Child Care Worker - After-School Enrichment Leader

Every afternoon a room of children needs one adult who is all the way there. That is the job.

Bob Burdette Center is a small nonprofit on Charleston's West Side. Every school day we run free after-school care for children in kindergarten through fifth grade, at three sites.

What you do

You have a group of children from the time they arrive until they go home. You sit with them through homework and help where you can. You run the activity your site has planned for the day. The plan comes to you, and you make it happen. You take them to the gym, outside, and down the hall to the cafeteria, and you are the reason the hallway is quiet and nobody is missing. At meal time you work the cafeteria: pouring milk, keeping the line moving, keeping voices down. Before you leave, your area is clean. Your Site Manager runs the site and is the person you go to.

The part we will hold you to

This job is done well or it is not done at all, and the difference is small things done every single day:

- Your phone stays in your pocket while you have children. You are watching them, not it.

- The children with you are quiet in the hallways and accounted for every minute.

- You follow the instruction you were given, the first time, the way you were given it.

- You clock in when you arrive and clock out when you leave. Every day.

- You leave your area clean without waiting to be asked.

We are putting this in the ad because it is where people fall down here, and we would rather you know it now.

What you need

- To be 18 or older.

- A clear background check and fingerprinting before your first shift. We pay for both and we walk you through it.

- Legal authorization to work in the United States.

- Enough comfort with a tablet and email to use ours.

- No particular experience. If you have worked with children (after-school, daycare, camp, coaching, church, your own family) tell us. If you have not, tell us where you learned to show up.

Who tends to do well here

- People who like children and are not worn out by noise.

- Kind, and not a pushover. The children know you like them, and they know you mean it.

- People at every stage of life. Some of the best classroom handlers we have ever had were retirees, and some were students with free afternoons.

- The sort who notices the child who has gone quiet.

Hours, pay and the practical bits

- 1:00 to 5:30, Monday through Friday. 22.5 hours a week.

- $12.00 an hour.

- Year-round. We do not shut down over the summer.

- On site, at one of our three West Side locations.

- We welcome applicants with a criminal record who can pass a background check.

- This is an entry-level position, and people really do move up from it. Our Site Assistants often start as Enrichment Leaders, and our Site Managers can come up the same way.

One more thing

There are children who will walk through our door every afternoon looking for you. Take the job knowing that.

How to apply

Send your resume. In a line or two, tell us about something you kept doing right when nobody was watching.

We hire without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, or genetic information.

Pay: $12.00 per hour

Expected hours: 22.5 per week

People with a criminal record are encouraged to apply

Application Question(s):

• Think of a job where you were responsible for watching something (children, a register, a pool, a door). Where was your phone during that shift, and what did you do when you wanted to check it?
• Tell us about a time a supervisor asked you to do something a specific way and you thought your way was better. What did you actually do?
• You are walking twelve children from the classroom to the cafeteria. Two of them start running and yelling ahead of the group. What do you do, in what order?
• It is 3:30 and the plan has fallen apart (someone did not show, the room changed, the thing you needed is gone) and you still have a group of children in front of you. What do you do first?

Work Location: In person

Salary : $12