Counsellor on Placement — Build Clinical Hours & CPD in London

This Counsellor on Placement application form should only be completed by applicants for Level 5 Certificate. Before applying, please check that there's a school on our map that is convenient for you to commute to for your placement. While we do our best to arrange a placement close to you, this cannot be guaranteed. If there isn’t a school nearby convenient for you to commute to once a week, this course may not be the right fit at this time. Please also note that not all schools on the map will have placements available.

This application is only for external candidates applying for a placement to support their Autumn 26/27 Level 5 application with Place2Be. Please note: this is not the Level 5 course application, which must be completed separately. You will be able to let the tutors know of any placement requirements during your interview (e.g., days of the week, general school location).

Counsellors on Placement provide emotional and therapeutic support to children and young people aged 4-18 in Place2Be partner schools. As an organisation that has adopted the BACP ethical framework of good practice in Counselling and Psychotherapy, counsellors working within the organisation are dedicated to improving the mental health and well-being of the children they work with.

Place2Be provides a high level of support to counsellors on placement through regular supervision, tailored training workshops and offers a well-recognised clinical placement. We provide a comprehensive induction programme and clinical supervision is undertaken at the end of each day. We need you to be available for a minimum of one day per week to work in a therapeutic capacity with up to 3 children offering one-to-one counselling. Placements are term time only and run for one academic year. There are opportunities for you to stay with us beyond one year.

You will have the opportunity to attend up to six optional workshops throughout the year which are recognised as continuing professional development time. Sessions spent with children are accepted as clinical hours towards professional accreditation, and are recognised by the BACP and UKCP. A placement is an excellent stepping stone into a job opportunity and career with Place2Be; over ⅔ of our clinical staff were once Counsellors on Placement.

We have places available in our projects in both primary and secondary schools nationwide. All clinical hours gained on placement can be used towards accreditation with a body such as BACP and UKCP. However, if you need to gain clinical hours for your course, we would strongly advise that you check with your course tutor as to whether child hours are accepted before applying. If your course does not accept child hours but you would like to gain counselling experience of working with Children and Young People, you can still apply for a Place2Be placement as a second placement.

Diversity and Inclusion

Place2Be is committed to equal opportunities and anti-discrimination practices and we positively encourage applications from all sections of the community. We are particularly interested in attracting applications from Black, Asian, and Minority Ethnic backgrounds. Additionally, for our clinical roles, we are particularly keen in attracting male candidates to reflect the diversity of the partner schools and communities we work in. All successful applicants to clinical roles will be asked to undertake an Enhanced Disclosure from the DBS/PVG.

About You

For this vacancy, you should have already completed an application for the Level 5 course and met their entry requirements. This means that you will be a fully qualified Counsellor, Therapist or Clinical Psychologist and 6 months post qualification. If you are only interested in becoming a Counsellor on Placement and not the Level 5 course please return to the vacancy page and apply for one of our other Counsellor on Placement roles.

About Us

Place2Be is the leading children's mental health charity providing in-school support and expert professional development to improve the emotional wellbeing of children and young people, families, teachers and school staff. The charity currently provides an embedded mental health service in 500 UK primary and secondary schools supporting a school community of around 243,000 children and young people. Our teams provide a range of services in our partner schools to build resilience early in life through counselling, creative work and play and support a child’s ability to engage in school life.

Our work, focused on early intervention, is part of the comprehensive CAMHS (Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services) system. Through our professional development programme, we are training around 1,200 Counsellors on Placement each year who build their mental health and counselling skills and experience through practice in our partner schools. We also provide a range of professional development programmes on mental health and wellbeing for school leaders, teachers and other professionals who work with children and young people, so we can help to build ‘mentally healthy’ schools and communities where all children can thrive and flourish.

We continue to pilot, trial and explore new ways in which we can develop our practice as well as share learning, expertise and findings from the robust evidence and evaluation we gather. HRH The Princess of Wales is our Royal Patron and Place2Be is one of the founding charity partners of Heads Together. We also work collaboratively with a range of charities and expert organisations to leverage best-in-class knowledge and expertise to inform, develop and improve outcomes for the children, families and schools we support. We ask our staff team to share our core values of perseverance, integrity, compassion and creativity, and to have the skills and patience to support some of the UK’s most vulnerable children and families.

Our values: We believe that how we approach our work is as important as the work itself. Our four key values shape everything we do: Compassion – We bring empathy and kindness to all we do, to better understand and meet the needs of children and young people, colleagues and other stakeholders. Integrity – We demonstrate sound ethical values in all our work, and we are honest, transparent, courageous and authentic. Perseverance – We have the courage to continue in the face of adversity and do this with determination to find effective solutions. Creativity – We bring an open-minded approach and flexibility to our thinking and actions and enable others to do the same.