JOB TITLE: Immigrant Domestic Violence Advocate
PROGRAM: Survivor Support Services
SUPERVISOR: Coordinator, Domestic Violence Services
WORKING HOURS: 40 hours per week
QUALIFICATIONS:
Education:
BA/BS in the social work or human services field required
MS/MA in the social work or human services field preferred.
Experience:
Experience (1-2 years) in providing direct human services is required.
Experience serving victims of violence and/or trauma is required.
Experience in the area of cultural responsiveness/humility and candidates who are bi/multi-lingual are encouraged to apply.
Additional Experience is Preferred:
- Ability to work effectively in crisis situations
- Enthusiasm for creating social change & passion for social justice
- Enjoy being part of and contributing to a team dedicated to human rights-based work
- Excellent communication (oral and written), interpersonal and organizational skills, including effective time management
- Flexible schedule to meet client safety needs
- Ability to work in a multi-cultural setting and communicate with clients from a variety of ethnic and religious backgrounds and lifestyles
- Must adhere to the Social Worker’s Code of Professional Ethics
- Current valid driver’s license, and access to own transportation
- Ability to meet short timelines, under pressure
JOB SUMMARY:
The primary role of the Advocate involves providing intensive, comprehensive, and culturally responsive services to foreign-national survivors of domestic violence within the Western New York community. IIB specializes in services to the immigrant community who experience specific and additional impediments to safety. IIB believes that safety and low-barrier access to crime victim support/compensation are the right of every individual and therefore, services that focus on education regarding those rights and access to all services are at the core of an advocate’s work. Provision of services may include:
- Individualized safety planning
- Providing and advocating for appropriate language access (advocate will receive on-going training on working effectively with an interpreter and providing culturally responsive services)
- Providing education on rights/laws within the United States and as victims of crime
- Crisis intervention
- Court advocacy and accompaniment (criminal and family court)
- Advocacy within the criminal justice system
- Linkages and/or accompaniment to medical, mental health, public benefit, legal services
- Advocacy and support on behalf of survivors’ children as secondary victims
The Advocate will also work with the program team to strengthen community partnerships with other domestic violence and immigrant specific service organizations in order to ensure a quality, community response to these vulnerable populations. This includes helping to identify both gaps in services and potential community resources to meet survivors’ individualized needs.
On-call responsibilities occur periodically.
Other duties: The Survivor Support Services team is truly that; a team. Members of this team are expected to both seek and provide support by attending group, program, and individual supervision. Team members are also expected to ascribe to and continually expand their knowledge of a human rights-based, trauma-informed, and harm reductionist perspective, which underlies all IIB services. This includes recognizing the intersectionality of trauma and culture and creating an atmosphere of welcome and equity, while working to ensure access to all services are as low-barrier as possible for survivors, no matter their age, experienced type of exploitation, immigration status, or stage of change they may be in at time of referral.
WORKING CONDITIONS:
As an equal opportunity employer, we stay true to our mission by ensuring that the Institute is a diverse and inclusive workplace where we welcome the unique contributions that our staff bring in terms of their education, opinions, culture, ethnicity, race, sex, gender identity and expression, nation of origin, age, languages spoken, veteran’s status, color, religion, disability, sexual orientation, beliefs, and more. This includes fostering an inclusive work culture and proactively addressing bias within our organization through intentional dialogues, trainings, and community connection.
HOW TO APPLY
We encourage expressions of interest as early as possible. For immediate consideration, please e-mail your cover letter and resume, along with salary requirements to:
Human Resources
International Institute of Buffalo
864 Delaware Avenue
Buffalo, NY 14209
www.iibuffalo.org
