The Conservation Volunteers is the UK’s leading practical conservation charity working with people from all sectors of the community in positive action to improve the environment.

Our Natural Health Service is a national programme led by Scottish Natural Heritage with representation from a range of partners from education, sport, transport, NHS and environment sectors. The programme aims to make better use of Scotland’s natural environment as resource to improve health and wellbeing by mainstreaming green exercise into health and social care policy and practice and building capacity and participation within communities.

Green Health Partnerships (GHPs) are part of a wider ‘Our Natural Health Service’ programme. There are four GHPs in Scotland and TCV have been appointed to deliver the programme in North Ayrshire on behalf of the North Ayrshire Green Health Partnership. The main purpose of this post is to lead the development and delivery of the GHP in North Ayrshire.

The Senior Project Officer will lead the work in North Ayrshire providing support and training for local community Green Health projects through training and coordinating networking events. While supporting the development of Green Health activities such as gardening, conservation, walking and cycling the successful candidate will develop referral pathways alongside our partner KA Leisure to help build and strengthen the connections between health professionals and green activities in the community. This will involve liaising with NHS staff, identifying barriers to participation and working with KA Leisure staff to put in place support mechanisms to encourage people to take part in green health activities.

The Senior project Officer will work closely with TCV staff working on other Green Health projects and TCV’s wider work on the Our Natural Health Service programme.

Key elements of the delivery of the Green Health Partnership include:

• Organising quarterly networking events for groups delivering green health activities and coordinating/delivering training
• Working with KA Leisure to develop referral pathways
• Identifying barriers to participation and implementing measures to reduce them
• Attending events (for the public and health professionals) to promote the benefits of outdoor activity and engaging with nature
• Complete ongoing progress reports for funders and work towards the national evaluation framework

Please note – the core hours of this role will be Monday to Friday and 9-5. However, the nature of the role involves providing activities and events for a range of communities. It is therefore expected that the post holder would support and deliver events during evenings and weekends. This will be planned on a flexible basis and time off in-lieu will be provided. We anticipate it will amount to approximately 1 weekend and a handful of evening sessions each month.

We have live vacancies across various locations in Scotland. And they’ll be a steady flow of new vacancies released over the coming months. Please search for a job in your postcode by clicking apply, and if there’s not a job near you right now then remember to sign up for alerts and we’ll notify you when we have one in your community.

We’re looking for member pioneers to join Co-op, in communities across the country. In this unique role you’ll be focused on bringing people together to make a difference in your community. That means talking to Co-op members, colleagues in stores and funeral homes, and representatives of the many local causes we support. By building relationships with and connecting these people you’ll be the catalyst for new ideas, initiatives and projects that will make our communities better places to live.

We plan to have a member pioneer dedicated to each of our communities and you’ll be a part of this ambitious plan for a better future. Everything you do will contribute to our community plan, making sure we make the biggest impact possible across the UK by increasing community co-operation. It’s an opportunity to make a visible difference where you live, supported by an organisation with nearly 70,000 colleagues.

What you’ll do:

• develop an action plan to improve community wellbeing, aligned to key themes
• establish and run a local community forum, or make connections with one that already exists
• build a strong group of contacts locally, making use of social media platforms to help with listening to and getting involved in community conversation
• get activities off the ground and encourage lots of involvement from members in your community
• prioritise your time, making your hours count and focusing on opportunities to make the biggest difference

This role would suit someone who:

• has lots of enthusiasm with the ability to get things moving
• is interested in all things community focussed
• can inspire and motivate people through their communication style
• loves working with and connecting people
• can prioritise their time and remain focussed on a long term goal
• is confident using social media
• has good basic IT skills (ideally with experience using collaborative tools like the Google suite or Skype)
• is both committed and dedicated
• lives within or very close to the community you’ll support, detailed above

Why Co-op?

As a member pioneer you’ll have the chance to support local communities, making a visible difference by encouraging people to work together. As a Co-op colleague you’ll also receive a competitive salary and a wide range of benefits including:

• 24 days holiday (rising to 30 with service)
• discounts on all kinds of Co-op products and services
• a pension with up to 10% employer contributions

Building an inclusive work environment

We’re actively building diverse teams and welcome applications from everyone. But simply having a diverse workforce is not enough. We want to build an inclusive environment, where everyone can develop to their full potential. We celebrate our differences, and recognise the importance of teams reflecting the communities they serve.

We can make adjustments to the interview process according to your needs. And we offer a flexible working environment so you can adjust your hours to suit your personal circumstances. You can find out more about Co-op people policies at coop.co.uk/peoplepolicies

As part of your application you’ll need to complete an online assessment. It will take you around 12 minutes to complete this test.