Job Description

Salary range: £71,719 - £75,304 per annum inclusive of London weighting

Contract: Permanent

Hours of work: 36 hours per week

Location: Civic Centre and other locations from time to time

Shape the future of SEND. Lead change that improves lives.

Are you an experienced Educational Psychologist ready to take your expertise further?

At Brent, you’ll have the opportunity to combine high-quality psychological practice with leadership, service development and system-wide influence — helping shape how we support children and young people with SEND across the borough.

As a Senior Educational Psychologist, you’ll work closely with the Principal Educational Psychologist to strengthen the Educational Psychology Service, develop our workforce and help turn national and local SEND priorities into meaningful improvements for children, young people and their families.

This is a role for someone who wants to lead, influence and innovate — while remaining closely connected to the professional practice that makes a difference every day.

The Role

You’ll play a key role in delivering a high-quality, equitable Educational Psychology Service for children and young people aged 0–25, combining strategic thinking with operational leadership and professional expertise.

Working under the direction of the Principal Educational Psychologist, you’ll contribute to statutory service delivery, workforce development and wider SEND system improvement.

You’ll have strategic and operational responsibility for areas of service delivery and will provide supervision, professional support and performance management to Educational Psychologists and Assistant Educational Psychologists.

You’ll also:

• Support the Principal Educational Psychologist in providing professional and operational leadership across the Educational Psychology Service.
• Contribute to the strategic development, delivery and evaluation of the service within the wider SEND system and Children and Young People’s Directorate.
• Help lead the implementation of current and emerging SEND reforms and national policy, including the strategic and operational development of the Experts at Hand offer.
• Support innovation in the planning, deployment and development of Educational Psychology services.
• Contribute to recruitment, retention and deployment of Educational Psychologists to ensure statutory services are delivered within required timescales.
• Support the Local Authority in fulfilling its statutory SEND responsibilities, including statutory assessments, reassessments, annual reviews and transition reviews.
• Provide high-quality, evidence-based psychological advice and reports and contribute to tribunals, mediation and related proceedings where required.
• Provide supervision and professional support, helping colleagues develop their practice and maintain high standards of quality.
• Lead and develop specialist areas of EP practice in response to service and system needs.
• Design, deliver and evaluate training for schools, parents, carers and professionals across education, health and care.
• Strengthen partnership working across statutory and voluntary services.
• Contribute to service-user participation and use feedback and evaluation to improve the impact of the service.
• Contribute to, and where appropriate lead, the EPS response to critical incidents.

You’ll be a senior professional role model within the service — helping to create consistent, reflective and evidence-informed practice while supporting colleagues to deliver the very best outcomes for children and young people.

The Person

We’re looking for an experienced Educational Psychologist who is ready to make an impact beyond their own caseload and take a leading role in shaping practice, people and services.

You’ll have a good honours degree in Psychology recognised by the BPS, together with either a teaching qualification and significant teaching experience plus a Masters in Educational Psychology, or significant experience working with children and young people and a Doctorate in Educational & Child Psychology.

You’ll bring substantial post-qualification experience as an Educational Psychologist, including experience of supervision, service development and leading areas of practice.

You’ll also have:

• In-depth knowledge of SEND legislation, national policy and current developments affecting Educational Psychology services.
• Specialist knowledge of inclusion, child development and applied psychological practice within a local authority context.
• Strong communication, negotiation and influencing skills, with the ability to engage effectively with a wide range of audiences.
• The ability to respond positively to change and develop, implement and evaluate creative approaches that improve outcomes.
• The ability to inspire others and develop common standards and effective working practices.
• Strong partnership-building skills, with the ability to influence and work collaboratively with schools, agencies and service providers.
• Excellent organisational skills and the ability to manage competing demands while maintaining high-quality service delivery.
• The ability to provide effective supervision, support and mentoring to Educational Psychologists and Assistant Educational Psychologists.
• Strong leadership and people management skills.
• A commitment to high standards of public service, honesty, integrity and professionalism.
• Experience of supervising main-grade EPs, Assistant EPs or TEPs would be desirable.

Most importantly, you’ll be someone who can combine professional expertise with curiosity, leadership and the confidence to influence change.

Join us. Lead change. Shape better futures.

Why join us?

We know people do their best work when they feel valued, supported and able to grow. At Brent, you will benefit from:

• 27 days' annual leave, rising with length of service, plus bank holidays
• Local Government Pension Scheme with generous employer contributions
• Hybrid and flexible working options available for most roles
• Supportive family-friendly policies, including carers’ leave, paternity leave and compassionate leave for eligible employees
• Health and wellbeing support, including eye test support and a 24/7 Employee Assistance Programme
• Financial wellbeing support, including education sessions, childcare deposit loans and season ticket loans
• Travel support, including affordable parking nearby, a Cycle to Work scheme and onsite facilities
• Learning and development opportunities to support your career
• Access to My Brent Rewards with exclusive discounts on shopping, travel, leisure and entertainment

To learn more about our staff benefits, visit Our offer to you.

How to apply

Please note that employees must have successfully completed their probationary period before applying for this vacancy

Closing date: day date month year (23:59)

Assessment and interview date: Include this only if it has been provided. Otherwise, delete.

Interested in applying? Click "Apply Now" to begin your application.

You will need to submit a supporting statement demonstrating how you meet the essential criteria in the job description. This is a key part of the selection process, and applications without a supporting statement may not be considered. You may also upload a CV to support your application, but it cannot replace the supporting statement.

We reserve the right to close this vacancy early if we receive a high volume of applications. If you are interested, we encourage you to apply as soon as possible.

Brent Council values the diversity of its community and aims to have a workforce that reflects the people we serve. We welcome applications from all sections of the community and encourage applicants to complete the diversity survey section of the application.

We are committed to fostering an inclusive workplace where everyone is treated with dignity, respect and fairness. We expect all employees to demonstrate a commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion and to promote inclusive, non-discriminatory practices in their work. This commitment forms part of our recruitment process, and candidates may be assessed on their understanding of and ability to contribute to an inclusive working environment.

The information we collect from you will be shared with Cifas, who will use it to help prevent fraud and other unlawful or dishonest conduct, malpractice, and other seriously improper conduct. Further details on how your information will be used by Brent and Cifas, and your data protection rights can be found here.

As a Disability Confident employer, we guarantee an interview to disabled applicants who meet the essential criteria for the role. This includes people with hidden disabilities, long-term health conditions, diagnoses and mental health conditions. We also guarantee an interview to care-experienced applicants who meet the essential criteria. Information shared for this purpose will be treated fairly and used only to confirm eligibility under these schemes.

If you need reasonable adjustments at any stage of the recruitment process, please contact recruitment@brent.gov.uk.

Brent has a positive approach to flexible working.

Job Description