A lot has happened since last autumn when I wrote about the Elevate funding we’d received from Arts Council England to help the Touretteshero team grow and make new plans for the future.

Our plans included recruiting for a General Manger, a role that we urgently needed to meet the demand for our work. It was hugely disappointing that we had to pause recruitment back in April because of COVID-19, but we’ve been able to keep the funding for this role and plan to re-open recruitment in the spring.

This post is about a new role at Touretteshero – we’re looking for a Solidarity Worker. Let me tell more about this post and what we hope it will achieve.

Throughout the pandemic we’ve been prioritising our essential services. These have included providing direct support to disabled Londoners and people with Tourettes across the UK. Traditionally we talked about this strand of our work as ‘support’ or ‘outreach’ but neither of these terms has ever felt quite right.

So, we’re now describing this type of work as Solidarity because it locates us directly within the community we’re providing services for.

We’ve secured funding from the Social Enterprise Support Fund to develop new services for people with Tourettes and their families. We’ll focus on providing practical responsive support, making resources, and nurturing disabled young creatives through a brand-new commissions programme.

And if that sounds interesting, perhaps you can help!

We’re looking for a Solidarity Worker who can coordinate these services for us. It’s a part time role, initially for six months, and we’re open to requests for flexible working.

While Touretteshero is based in London, the Solidarity Worker will have national scope and the role will include significant levels of home working, so we’ll consider applications anywhere in the UK.

The role involves working closely with people with Tourettes and their families and we’d really encourage people with lived experience of disability, Tourettes or associated conditions, to apply.

It’s been an incredibly tough year for many people and watching the impact on our community, both locally and across the world, has been hard. People with Tourettes are facing some specific challenges and we’re really excited to be in a position to find new ways of offering support and solidarity.

• The application deadline is Monday 30th November 2020
• Interviews will be via Zoom
• The recruitment pack, with all the information you need to apply can be downloaded here.

Touretteshero uses the Social Model of disability and as a disabled-led organisation we’re used to making adjustments so everyone can do their best work. You can find out what this looks like for me here.

If you’re a great communicator with excellent organisational skills and a passion for social justice, we’d love to hear from you. Please help us by sharing this post with anyone you think might be interested in this exciting new role.