Lead Family Empowerment Coach

The Lead Family Empowerment Coach is a hybrid leadership role that combines direct student support with leading adults.  The Lead Coach serves as a member of the Student Services team and cabinet leadership team, supporting high school students and families in a “best fit” environment for teenagers with significant barriers to education.  Coaches help students achieve their academic and post-secondary goals by providing ongoing advising, support, and resource connections to the student, family, and other supportive adults around the student.  Each coach is responsible for a caseload, typically ranging from 65–90 students.  Coaches build relationships with students and families and provide resources to connect to opportunities and remove barriers to the student’s educational progress.  The Lead Coach has a reduced student caseload and spends the remainder of their time supporting the development and success of the other Family Empowerment Coaches and providing leadership on projects for the coaching team.  With our core values of Professional, Unstoppable, Motivated, Accountable, and Supportive, the school priorities include:

• High rigor, high support instruction to close academic gaps and prepare students for post-secondary opportunities.
• Trauma-informed social-emotional learning.
• Student and family empowerment through coordination with a robust student services team of coaches, counselors, and more.

Example Duties and Activities

Cabinet Leader

• Serves as a member of the school’s Cabinet leadership team and participates as an active leader on school-wide initiatives.
  • Partners with school leadership to establish essential team goals that support the mission and vision of the school.
  • Collects and monitors data around key team metrics and reports progress regularly to the school administration and cabinet.
  • Heads up group initiatives that result in the achievement of team objectives.
• Provides oversight of student scheduling.
• Oversees the school’s mentoring program, which connects students with Goodwill mentors that provide guidance for post-secondary planning.
• Recruits and oversees interns who support the work of the coaching team.
• Provides feedback and professional development to assist other members of the team in implementing best practices aligned with the school mission and vision and improving team members’ contributions toward team goals.
• Communicates closely with the administration regarding the progress and support of team members.
• Provides coaching in alignment with the administration’s formal evaluations.
• Aids the school administration with recruitment, hiring, onboarding, and ongoing training for staff roles within this team.
• Assists the school administration with developing and maintaining community partnerships relevant to the team.

Student Success

• Meets with students to set goals, creates action plans, connect to resources, and ensure all is met within a provided timeline.  Utilizes coaching strategies to build rapport with students to influence decision-making.
• Attends all team, student, family, and professional meetings to advocate on behalf of students.
• Engages actively with students’ families and support networks through all means necessary, including home visits.  Monitors attendance and intervenes when students are absent.
• Tracks, maintains, and reviews accurate, compliant student data related to academic progress.  Monitors student progress and adjusts plans based on ongoing data review.
• Develops class schedules.  Advises, directs, and supports students on a path that leads to graduation and postsecondary success.
• Initiates and maintains networks with key community partners including Goodwill Mission Initiatives, community agencies, educational institutions, and employers to enhance the menu of services offered and to connect students to wrap-around services to remove barriers and support academic and/or personal goals.
• Chaperones field trips and drives mini-bus to take students to community events and to help with the daily transportation of students.  As needed, travels on Indy Go buses with students and provides supervision at bus stops/stations to support student behavior and safety.
• Maintains a visible presence and is active in the building during the school day.
• Partners with colleagues to refer and connect students to wraparound supports including internal and community resources, Social-Emotional Learning, Special Education, and more.
• Develops deep and lasting relationships with staff, students, and families to create a positive student culture.
• Aids the school community by attending extracurricular events such as athletic contests and family nights.

Required Competencies

• Degree and Credential Requirements – Master’s degree in psychology, human relations, social work, rehabilitation counseling, education, academic advising, or related fields and current Indiana Guidance Counselor or Social Worker Licensure, or the willingness to become licensed.
• Counseling Expertise – Provides academic, career, college/certification access, and social-emotional mentoring, counseling, or advising ideally to high school-age students in a high poverty, racially diverse education setting.
• Academic Mindset – Possesses the essential mindset that all students can succeed. Is compelled to improve the outcomes and lives of students in and out of the classroom.
• Communication Skills – Articulates thoughts and expresses ideas effectively using oral, written, visual, and non-verbal communication skills, as well as listening skills to comprehend others’ needs. Delivers information in person, in writing, and in a digital world.
• Student Engagement – Takes a strengths-based, student-centered approach to developing relationships at all levels while establishing appropriate boundaries. Adept at delivering feedback that is constructive and unbiased. Creates and maintains a safe environment for open discussions.
• Established Contacts – Maintains and grows a professional network of local community resources, health care providers, employers, and others as appropriate to the organization.
• Informed Decision-Making – Identifies and comprehends issues, problems, and opportunities; compares data from different sources to draw conclusions; uses effective approaches for choosing a course of action or developing appropriate solutions; takes action that is consistent with available facts, constraints, and probable consequences.
• Organizational Aptitude – Plans and attends to details and pursues quality in accomplishing multiple tasks in an organized and timely fashion. Exhibits careful attention to detail and follow-through.
• Technical Knowledge – Has working knowledge of G Suite, MS Office, and the Internet, as well as student information systems.

Preferred Competencies 

• People Management – Enables direct reports and co-workers to grow and succeed through feedback, instruction, and encouragement to ensure their success and the accomplishment of organizational goals.
• Diversity Awareness – Works with diverse populations including people who have experienced barriers to their education.

Other Requirements

• Background Screening – All candidates must pass a pre-employment background check.  Must have a valid driver’s license, a good driving record, and qualify under the district’s insurance carrier when driving a district vehicle.

Benefits: Full-time employees may participate in a comprehensive benefits program that includes:

• Continuing education and leadership development
• Comprehensive health plan
• Paid time off (PTO)
• Life, dental and vision insurance
• Short- and long-term disability plans
• Nationally recognized preventive health and wellness program
• Section 125 pre-tax health spending account, dependent care spending account, and premiums
• Retirement plan with generous match or contribution into Teachers’ Retirement Fund for eligible employees.

Goodwill Education Initiatives

Goodwill strongly believes it is essential to raise education attainment levels in Indiana. Not only are the lifetime earnings of high school graduates significantly higher than those of dropouts, children of high school graduates are 50% less likely to drop out of high school than the children of dropouts are. Goodwill provides opportunities for adults (The Excel Center) and youth (Indianapolis Metropolitan High School).