university-pledges-to-support-armed-forces-personnel

Our Armed Forces Commitment

Are you a member of the Armed Forces, a Reservist, an Adult Cadet Volunteer, a Service Veteran or a member of a Service Family?

If the answer is yes to any of the above, then Canterbury Christ Church University is pleased to recognise and value the unique skills and attributes that you bring to our workplace.

To demonstrate the university commitment to you, our Vice-Chancellor signed the Armed Forces Covenant in October 2016. The covenant sets out the University's commitment to ensuring those who serve, whether regular or reserve, veterans, service families and those who help young people into Armed Forces careers (adult cadet volunteers), face no disadvantage compared with others in our organisation, and that special consideration will be given by the University to this group.

A member of the Senior Management Team was nominated as the Armed Forces Lead to effectively manage our response to the covenant. During 2017, the Armed Forces Lead worked directly with staff to develop insight into their experiences of being a reservist within the organisation. As a result of this work, good practice was revealed.

"As a Reservist I am a Flight Lieutenant currently serving in the RAF Reserves with 600 City of London Sqn at RAF Northolt. My role is to organise, plan, deliver and quality assure all training that takes place. We have had many personnel who support the regular RAF and have been on operations including Afghanistan, so the commitment is extremely high. To date I have felt very well supported by Christ Church.

My line manager is extremely supportive and so are my peers who have covered for me as required when I have attended a variety of events. I live 101 miles from 600 Sqn so there have been a couple of occasions when I have needed to leave work a little earlier which has not been an issue as I am trusted to complete my work."

— Rich Little, Senior Lecturer at CCCU

DEFENCE EMPLOYER RECOGNITION SCHEME SILVER AWARD

The University's commitment to the Armed Forces was acknowledged in 2017 when it received a Defence Employer Recognition Scheme Silver Award. You can find out more about the award here.

The University has a long history of student engagement with the Armed Forces, which continues enriching the lives of our students through engagement with the Officer Training Corp, tuition with Military bands and supporting career transitions. Building a supportive environment for our staff is equally important and this page highlights to managers and employees (new and established) how we help our Armed Forces staff community.

HELPING YOur career transition from the Regular Armed Forces

As part of the University's commitment to the British Armed Forces and to ensure that ex-armed forces personnel are not disadvantaged as a result of their service, veterans applying for a job at the University will be guaranteed the offer of an interview provided that they meet the essential criteria for the advertised role and are able to answer 'yes' to these questions:

Do you consider yourself to be a veteran of the British Armed Forces?
Are you currently serving in the British Armed Forces and are within 12 weeks of your discharge date? Or
Were you in long-term employment within the British Armed Forces within the last five years?

The University also works with the Career Transition Partnership to ensure employment opportunities are made available to veterans.

The University has recently launched an Armed Forces Staff Network with the initial focus on sharing experiences and thinking through contributions to the University's work with the Armed Forces Covenant. The network will also explore the development of peer mentoring as an enabler of transitions.

The University is exploring other ways to assist those leaving the Armed Forces who are seeking employment with us, including signposting for family members to our UNITEMPS website, to enable their employment at the same time as yours.

The university also looks favourably on Armed Forces personnel wishing to transition into study in Higher Education, so please make sure this is clearly stated on your application form for any programme of study (*Admission Policy update 2017-18).

Support for service families

In addition to the Armed Forces Staff Network that service family members may attend, the University also offers a day's leave to members of a service family to coincide with the deployment of their spouse/partner/sibling/child.

FACILITATING Reservist deployment

The University has an established policy for when volunteers and regular reservists are deployed into active service.

This sets out the arrangements required for employees to be released to be deployed
It also enables those who are supporting their country during times of conflict to be assured of their continued employment for a guaranteed time period.

encouraging your development as a Reservist

The University recognises the value of, and the skills developed, during Reservist activities. In acknowledgement of this our plans include;

developing links with the Armed Forces community across Kent and Medway to enable awareness raising of their role and the opportunities available to our staff;
support for reservist staff to attend development opportunities provided by the Armed Forces community, which will demonstrate a positive contribution to your work in the University (for example leadership and technical courses). These opportunities will be at no cost to the university;
support to enable active reservists to attend the required Annual Camp (or similar training commitments), without detriment to their or their familie's wellbeing;
reservists at the University are entitled to an additional ten days paid leave, to undertake reservists activities. This leave is only to be used for reservists' annual training. If it is not used in one annual leave year, it will not carry over to the next.