The purpose of the Adult Casework volunteer role is to support adults with a refugee or asylum seeking background to understand their rights, access information and services, and ultimately, take control of their own lives. You will work with individuals to address problems they may face relating to, among other issues, asylum support, accessing healthcare and education, access to legal advice and finding activities and opportunities.
You will start from an understanding that individuals are always best placed to solve their own problems, and often need nothing more than to talk out a problem and find the solution themselves. When helpful, you will provide information to clarify and support to take action.
The Adult Casework team hold a support session at our office in Tooting on Thursday afternoons from 2-5.30pm. Volunteer caseworkers have 1:1 appointments, either in person or by phone, with CARAS members. These can be related to a range of topics. Currently our biggest areas of work are around housing for people seeking asylum, access to college, nursery/school places for children, referrals to mental health providers, searches and signposting to activities, finding solicitors and supporting people to apply for bus passes and ID cards. Volunteers also support with administrative tasks such as updating our databases, collating resources and creating information guides.
Adult Casework Volunteer Tasks and Responsibilities:
- Working in an empowering way with individuals and promoting their independence through goal-setting.
- Supporting people to develop their knowledge of rights and entitlements.
- Assisting with filling out forms.
- Signposting and referring onto other services and organisations.
- Gathering information from experts and disseminating information to people in an accessible manner.
- Engaging in collaborative internet and phone research on services, organisations and grants.
- Flagging safeguarding concerns and other issues where further support is required.
- Keeping accurate case-notes.
- Supporting to maintain our signposting database.
- Researching and collating resources.
- Working collaboratively as a team and assisting to shape the Adult Casework project.
· Learn about issues relating to refugees and people seeking asylum.
· Work as part of a friendly, welcoming team.
· Develop your skills and competencies.
· Be able to access relevant training, including safeguarding training.
Obtain a reference from us relating to your volunteering.
All volunteers must complete a basic DBS check for volunteers working with adults and attend training with us before starting. You will also receive training and support relevant to your specific role.
Essential:
- Experience of doing 1:1 advice work/casework
- Excellent communication skills, especially with people with varying levels of English.
- Confidence in using IT (Microsoft office, outlook, zoom, Google search, online forms)
- To be non-judgemental and able to engage with people from diverse backgrounds;
- A commitment to confidentiality and data protection
- Thorough with good attention to detail
- Reliable
- A high level of spoken and written English
- Ability to gather information from people in a sensitive way
- A calm, friendly, kind and patient approach
- Enjoyment in speaking to new people
- A commitment to working in an empowering way
- Able to maintain boundaries
- Able to work autonomously
- Currently resident in the UK
Desirable:
- Working knowledge or experience of relevant law and policy around asylum support, the asylum process, rights and entitlements for people seeking asylum.
- Experience of working with interpreters.
- Direct experience of the UK immigration system.
- Past experience of working with people seeking asylum.
- Proficiency in one or more of the following languages: Albanian, Amharic, Arabic, Bengali, Dari, Farsi, Kurdish, Oromo, Pashto, Russian, Spanish, Somali, Tigrinya, Urdu or Vietnamese.
- We will prioritise applicants with lived experience of the asylum process.
To apply, download and complete the CARAS volunteer application form (attached) using the role description. Email to Mirza at volunteering@caras.org.uk with the subject 'Adult casework volunteer'
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