Family Facilitator/Home Visitor 1.0 FTE

Douglas County West Elementary School

Family Facilitator/Home Visitor Job Description

The Family Facilitator/Home Visitor implements a birth to third-grade programming approach through the Superintendents’ Early Childhood Plan. This role has two central roles.

• To assist in sustaining the family-school collaboration. This will include supporting child and family transitions into preschool, kindergarten, and across the primary grades.
• Implement the birth through age 3 personal visiting component by serving participating families.

Job Responsibilities

• Provide outreach to families of enrolled preschool through 3rd grade children.
• Provide support for two-way communication and information exchange between school staff and families to work toward shared developmental and learning goals for children.
• Facilitate the development of various accessible opportunities for families to understand and promote their children’s learning and development.
• Collaborate with school staff to facilitate parent-child groups and family engagement activities that increase families’ confidence, skills, and opportunities to advocate for their children’s education.
• Collaborate with community partners that will assist in linking families to needed support services and resources.
• Participate in ongoing professional development and technical assistance that will increase teamwork and collaboration within and across participating schools.
• Participate in evaluating the Superintendents’ Early Childhood Plan implementation by documenting program activities and assessments.
• Recruit expecting families, or families with children between birth and age 3, from the local school area to participate in the program.
• Participate in developing, scheduling, and delivering the personal visiting program activities including personal visits, parent-child socializations & playgroups, transition to school activities, and other programmatic activities.
• Conduct child screenings, share results with parents, plan for supports and needs, and make necessary referrals to appropriate providers for follow-up assessment.
• Collaborate and communicate with various community partners to promote the mutual access of children and families to community services that are responsive to their needs.
• Participate in evaluating the personal visiting program and the Superintendents’ Early Childhood Plan implementation by documenting program activities and assessments.
• Coordinate and serve the Mobile Food Pantry with the Food Bank for the Heartlands once a month over a 12-month timeframe.
• Coordinate the Food Backpack program in collaboration with the Food Bank for the Heartlands from August through May.
• Coordinate Operation School Bell in collaboration with the Assistance League of Omaha during the Spring.
• Coordinate the Snack Program which includes grant writing, ordering, and distribution from August through May.
• Serve a caseload of 15 families over a 12-month timeframe.
• Provide individualized personal visits to each family on caseload over a 12-month timeframe and document in Child Plus accordingly:

? 3 personal visits each month for children birth through 36 months.

? 1 personal visit each month for children 37 months through 5 years of age.

• Provide Socialization events each month, over a 12-month timeframe, using the GGK curriculum to provide opportunities for families of young children to connect, share experiences, and build supportive networks.
• Provide Drop-In & Play events each month, over a 12-month timeframe, in an informal gathering designed for families to engage in spontaneous play and learning experiences with their children.

Essential Characteristics

• Advocacy: Champion the needs of children and families.
• Cultural humility: Ongoing journey of self-reflection and self-assessment, paired with an openness to learning from the experiences and perspectives of others.
• Collaboration: Work well with families, schools, and community partners.
• Effective Communication: Convey information clearly and listen actively.
• Problem-Solving Skills: Identify challenges and develop solutions.
• Strong Interpersonal Skills: Build and maintain trusting relationships with families.
• Adaptability: Adjust to changing situations and needs.
• Commitment to Equity: Ensure equal opportunities for all which may require different resources and opportunities for each person.
• Empathy and Compassion: Understand and support family needs.
• Organizational Skills: Manage tasks and coordinate activities efficiently.
• Parenting Support Knowledge: Provide effective parenting advice to promote child development.
• Professionalism: Maintain high standards of conduct and reliability.

Minimum Requirements

• A bachelor’s degree or higher in early childhood development and education, child, youth and family studies, family science, social work, or a closely related field with coursework directly related to infants and toddlers.
• Knowledge of early childhood development with an emphasis on infants/toddlers, early language, literacy, preschool, and/or early elementary.
• Experience working in a home visiting, infant/toddler early childhood, or parent education program that includes developing and leading developmentally appropriate interactive group experiences.
• Experience collaborating with a variety of community agencies working with children and families.
• Knowledge of families living in poverty and functioning under conditions of high stress.
• Experience working with racially, culturally, or linguistically diverse children and families.

Additional Considerations

The Family Facilitator & Home Visitor role is on a teacher contract of 185 days. Job responsibilities are fulfilled over 12 months with a flex schedule that best meets the needs of the families/children enrolled, the staff, and the school. This may include late afternoon or early evening personal visits, parent-child group activities, or other meetings.