Senior Research Officer

This is an exciting opportunity to join the dynamic, multi-disciplinary team at the Centre of expertise on child sexual abuse (CSA Centre) as our new Principal Researcher and Evaluation Officer - Impact. This is a key role within the CSA Centre, central to our ambition to develop, understand and embed evidence-informed improvements in the response to child sexual abuse.

The CSA Centre aims to inform and improve policy and practice at local and national levels by identifying, generating and sharing high quality evidence on what works to prevent and tackle child sexual abuse, and our extensive evaluation and monitoring activity is central to that mission. As Principal Research and Evaluation Officer – Impact, you will lead the CSA Centre's monitoring and evaluation activity, working closely with other research and evaluation colleagues and our team of multi-agency Practice Improvement Advisers.

This is a rare opportunity to develop and deliver approaches to evaluation and monitoring that support sustainable improvements to knowledge, understanding and practice, driving real change in the response to child sexual abuse across England and Wales. You will be an experienced evaluator with strong skills and significant experience of designing, planning and overseeing programmes of monitoring and evaluation, using a wide range of methodologies.

We welcome applications from experienced evaluation specialists working in the field of child sexual abuse, as well as those with evaluation experience in closely related fields such as violence against women and girls, violence against children or sexual violence, where your skills and expertise can readily transfer to this role. You will have demonstrable expertise in applying analytical methods and tools for gathering data and interpreting evidence, and managing multiple impact and evaluation projects simultaneously, ensuring effective planning, prioritisation and timely delivery.

As Principal Research and Evaluation Officer - Impact, you will play a key role tackling child sexual abuse alongside the work of our colleagues across practice, policy, communications and training. This is important work - the CSA Centre conservatively estimates that one in ten children will experience some form of child sexual abuse before age 16, and our ambitious programmes seek to improve the knowledge, skills and confidence of professionals (social workers, teachers, nurses etc.) in identifying and responding to child sexual abuse.

We are the Centre of expertise on child sexual abuse (CSA Centre). Our aim is to reduce the impact of child sexual abuse through improved prevention and better response. To tackle child sexual abuse we must better understand its causes, scope, scale and impact. Established since 2017, we are a multi-disciplinary team that is funded by the Home Office, hosted by Barnardo's and we work closely with key partners from academic institutions, local authorities, health, education, police and the voluntary sector. We are proudly independent and our team will challenge any barriers, assumptions, taboos and ways of working that prevent us from increasing our understanding and improving our approach to child sexual abuse.

We bring about change by:

• Collating and analysing existing research, policy, practice and the real experiences of those affected, and filling the gaps we identify with new research, insights and analysis;
• Using that evidence and insight to challenge and improve existing policy and practice, develop new approaches and increase everyone's knowledge and confidence to more effectively tackle the issue.

This role is hybrid working from home with regular travel required, usually to London. The CSA Centre acknowledges that tackling child sexual abuse can feel challenging but is incredibly rewarding and positive when actively making change. Our open working environment ensures that there is support for all employees, across the team and with access to a therapist, if needed. Please do get in touch if you would like to discuss any aspect of this further.

We believe in creating equality of opportunity in the workplace and supporting people to manage their work-life balance; we are therefore open to offering flexible working arrangements. When completing your application please refer to your skills, knowledge and experience in relation to the Person Specification and Job Description.

Although this contract has a permanent status, please be aware that CSA Centre roles are subject to funding currently until 31 March 2027 and therefore should this funding not be extended further, you may be subject to a redundancy consultation or a TUPE arrangement. This contract is due to expire on 31 March 2027. This will be reviewed in late 2026, as future funding for the CSA Centre from 2027/28 onwards is confirmed.

Please note due to the high volume of applications for some posts, this advert might close before the displayed closing date. We recommend that you apply for this role as soon as possible.