Job Description
Post: Sparkle Funding and Impact Officer
Accountable to: Head of Sparkle Operations
Location: Working from home with travel to Sparkle Head Office (Serennu Children’s Centre, Newport) for in-person meetings/events as required
Salary: £16,848 per annum
Hours: 22.5 hours per week, Flexible working pattern considered; some evening/weekend work required for events
Contract: Permanent
Holidays: 25 days per year pro rata, not including bank holidays
Pension: Automatic enrolment pension scheme. Sparkle matches members’ 5% contribution.
About Sparkle
Sparkle is the official charity supporting Serennu Children’s Centre, Nevill Hall Children’s Centre and Caerphilly Children’s Centre.
Sparkle’s principles are to ensure that children with a disability or developmental difficulty, and their families, are fully supported to participate in valued childhood experiences and have access to the same range of opportunities, activities, services and facilities as other children.
Several hundred children visit the centres each week. Sparkle has to raise more than £700,000 every year to fund the vital services we deliver, including specialist leisure activities, family activities, and holistic family support services.
Job Purpose
To secure income from trusts, foundations, statutory funders, and other sources by identifying opportunities, writing compelling applications, and managing grants from award to completion.
The role will also lead on capturing and analysing the impact of Sparkle’s work—collating data, conducting consultations, and producing high-quality reports for internal and external audiences.
The postholder will play a key role in demonstrating the value of Sparkle’s services to funders, stakeholders, and the wider community.
Key responsibilities
Research, identify, and prioritise funding opportunities from trusts, foundations, statutory bodies, and local authorities.
Write clear, persuasive, and tailored funding applications and expressions of interest.
Manage the full grant lifecycle—from application to monitoring and final reporting—ensuring deadlines and compliance requirements are met.
Maintain accurate, up-to-date records of grants, funder communications, and reporting history using appropriate systems.
Liaise with funders to build and maintain positive relationships, respond to queries, and provide regular updates.
Work with programme leads and finance colleagues to gather relevant information for funding bids and impact reports.
Conduct surveys, interviews, and focus groups to gather feedback from families, young people, and partners.
Analyse feedback and outcome data to assess service quality and identify areas for improvement.
Produce engaging, evidence-based evaluation reports that demonstrate Sparkle’s outcomes and impact.
Support the preparation of board and committee reports on funding and impact.
Represent Sparkle at funding meetings, events, and stakeholder engagements, as required.
Confidentiality
In the course of your duties you may have access to confidential material about children, young people and their families. On no account must information be divulged to anyone other than authorised persons, for example, other professional staff as appropriate. If you are in any doubt whatsoever as to the authority of a person or body asking for information of this nature, you must seek advice from your manager.
Similarly, no information of a personal confidential nature concerning individual members of staff should be divulged to anyone without the proper authority having first been given. Failure to observe these rules will be regarded by your employers as serious gross misconduct, which could result in disciplinary action being taken against you. Individuals will be responsible for any records they create, use or handle. This responsibility is established at, and defined by law.
All employees who record, handle, store or otherwise come across information, have a personal common-law duty of confidence. The Data Protection Act 2018, places statutory restrictions on the use of personal information, including health information. All staff need to acknowledge the importance of personal records and their responsibilities.
It’s security is of prime importance and serious consequences can result should a record go missing. Any disclosure of such information without permission is a disciplinary offence and may result in dismissal.
Special Conditions
Working Hours
The post holder will be required to work flexibly and the post will require evening and weekend working as required by the needs of Sparkle.
Disclosure and Barring Service
This post is subject to an enhanced Disclosure and Barring check with a children barred list check.
This post is subject to an exception order under the provisions of the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974. This stipulates that all previous convictions, including those that are ‘spent’ must be declared.
Previous convictions will not necessarily preclude an individual from employment but must be declared in writing at the appropriate stage during the recruitment process.
General Responsibilities
Health & Safety
It is the responsibility of all employees to work to achieve a healthy and safe environment, and to take reasonable care of themselves and others.
Equality & Diversity
It is the responsibility of all employees to support Sparkle’s vision of promoting a positive approach to diversity and equality of opportunity, to eliminate discrimination and disadvantage in service delivery and employment, and to manage, support or comply through the implementation of Equality & Diversity Strategies and Policies.
This job description sets out the main duties of the post at the date when it was drawn up. Such duties may vary from time to time without changing the general character of the post or the level of responsibility entailed. Such variations are a common occurrence and cannot of themselves justify a reconsideration of the grading of the post.
Sparkle is committed to Safeguarding and Promoting the welfare of children, young people and vulnerable adults
Pay: £16,848.00 per year
Work Location: Hybrid remote in Newport NP10 9LY
