School Counsellor

**Position Information**:
School counsellors are an essential part of the department’s School Counselling Service.
They provide counselling and psychological assessment of students to complement and enhance the work of teachers to strengthen student learning and wellbeing outcomes, and they help families understand and manage their children’s learning and mental health needs. This is a truly collegiate role offering unique challenges and opportunities - both in your professional development and your ability to make an impact on the lives of children and young people.
School counsellors receive regular, individual professional supervision with the Senior Psychologist Education and participate in group and peer supervision as a member of the broader district school counselling team. You will most likely be collaborating with a number of school communities and colleagues, as well as outside agencies, with the opportunity to use and expand the full range of your skills and expertise as part of a supportive, multidisciplinary team.
School counsellors are provided with regular opportunities to participate in continuing professional development and the NSW Department of Education will support you to complete or maintain your registration with the Psychology Board of Australia. Other benefits include school holiday leave, travel allowances and health and wellbeing benefits such as our Fitness Passport program. The department will also cover your indemnity insurance as a psychologist.

Bega Valley Public School is the only public primary school located in the small rural town of Bega on the Sapphire Coast of NSW. The current enrolment of 305 students includes 12 mainstream and 4 Multi-Categorical support classes. 18% of Bega Valley students identify as First Nations students. Our students come from a wide range of socio-economic backgrounds.
Extra-curricular opportunities in sport, Science and Technology and Creative and Performing Arts, enable our students to excel through a range of different experiences.
Our school has previously participated in the Early Action for Success program with a continued focus the highest quality instructional leadership support aimed at improving literacy and numeracy outcomes across K-6. We continue to build on the strengths of this program and continual monitoring of student performance data determines the areas of need and success at an individual, cohort and school level.
Bega Valley Public school has fostered strong partnerships with external support and health agencies, universities, local community of schools, community groups and our Parents and Citizens Association. Parent support is strong and highly valued. For more information, please visit the school website Bega Valley Public School.

**Selection Criteria**:

- Experience in counselling using evidence-based interventions with a demonstrated understanding of the mental health needs of children and young people.
- Experience in the psychological assessment of children and young people, including case formulation and report writing.
- Demonstrated ability to collaborate with key stakeholders to improve the learning and wellbeing outcomes of children and young people including students from diverse backgrounds and needs.

**Conditions**:

- Be a registered or provisionally registered psychologist, or eligible for registration with the Psychology Board of Australia.
- Ability and willingness to travel between worksites.

**Special Notes**:
Successful applicants will be provided with a Departmental induction program, ongoing professional learning and professional supervision.

Find out more about working in the school counselling service. Visit the Department’s School Counselling Service pages to discover more about working as a school psychologist or school counsellor in NSW public schools.

**About the NSW Department of Education