Science Technician

The Role and the Department

Ark Greenwich Free School would like to appoint a proactive and highly organised Science Technician who will predominantly provide laboratory support to staff and scholars and contribute towards an exciting, growing science department. Additionally, this post provides an opportunity to develop your career enhancing your skills across departments. We are proud to be at the cutting edge of international educational developments with a dedicated team of professional staff who are passionate about providing outstanding education and pastoral care for all students.

You will support class teachers in science lessons from year 7-11. Other responsibilities will include preparing practical equipment, apparatus and resources, monitoring standards and practices within the lab. You may also contribute in helping the head of science with administrative jobs. There will also be opportunities to grow your skills through supporting our creative departments and school wide activities. This means that we are looking for a flexible and highly organized individual with a background in science and an interest in education across a range of subject areas. Previous experience within a school laboratory or similar environment would be advantageous.

• Salaries 2.5% higher than main pay scale.
• Twice as many training days as standard.
• Generous pension scheme.
• Access to Ark rewards – a scheme offering savings from over 3,000 major retailers
• Interest-free loans – up to £5,000 available for season ticket or to buy a bicycle.
• Gym discounts – offering up to 40%.
• Access to Employee Assistance Programme – providing free, confidential counselling, legal advice and a range of different support.

How is Ark Greenwich different?

• We are part of the Ark family of schools and benefit accordingly from outstanding networking and career opportunities and first-class CPD. 
• Staff wellbeing is one of our main priorities. We provide breakfast for staff each morning, lunch for early careers staff and have a 6pm/weekend work-related communication cut off. We do not do knee jerk reactions, fads or last-minute deadlines. Our systems and processes for communication, marking and feedback and assessment are streamlined and the approaches we take are research led and based on our local context. We offer a WFH day to HoDs for curriculum design and also offer external marking of scripts to support workload.
• This is a small school model (600 scholars aged 11-16) because we believe that our close-knit family community provides the optimum conditions for success.   
• Scholar behaviour is exceptional with clearly defined and embedded routines. This means our teachers can focus their time on the things that matter – planning and delivering brilliant lessons for our scholars. 
• This is a strict no excuses, no mobile phone school. Phones are not permitted onsite at all. Scholars wear business dress to prepare them for a professional career.
• Our curriculum is traditional and academic, and we do not take shortcuts to seek to boost our position in school league tables – we do not, for example, offer equivalencies such as Btecs or Vcerts.
• We put high-quality teaching at the heart of what we do. We are committed to providing staff with weekly high-quality training. We run coaching for staff who want to see rapid progress in their discipline. Live coaching and current best practice in the field of education is central to our approach. 
• We don’t grade individual lessons or ask for lesson plans but we do place a primacy on curriculum design, independent learning and formative assessment.
• Our scholars enjoy a compulsory co-curricular program on a Wednesday afternoon which includes a strong focus on community volunteering and we facilitate 6 drop-down days per academic year ensuring scholars benefit from a range of life-enriching experiences. 

Alignment with the school’s vision, values and approach to education is essential.