ELSA / Thrive Practitioner – SEMH School (Horley, Independent)

Location: Horley
Age Group: 11+
School Type: Small, Independent, Vocational & Highly Therapeutic
Start: ASAP
Contract: Full‑time, long‑term
Experience: ELSA or Thrive preferred, SEMH experience highly beneficial

Are you passionate about emotional wellbeing, therapeutic support, and helping young people rebuild confidence?
Do you want to work in a setting where relationships, nurture, and emotional literacy are at the heart of everything?

A wonderful small, independent SEMH school in Horley is looking for an ELSA or Thrive Practitioner to join their therapeutic support team. Working with students aged 11+, you’ll play a vital role in helping them understand feelings, manage emotions, build resilience, and develop positive coping strategies.

If you love seeing young people grow emotionally and socially — this is the role where your impact truly counts.

💛 The Role – ELSA / Thrive Practitioner

As part of the school’s wellbeing provision, you’ll deliver targeted emotional literacy sessions, support behaviour regulation, and help create a calm, stable school experience for every student.

Your responsibilities will include:

• Delivering 1:1 emotional literacy and wellbeing sessions
• Running small‑group work focused on confidence, friendships, and self‑regulation
• Supporting students with anxiety, low mood, trauma backgrounds and behavioural needs
• Using ELSA, Thrive or therapeutic strategies to build emotional awareness
• Supporting de‑escalation and offering nurturing interventions
• Working closely with the Pastoral Lead, SENCO, therapists and teaching staff
• Creating safe, trusted spaces where pupils feel heard and understood

Because the school is vocational and very therapeutic, you’ll have the time and freedom to build meaningful, long‑term relationships.

🌟 Who We’re Looking For

You might be:

• A qualified ELSA
• A Thrive Practitioner
• A Therapeutic Teaching Assistant
• A behaviour mentor with emotional‑literacy experience
• Or someone with strong SEMH experience who is keen to specialise

You’ll thrive here if you are:

• Warm, nurturing and emotionally intelligent
• Calm and confident supporting dysregulation and behaviour
• Skilled in building trusting relationships with young people aged 11+
• Able to deliver structured sessions around emotions, resilience and friendships
• Reflective, patient, creative, and consistent

🏫 Why This School?

• A close‑knit, small independent school
• Highly vocational, therapeutic and relationship‑based
• Supportive leadership who genuinely value staff wellbeing
• Progression opportunities and ongoing CPD
• A chance to help young people rebuild trust, stability and self-belief
• An environment where the little wins matter just as much as the big ones

📩 Interested?

If you’re passionate about emotional wellbeing and want to make a life‑changing difference in a nurturing SEMH environment, we’d love to hear from you.

How to Apply: If you are passionate about education and eager to make a difference in the lives of young learners, we would love to hear from you. Apply below.