Garden Supervisor

We are looking for a volunteer with gardening / horticultural knowledge and experience of supervising groups outdoors, to assist our lead volunteer gardener in running the WERS garden group on Mondays.

The WERS garden group meet fortnightly, to do planting and garden maintenance in the outdoor area surrounding the main WERS building.

The aim of the WERS garden project is to provide opportunities for people with lived experience of the asylum system to engage in outdoor gardening tasks and the associated benefits for physical and mental well-being; secondly, to provide an opportunity for people to come together socially and spend time in each other’s company; thirdly, to improve the environment at WERS, to create a welcoming, beautiful and peaceful space for anyone visiting the building to spend time in.

We started developing the garden at WERS about 18 months ago, and are lucky to have a professional gardener who volunteers once a fortnight with us, who oversees planning and tasks for garden volunteers. We are developing the WERS garden along wildlife-friendly principles, so there are areas which are deliberately left to be more ‘wild,’ as a habitat for urban wildlife.

We are looking for another 1 - 2 volunteers with experience of both wildlife-friendly gardening and working / volunteering with groups, to supervise the group sessions alongside and in consultation with our volunteer gardener.

Skills

• Horticultural / gardening experience
• Experience of supervising people in an outdoor group setting
• Experience of health and safety / managing risk in relation to garden and outdoor group tasks (desirable)
• Good communication and listening skills
• Friendly, kind, non-judgemental, inclusive, empathetic - good interpersonal skills
• Adaptable and flexible
• Understanding of and ability to maintain confidentiality
• Reliable and committed when making arrangements, and to the volunteer role over time
• Willingness to learn