different schools within the Trust as a Professional Advocate.
- Participating in peer reviews.
- Access to a suite of online courses.
- Placement projects within our family of schools.
We know our people are the key to our success and so we’re committed to ensuring the employment experience at Shaw Education Trust is a rewarding one.
Actual Salary: £23,019 - £25,358
Contract type: FTC until 31st August 2026 – with a view to being made permanent
Further information about the job
Commitment to safeguarding
Our organisation is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people and vulnerable adults. We expect all staff, volunteers and trustees to share this commitment.
Our recruitment process follows the keeping children safe in education guidance.
Offers of employment may be subject to the following checks (where relevant):
childcare disqualification
Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS)
medical
online and social media
prohibition from teaching
right to work
satisfactory references
suitability to work with children
You must tell us about any unspent conviction, cautions, reprimands or warnings under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975.
Applying for the job
This school accepts applications through their own website, where you may also find more information about this job.
CVs will not be accepted for this application.
View advert on external website (opens in new tab)About The Westleigh School
- School type
- Academy, ages 11 to 16
- Education phase
- Secondary
- School size
- 957 pupils enrolled
- Age range
- 11 to 16
- Ofsted report
- View Ofsted report
- School website
- The Westleigh School website
The Westleigh School is a secondary school providing education to pupils aged 11 to 16, as well as providing an adult education centre to members of the local community.
The school motto of “Aspiring and Achieving Together” accurately captures the shared vision which ensures that leaders at all levels are developing their ability to communicate high expectations.
At The Westleigh School, an unrelenting focus is placed on the quality of teaching above all else so that the pupils are able to grow in a continuously developing learning environment.
School location
Similar jobs nearby
Eden Girls' Leadership Academy, Manchester
40 Rayburn Way, Manchester, Greater Manchester, M8 8DT
Get a job alert when similar jobs are listed
Find more school jobs in Lancashire, Blackburn and Blackpool