Community education officer : Job description

A community education officer promotes a wide range of educational and developmental activities to all members of the community, regardless of age.

Community education aims to encourage learning at all levels from very basic life skills to learning for further and higher education. It also includes learning for enjoyment and for building better citizens and communities.

The work involves engaging with local individuals and groups to identify community interests, needs and issues and then facilitating access to the different available projects and programmes.

In providing these activities, community education officers work in partnership with a range of other local authority and voluntary sector providers as well as providers of further and higher education.

Typical work activities

Community education roles typically involve an element of community engagement to increase participation in mainly informal, educational activities. Some roles, such as in adult literacy work, may also include tutoring, but most involve the following tasks:

• engaging with individuals and community groups, such as residents' associations, parents’ groups and young people;
• identifying local interests and needs;
• helping potential learners to overcome existing barriers to learning;
• working with individuals to create learning plans;
• formulating service plans and priorities, in cooperation with other providers;
• encouraging and influencing the development of new learning opportunities through formal and informal classes as well as individual tutoring and mentoring;
• community capacity building through supporting the development of community or local voluntary groups;
• identifying and providing for the training needs of local volunteers;
• sourcing grants and funding for community projects;
• allocating and monitoring budgets;
• undertaking the administration and evaluation of provision and reporting to advisory bodies and management groups;
• managing staff and dealing with team training, although this is more usual in senior roles.

Depending on the role, some community education officers have responsibility for particular groups, such as young people, families, black and ethnic minority groups, unemployed adults or travelling people. Others promote participation in specific settings, such as national parks, urban and rural areas, and in specific communities of interest, such as homeless people or carers' groups.

Community education officers usually (though not exclusively) work in areas of social deprivation or high unemployment, to develop provision and to challenge individual, collective and institutional perceptions about learning. In Northern Ireland, community education officers work in similar contexts but are often involved in using education to foster better community relations. Some community education officers may have a specific focus on enabling access to appropriate qualifications and relevant training. This often involves working sensitively and creatively to overcome barriers and may entail many setbacks before success rates are obvious.

There may be strong links with social work, health or housing support agencies and local charities. Government initiatives are currently encouraging lifelong learning and increasing access to education in sections of the community that have not traditionally taken part before. In these instances community education officers may work exclusively in the field of education to alleviate mental health problems, homelessness, substance addiction, crime or domestic violence.