Legal Prep Charter Academy seeks a School Social Worker (with the SSW endorsement) to begin in August 2024. Legal Prep Charter Academy (“Legal Prep”) is Chicago’s first and only legal-themed high school, putting diverse, low-income students on the path for college success. Legal Prep opened its doors on August 20, 2012 in West Garfield Park and began offering free, college preparatory education to students in a community with primarily low performing schools. Legal Prep is currently the highest rated high school in a two-mile radius and has over 70% of its alumni in college. Legal Prep will be in its thirteenth year of operation during the 2024-25 school year and enroll 250 students. As the name indicates, Legal Prep has a legal-themed curriculum and uses this unique theme to engage its diverse population of students in their learning and teach skills that will make our students successful in college and life. Legal Prep also works closely with the Chicago legal community to provide additional resources, exposure, and skills that complement our curriculum and promote analytical reasoning and critical thinking.

The School Social Worker (“SSW”) has overall responsibility for supporting our special education department with its social work minutes, performing mediations between students, and generally supporting the social and emotional needs of our students and the corresponding programs. In this role, the SSW will work closely with Director of Special Education Services to identify students who would benefit from social work minutes, help write IEPs to support these students, and provide the necessary minutes to make sure these students have the support and counseling they need to be successful. The SSW will also work alongside our two School Counselors to lead student mediations, restorative conversations, and peace circles to prevent and repair harm to the school culture. The SSW will provide counseling services to our students as needed and generally support the school’s various social and emotional learning programs and initiatives. The SSW will also serve as the team lead for behavioral MTSS to ensure tiered support for students with behavioral struggles.

Organizational development, program management, and oversight of administrative duties are among the diverse skills needed for this position. In addition, the SSW should be a person of vision, high energy, initiative, creativity, and follow through. This position reports to the Director of Curriculum & Instruction.

Responsibilities:

The SSW will participate in and contribute to a broad range of activities within the organization, including but not limited to the following:

• Support the Special Education department in creating and implementing student IEPs
• Write, evaluate, and update students IEPs
• Provide social work minutes to students per their IEP
• Lead student mediations, restorative conversations, and peace circles
• Lead parent/guardian and student attended mediations, restorative conversations, and peace circles
• Lead behavioral MTSS, collecting data and implementing tiered interventions together with the counseling and culture teams
• Communicate with parents/guardians when necessary to best serve a student, report issues, report improvement, etc
• Lead teacher/staff and student mediations, restorative conversations, and peace circles
• Support and work closely with our Dean of Culture, Discipline staff, and School Counselors
• Support students and their social emotional needs by meeting with them one on one, in a focus group, or as a grade level to proactively or reactively address areas of growth or concerns
• Report large-scale social emotional or behavioral trends to the Principal

Qualifications:

The qualified candidate for this position should have at minimum a Bachelor’s degree and Master’s in Social Work. Additional qualifications include the School Social Worker endorsement and experience working in either a school, non-profit, or for-profit organization, with particular experience and interest in:

• School Social Work
• Counseling Services & Special Education Support
• Student Mediations and Restorative Practices
• Program development and management, and
• Student teaching and/or management.

The qualified candidate should have superior organizational skills and the ability to develop a rapport with students and families. Other qualifications and experience should include:

• Commitment to the organization’s mission
• Experience with or in high need communities similar to West Garfield Park
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills
• Ability to apply principles and practices of sound management and supervisory methods
• Competence in a variety of computer applications, including word processing, databases, and spreadsheets

Attributes and Strengths:The SSW will be expected to display critical thinking skills and abilities consistent with high quality program management, including:

• Dynamic leadership skills
• The ability to manage multiple priorities
• The ability to analyze information and communicate the results effectively to a widely varied audience of Directors, staff, volunteers, students, funders and other community stakeholders
• The creativity required to oversee the design of new programs and services
• The strategic thinking required to envision long-term goals and objectives
• The management skills required to move the organization forward in achieving its goals

If you would like to be considered for this position, please apply through Indeed.

Job Type: Full-time

Pay: $55,000.00 - $67,000.00 per year

Benefits:

• 401(k)
• Dental insurance
• Flexible spending account
• Health insurance
• Paid time off
• Parental leave
• Vision insurance

Schedule:

• 8 hour shift
• Monday to Friday

Work setting:

• In-person

Application Question(s):

• Do you have an Illinois School Social Worker endorsement?

Education:

• Master's (Required)

Work Location: In person