Managing Therapeutic Services and Advocating for Intersectional Feminism

What course/degree did you do?

Politics BA 

What is your current role?

Therapeutic Team Leader

What organisation are you working for?

Kirklees, Calderdale and Wakefield Rape and Sexual Abuse Centre (RASAC) 

How did you find this job?

Indeed

What do you enjoy about this job?

As Therapeutic Team Leader at RASAC I oversee the day-to-day line management of the organisations therapeutic service and team. In doing so, I provide line supervision for all therapeutic team members (paid staff, voluntary and placement students), I assist the Therapeutic Team Manager in driving forward projects funded for the therapeutic service and its development.

Equally, I oversee the organisations helpline and volunteering services, I deliver training internally and externally and I personally hold a reduced caseload of survivors assessments, therapeutic support and Group Therapy. Lastly, as an additional role, I also manage the social media for the whole organisation. I particularly enjoy the elements of my role that allow me to express my personal intersectional feminist values and ethos, for example, I recently organised and led a demonstration during Sexual Violence & Sexual Awareness Week 2023 to raise awareness on male sexual violence, not only within Kirklees, Calderdale and Wakefield but nationally.

Furthermore, I am immensely proud of the work I am able to do that grows our organisation and thus increases the number of survivors we are able to support. For example, through recruiting and training our inductees, this past year as an organisation we have supported over 10 trainee and newly qualified psychotherapists to offer therapeutic support to survivors of rape, sexual and domestic abuse.   

What skills are you using in this job that you got from Uni

In terms of knowledge that I gained whilst at Leeds Beckett University that I apply every day within my role, it would be a comprehensive understanding of intersectional feminist theory. When supporting survivors within our therapeutic services, undertaking research to apply for funding or in multi-agency meetings discussing exploitation within West Yorkshire, I have a comprehensive understanding of the personal, social and institutional layers of oppression that specifically survivors of rape, sexual and domestic abuse encounter, and the patriarchal structures that uphold these.

What advice would you give young women looking for work in this area?

You have to first be passionate about what you are doing and, as said best by Angela Davis, “you have to act as if it were possible to radically transform the world. And you have to do it all the time.”

For support with any of the themes mentioned above, you can contact the Kirklees, Calderdale and Wakefield Rape and Sexual Abuse Centre on 0300 303 4787 or via helpline@kcrasac.co.uk alternatively, you can contact the Rape Crisis National Helpline on https://rapecrisis.org.uk/get-help/want-to-talk/