Higher Level Teaching Assistant

Start date: As Soon As Possible. Closing date: Monday 20th July 2026. Interview date: Tuesday 28th July 2026. Location: Oasis Restore secure school in Rochester, Medway, Kent.

Are you a qualified or aspiring Higher Level Teaching Assistant (HLTA) driven by a purpose to transform the lives of the most vulnerable children? Do you have a keen interest in developing your knowledge, skills and practice to support with learning across the school? Do you see relationships as fundamental to your work with children, families, and the wider community? Do you want to be a part of an innovative and courageous team developing the UK’s first secure school?

We are offering an exciting opportunity for qualified or aspiring HLTAs to join the team in contributing to and supporting teachers and Head of Departments with delivering an outstanding curriculum and high-quality learning opportunities at the UK’s first secure school. Oasis Restore represents a revolution in youth justice: an opportunity for children within the criminal justice system to experience a truly restorative environment, that creates the potential for them to thrive in the future.

You will be key to delivering a curriculum that provides nurturing, therapeutic and educational community that embeds hope, stability, and opportunity for children in our care. Come and develop your career within an organisation dedicated to transforming lives.

The role and what we are looking for

Your role as a HLTA will be integral to supporting the progress of all children at Oasis Restore, to help them to achieve their individual educational outcomes. You will be responsible for supporting the delivery of a bespoke, skills-based curriculum; and working with individual children and small groups within the classroom to facilitate a personalised and aspirational education for all. You will work as part of an education team within departments and contribute to the regular assessment of the children you are working with as well as forming part of a core team around the child and feeding into formulation meetings to report on progress and next steps.

You will be responsible for working with teachers to deliver lessons that develop curious and dedicated learners and meet their individual needs and interests. You will have the opportunity to feed into and continuously contribute to a creative curriculum underpinned by progressive pedagogies, in line with the national curriculum, setting a true gold standard for learning.

You will be an integral part of a passionate, committed, and ground-breaking multidisciplinary team, working integratively towards improving the outcomes for children so often overlooked. Together, we will devise strategies to empower children to take ownership of their own learning journeys, so preparing them for successful transitions into the next phase of their journey.

As a champion of restorative practice, you will place relational connection at the heart of everything you do. Your work will be the driving force that enables children to transition out of Oasis Restore with the support in place for them to succeed in the next step of their journeys.

Our Secure School

Oasis Restore is the UK’s first secure school that is a proof-of-concept policy initiative funded by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) and the Youth Custody Service. Oasis Restore’s mission is to transform the life chances of children aged 12-18 years in the criminal justice system through delivering psychologically informed, integrated practice that centres on trusted, safe relationships between staff and children. Oasis Restore is a learning community that embeds hope, stability, and opportunity for children beyond the secure school.

Benefits to Staff

• A mixture of one to one and group reflective practice, coaching & supervision sessions as well as regular line management.
• Experience an Appraisal policy that decouples pay and performance.
• An elected staff forum to listen to, and act on, staff feedback.
• Access to a competitive defined benefit pension scheme (either the Teachers Pensions Scheme or Local Government Pension Scheme subject to individual scheme rules).
• 40 days annual leave including bank holidays (see application pack for staff working pattern).
• Subject to meeting basic eligibility criteria, be entitled to up to 8 weeks full-pay and 18 weeks half-pay paid maternity/adoption/shared parental leave (based broadly on the NHS Employers scheme).
• Subject to meeting basic eligibility criteria be entitled to up to 3 weeks fully paid paternity leave.
• Paid time off to attend antenatal appointments (those staff who are either pregnant or whose partner is pregnant).
• Have a structured and bespoke induction training plan plus a probation period of 6 months as well as a training offer bespoke to our context leading to a level 4 qualification in the therapeutic care of adolescents.
• Receive the same offer of sick leave pay (based broadly on the length of service in the national ‘Green Book’ framework) from Day 1 of employment.
• Up to 5 days discretionary paid compassionate/emergency/general leave plus further discretionary unpaid leave.
• Up to 4 weeks paid parental bereavement leave plus up to 5 days paid bereavement leave for the death of other specified close relatives.
• Expenses and travel costs incurred as part of the working day (as appropriate, not including travel to work).
• Access to an eye care vouchers scheme, season Ticket Loans, a cycle to work scheme and free car parking.
• We are in the process of setting up a new employee health care cash plan and employee discount scheme.