School Support Manager

Ark The King's School; Pontefract; On-site; GBP 42,000 - 52,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Career development

CPD opportunities

EDD days

LGPS pension

Work-life balance

Ark Rewards

Blue Light Card

Wellbeing programme

Job summary

The King’s School, part of the Ark network, is seeking a School Support Manager to lead administration, reception, reprographics and first aid teams, ensuring efficient and professional support across the school. You will drive data governance, HR administration, financial processes and student services, and work with senior leaders to uphold safeguarding while continually improving systems.

This is a strategic, hands-on leadership role in a busy school environment.

Qualifications

• Experience leading or coordinating administrative functions within a busy environment.
• Excellent organisational skills and attention to detail.
• Ability to manage sensitive information with discretion and confidentiality.
• Confident and effective communication with students, staff, families and external agencies.
• Proactive in developing and improving systems and processes.
• Thrives in a fast-paced environment and prioritises to meet deadlines.
• Commitment to safeguarding, inclusion and delivering a high service level.

Responsibilities

• Lead and manage the administration, reception, reprographics and first aid teams.
• Oversee key school systems including data management, information governance and SCR maintenance.
• Coordinate HR administration processes including recruitment, induction and personnel records.
• Manage financial administration activities including ordering, payments, cash handling and debt recovery support.
• Lead administration of student services and ensure policies for student support are implemented.
• Lead parental communications and identify opportunities to improve systems and ways of working across the school.

Skills

Leadership

Administration

Data management

HR administration

Financial processes

Student services

Reception

First aid

Job description

Lead, innovate, support - become our School Support Manager at The King’s School.

We’re looking for an organised, proactive and dedicated School Support Manager to play a vital role in ensuring our school runs smoothly, efficiently and with an unwavering focus on supporting student success.

This is a key leadership role for a skilled professional who thrives in a busy school environment and is passionate about delivering outstanding operational support. As School Support Manager, you will play a pivotal role in ensuring the smooth day‑to‑day running of the school, overseeing a team of staff to ensure high‑quality administrative, reception and operational services are provided that enable staff and students to succeed.

Working closely with senior leaders, you will lead a range of essential functions including administration, reception, reprographics, first aid, data management, HR administration, financial processes and student services. You will ensure that systems are effective, compliant and continually evolving to meet the needs of our school community.

This is a fantastic opportunity to make a significant impact behind the scenes, helping to create the conditions for excellent teaching, learning and student outcomes.

Key responsibilities

In this pivotal position, you will:

1. Lead and manage the administration, reception, reprographics and first aid teams, ensuring efficient and professional support across the school.
2. Oversee key school systems including data management, information governance, and the accurate maintenance of the Single Central Record.
3. Coordinate HR administration processes, including recruitment, induction arrangements, personnel records and sickness absence monitoring recruitment administration.
4. Manage financial administration activities, including ordering processes, payment systems, cash handling, and support for debt recovery procedures.
5. Lead the administration of student services, ensuring policies relating to student support are implemented effectively and consistently.
6. Lead parental communications
7. Identify opportunities to improve systems, processes and ways of working across the school.

Contract details:

1. Permanent, all-year-round contract
2. 36 hours per week.

Is this role for you?

We’re looking for someone who:

1. Has experience leading or coordinating administrative functions within a busy and fast-paced environment.
2. Demonstrates excellent organisational skills and exceptional attention to detail.
3. Can manage sensitive information with professionalism, discretion and confidentiality.
4. Communicates confidently and effectively students, staff, families, visitors and external agencies.
5. Takes initiative and enjoys developing and improving systems and processes.
6. Thrives in a fast‑paced environment and can prioritise effectively to meet tight deadlines.
7. Is committed to safeguarding, inclusion and delivering an excellent service to the school community.

If you are a motivated professional looking for a varied and rewarding leadership role where you can make a real difference to the success of a school, we would love to hear from you.

School visits and further information

Potential candidates are encouraged and very welcome to visit our school. This is a great opportunity to explore our facilities, meet our dedicated staff, and get a feel for the vibrant community we have built here. We look forward to welcoming you and answering any questions you may have. Please contact us at [e-mail] or call 01977 601701 to arrange this.

About The Kings School

The King’s School is proud of its exceptional academic achievements and rich heritage, where tradition meets the future with confidence and excitement.

1. Recognised as the one of the highest-performing schools in the Wakefield District.
2. Renowned for incredibly high standards and excellence across all areas.
3. Every student is encouraged and championed to reach their full potential and live out our values and ethos.
4. A school environment where careers flourish and every child is embraced as exceptional, individual, and talented beyond measure.

This is an exciting time to join The King’s School as we continue to build on our reputation for excellence.

At the heart of The King’s School is a commitment to nurturing ambition and improving life chances for every student. We believe in creating an environment where students thrive academically and personally, supported by strong values and a culture of care.

As one of the oldest schools in Yorkshire, we are proud of our heritage and tradition, which continues to shape our future focused approach to education.

What our staff say about working here

In the 2025 Edurio Staff Survey, The King’s School’s results reflected the supportive and positive culture within our team.

Here’s what our staff had to say…

I genuinely love working at King’s!

My line manager always takes my personal needs into account. He is consistently supportive, approachable, and shows genuine care and understanding when it comes to my wellbeing.

Want to learn more?

For more insight, click here to watch our short promotional film, which asks the question, ‘Where will King’s take you?’

What can we offer you?

Be part of a team that values your growth, wellbeing and work-life balance. We offer a supportive environment with benefits designed to help you thrive including:

1. Exciting career and leadership pathways supported by outstanding CPD opportunities
2. Everyday Development (EDD) Framework: A simple, personal and flexible goal-based approach to continuous learning, career growth and wellbeing
3. For 2026/2027 academic year, we have provided staff with three Everyday Development (EDD) days, the next is on Friday 11th December 2026. These development days will offer you self-directed time away from the workplace to recharge and reflect on your personal and career goals
4. Generous employer pension (West Yorkshire Pension Fund - LGPS)
5. Fantastic family friendly policies with a focus on employee work/life balance
6. Access to Ark Rewards scheme offering savings from over 3,000 major retailers, interest‑free loans available for season tickets or a bike, gym discounts offering up to 40% off your local gym and free eye tests
7. Blue Light Card
8. Employee wellbeing programme (including physiotherapy, personal or professional concerns on legal, health, finance, wellbeing, and other matters).

Click here to find out more about the benefits of working for Ark

About Ark

There are 34,000 students learning in our network of 48 schools across Birmingham, Hastings, London, Pontefract and Portsmouth. We’ve always believed that, with the right approach, every child has the potential to succeed. We work in the communities where we can make the biggest difference to children’s lives, and all our schools are non-selective.

It works: our schools achieve great results – significantly outperforming national averages, especially when it comes to driving progress – the best measure for ‘closing the gap’.

We take what we learn in our schools to develop new solutions and approaches that we can share. Over the last two decades, we have developed and incubated more than 20 projects and programmes, supporting them to scale and achieve systemic impact on the life chances of all children. Over 300,000 children currently learn using an Ark curriculum and our Ark Start nurseries are demonstrating a new model for early years education that we hope will become the norm.