Programme Assistant

Main Duties

Turf is Croydon’s homegrown art space; a registered charity set up and run by local artists to support creatives and our local community. Find out more about what we do, our team and our space by visiting turf-projects.com/about-turf

This is a new role in the organisation designed to assist the Programme team with planning and delivering events and workshops as part of our exciting upcoming contemporary art projects. You’ll be responsible for coordinating and delivering public events that tie into our gallery shows, including talks, creative workshops, visits from schools, and our popular Family Art Fun Days. Look at our events archive to get a sense of the kind of workshops we run.

This is an entry level role. Training will be provided and support offered to enable someone starting out in or switching into a creative career to succeed in the role. No specific experience is required, but an interest in and passion for engagement in the arts will be necessary.

Key responsibilities

• Working closely with the Programme Manager, CoDirector (Programme & People), Learning & Access Coordinator, and other Turf team members to plan and coordinate events to engage the public with our programmes. This includes:
  • Liaising with artists/facilitators and other space users to arrange dates and times for events.
  • Compiling images, artist bios, and event descriptions for our Marketing Assistant to use to promote the events.
  • Ordering and preparing materials,
• Delivering these events and workshops for the public, including;
  • Setting up and tidying up the space before and after events.
  • Checking in attendees at the start of the events, and collecting feedback and encouraging donations at the end.
  • Representing Turf and promoting a safe and welcoming environment for visitors, staff, and other space users.
• Providing or arranging access support for attendees with access needs to engage. Access support training will be provided.
• Being familiar with programme activities in order to answer visitor’s questions and feed into planning of potential future events and ways to engage the public.
• Attending team meetings, quarterly trustee meetings, and annual review dates, and sharing in shared space care and collaborative planning processes.

By the end of the contract term, you will feel confident in planning and delivering arts related events and workshops independently to engage a wide variety of people in our activities.

Essential things to know about working at Turf

• Turf is a registered charity with a board of trustees who oversee our work. You’d need to align with Turf and the Charity Commission’s policies on finance management, code of conduct, conflict of interest, health and safety, equal opportunities & safeguarding.
• At Turf we;
  • Have mutual accountability processes and collaborative decision making on major decisions. We check in with each other weekly and have a board meeting quarterly.
  • All share in front of house duties, though we also participate in some working from home as possible.
  • Share various rota tasks e.g restocking the loo roll!
• As an artist-led space, 10% of our time can be used as ‘Wiggle Time’ – wiggle room to spend on activities which are of benefit to both our practices and Turf. It’s a bit like paid personal development time, but geared towards ensuring our practices are interwoven into Turf.
• Key tools we use are; Google Drive/Sheets, Xero, Asana, Slack – use of these forms the backbone of our accountability processes.

Skills and Experience Required

Person specification:

• We’re looking for someone with an affinity with Turf’s aims and ethos. We strive to be welcoming, kind, accessible and curious, conscious of our duty to the public and those we work with.
• You’ll be confident and patient, great at communication and collaborating, and able to work with individuals and organisations from a wide range of backgrounds, ages, and levels of experience.
• Organisation is a key part of this role; you’ll need to have excellent organisational and time management skills.
• You’ll have an active interest in arts and culture with an awareness of current arts and socio-political discourses (i.e. you like to interrogate things and ask questions!).
• You’ll be available on Saturdays (approximately twice a month) to assist or deliver workshops.
• Turf is an artist-led space, so we’d love to hear about your artistic practice if you have one. This is important as we all feed into programming at Turf.
• Experience in workshop facilitation and events delivery is a bonus, but not required.
• Personal connections to & active knowledge of Croydon are essential to engage meaningfully with our visitors.