Clinical Counsellor, Mental Health Services

DEPARTMENT: Mental Health and Wellness

COMPANY: Skills for Change

LOCATION: 791 St. Clair Ave West Toronto

REPORTS TO: Supervisor, Mental Health and Counselling Services

CONTRACT TYPE: Permanent (Union)

HOURS: 35 hours per week (Monday-Friday) with occasional evenings/weekends

PAY RATE: $26.00

START DATE: Immediately

APPLICATION DEADLINE: January 14, 2022

GENERAL ACCOUNTABILITY: With 38 years of operations, Skills for Change is a highly respected non-profit charity with a province wide reputation for pioneering programs that respond to shifting immigration and workplace trends and lead to employment. We offer a range of accelerated programs including mentoring, employment, settlement, language training, together with specialized programs for trades, women, and youth. We have 5 locations across the GTA and serve 16,000 clients annually.

PROGRAM NATURE AND SCOPE:

To provide high quality and responsive mental health and wellness services to support refugee, immigrants, and low-income vulnerable clients within Skills for Change. With the impact of COVID-19 and the increasing international refugee crisis, this role will work primarily with implementing programs and projects to: improve the mental and physical health and well-being of immigrants, refugees, vulnerable groups (youth, women, LGBTQ2S+); also including social mentoring, networking, settlement, research, and case study/blog posts writing. Clinical Counsellor, Mental Health Services assists individuals with disorders of thought, cognition, emotional regulation, perception, or memory that may seriously disrupt their judgment, insight, behavior, communication, interpersonal relationships, and social functioning. Individual and group therapy is provided according to assessed needs and best practices in counseling and psychotherapy.

IDEAL CANDIDATE HAS:

• Experience and sensitivity in dealing with members of different cultural and racial backgrounds, including visible and invisible dimensions of diversity
• Demonstrated commitment to high standards of culturally responsive service delivery within an anti-racism and anti-oppression
• framework
• Knowledge of social issues, immigrant issues, social isolation, sexual assault and VAW
• Knowledge of community resources and services relating to mental health services
• Demonstrated ability in using discretion in dealing with highly sensitive and confidential issues
• Understanding of and extensive experience in crisis response
• Proficiency in planning, implementing, and evaluating group activities
• Good organizational skills, ability to multitask while maintaining a high level of accuracy
• Demonstrated high degree of initiative, judgment, and problem-solving ability
• Intermediate to master level skills in Microsoft and Google Suite (Word, Excel and PowerPoint)

RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Provide individual short-term problem-solving support and long-term stability plan for populations including newcomers, immigrants, refugees, racialized groups, LGBTQ2S+, adults, youth, victims of violence, low-income communities through identifying the presenting problems, goals and available options
• Provide individual and family counselling based on evidence-based assessment and treatment.
• Provide crisis intervention, psychoeducation, and evaluation to clients as necessary through telephone, video conferencing or face-to-face contact, in the client’s preferred environment
• Provide counselling and intervention supports for clients who are victims of sexual assault/domestic violence through active listening, debriefing experiences, validating feelings, and respecting client choices and decisions.
• Provide psychoeducation in group settings.
• Conduct external referrals by matching client needs with available community resources as appropriate.
• Document assessment, intervention, client interactions, referral correspondences, clinical consultations, education, safety planning, outreach accurately, and in a timely manner, according to college, funder, and accreditation requirements.
• Maintain strict confidentiality as outlined in agency privacy and confidentiality policy; behave ethically.
• Participate in ongoing training & development in areas related to abuse & counselling, either self-directed or formal, as well as related topics, such as mental health, addictions, or coping strategies
• Design, promote and organize various online and in-person workshops, information sessions and webinars related to issues due to COVID-19 pandemic, dealing with trauma, mental wellness, stress management, employment supports, building confidence and planning for the future
• Register clients for workshops/information sessions/networking/mentoring activities
• Conduct client intake by performing duties such as obtaining demographic information, providing information regarding services offered through programs, assisting clients in completing intake forms, assessing needs, level of risk, and suitability for the program, and explaining issues related to confidentiality
• Maintain program and participants records and statistics, and is accountable for inputting accurate data into SkeduleX, Salesforce and designated databases; produce narrative/statistical reports are requested
• Evaluate the effectiveness of counselling programs and interventions, and clients’ progress in resolving identified problems and progress of defined objectives
• Conduct support groups, peer networking and wellness checks
• Conduct outreach activities to newcomer communities to increase awareness of the service and recruit eligible clients
• Make appropriate referrals to longer term community support services and/or mental health services as required
• Outreach and partnership development with various community agencies, business and individual sponsors of refugees to recruit clients and also establish partnerships with respect to program delivery (workshops), itinerant services and client referrals;
• Establish and maintain relationships with the team and other community agencies that provide specialized refugee settlement and social services;
• Service coordination with other agencies to meet client needs;
• Distribute survey and collect data related to the client satisfaction;
• Case manage client files; document activities in client files, follow up on action plans, additional counselling, etc.;
• Prepare and provide timely reporting/statics as required;
• Maintain files organized and available for review by the funder and program supervisor and management which includes mentor/mentee files and settlement client files;
• Participate in team meetings, as well as other internal and external committees as required
• Develop, document and report on client outcomes
• Prepare and submit monthly statistical reports, progress reports and evaluation of program results as required
• Work collaboratively with other programs within Skills for Change;
• Attend staff and committee meetings as required;
• Other duties as required by the Supervisor and Management

REQUIREMENTS:

• Masters’ Degree in Social Work, Counselling Psychology or related field is required
• Minimum 2 years of experience in group and individual counselling or crisis support work with families, with an emphasis on refugee/newcomer/immigrant clients required
• Mandatory clear vulnerable sector check.
• Must be registered as a certified counsellor with the Canadian Counselling and Psychotherapy Association (CCPA)
• Current registration with a regulatory body under the Regulated Health Professions Act
• Must hold a valid First Aid Certificate

QUALIFICATIONS, SKILLS AND ATTRIBUTES:

• Familiarity with suicide/risk assessment and crisis support
• Experience operating from ant-racism, anti-islamophobia and anti-black racism lens is critical
• Second language is considered an asset (French, Hindi, Farsi, Arabic, Yoruba, Swahili, Chinese etc)
• Ability to work flexible hours, including evenings and weekends;

WORK WITH US AND ENJOY:

• 100% employer paid comprehensive health, dental & wellness benefits
• Generous paid sick days and attractive vacation package
• Employer matched RRSP contributions
• Professional development workshops, training & development opportunities
• Company wide wellness initiatives, staff awards and retreats.

PLEASE SEND YOUR APPLICATION TO: hr@skillsforchange.org

Skills for Change provides learning and training opportunities for immigrants, refugees and equity seeking groups to access and fully participate in the workplace and wider community to persons with disabilities to newcomers to Canada (including refugees) to Indigenous peoples to members of a visible minority to children or youth to seniors to the LGBTQ2 community. Skills for Change offers accommodation for applicants with disabilities in each stage of the hiring process. If you are contacted regarding a job opportunity, please advise if you require accommodation. This document is available in alternate format on request. We thank all applicants for their interest in this position, however only those selected for an interview will be contacted.