Schools Outreach Lead

Schools Outreach Lead

• REMOTE, ANYWHERE IN CANADA
• Location: Remote, anywhere in Canada. You work with schools and school boards nationwide, remotely, and occasionally travel to them as needed (expenses paid)
• Employment: Part-time employee
• Hours: 20 hours a week to start. More hours can be agreed as the work grows
• Pay: $79,000 to $96,000 a year full-time equivalent (40 hours a week), depending on experience, paid in proportion to your hours: $39,500 to $48,000 a year at 20 hours a week
• Reports to: The CEO
• Start: As soon as possible

About us

Chapter One gives children one-to-one reading support at the time they need it most, in schools (online and in person) and at home (online, via the family's smartphone). We are a national not-for-profit corporation and registered Canadian charity with a team working from home across the country.

Summary

• Can you work out how a school board decides to take on something new, and who has to say yes?
• Will you follow up, politely and persistently, until you get an answer?
• When something is going wrong, do you speak up early?
• Would you like to help more children get one-to-one reading help at home?

If you answered yes, you may be our next Schools Outreach Lead!

Teachers and principals are often the first to see that a child needs reading support. We are looking for someone who understands schools and school boards to determine, board by board, often school by school, how more children who need this help can get it at home, and to build the working relationships that keep it going. The measure of this job is how many children start with us through the schools and boards you work with. You and the CEO agree on the number in your first month, and you review it each term.

Every school board works differently: who decides, what it can take on, and what it needs from us to make it work. You need to be resourceful, as you will not be handed a script. Much of the work is reaching out to people who did not ask to hear from us, and many will say not now. You follow up patiently over weeks and months, work independently, and tell the CEO what you are learning.

What you would do

• Find what works, board by board and school by school. Build your own list of schools, school boards and education authorities, starting with those we already work with. In many boards a principal cannot refer families to a program until the board has agreed, so you will often start centrally.
• Work out how each one can act. For each, find who can say yes, what they can and cannot do, and what would make it easy for them. Then propose an approach that fits, try it and learn from it.
• Work with Indigenous-governed schools and education authorities on their terms. Where a school or authority is run by a First Nation, or by an Inuit or Métis government or organization, the community decides whether and how we work together, and on what timeline.
• Explain Chapter One simply. Tell a busy person in two minutes what we do and why it helps the children in their school.
• Turn conversations into children starting with us. Agree on a way of working with each school or board that fits what it can do, then keep it going and adjust it until it works.
• Keep clear records and report daily. Note which school or board you contacted, who you spoke to and what happened, and send the CEO a short update each day you work: what you tried, what came of it and what you will try next.

Qualifications

• You already know how schools and school boards work, as a teacher, principal, education worker, social worker or community liaison, or you have worked with a school board or a children's service. This is the main thing we are looking for.
• You have been responsible for a number you could count, such as enrolments, referrals, sign-ups, partnerships or funds raised, and can tell us what you did when you were behind.
• You have built partnerships or programs with schools or community organizations, and can tell us what came of them.
• Experience working with First Nations, Inuit or Métis communities, families or education staff is a strong asset.

What else we are looking for

• You are motivated by our mission, work independently and take initiative. You set your own priorities, and you come to the CEO early with what you observe, including problems, and what you suggest.
• You enjoy working with colleagues across the organization, and you give and receive constructive feedback.
• You have an optimistic outlook, and you are patient, adaptable and diplomatic when priorities differ.
• You work out how an organization makes its decisions and find a way through, rather than waiting to be told how.
• You build working relationships quickly. If you already know people in schools or school boards, that helps a lot.
• You explain things plainly, in the language schools use. You follow up politely and persistently until there is an answer. When a school says no, you respect it; when it says not yet, you agree when to come back.

How we work

Our staff team works from home across Canada, alongside part-time tutors who work with children in schools (online and in person) and at home (online, via families' smartphones). We use Google Workspace and rely on clear procedures and shared calendars. Everyone here wears more than one hat and pitches in where the need is greatest, such as helping at an event, covering for a colleague who is away or helping a new tool or program start.

You will work closely with the CEO and with colleagues across the organization. Most of your conversations with schools happen during the school day, so you must be available to work during school hours. We set your weekly schedule with you. The 20 hours continue through the summer, when schools are closed and the work shifts to planning, follow-up and records. Time you spend travelling to schools for work counts as working time.

Benefits and terms

• Employee position on our payroll, with paid vacation and sick time from your first day, and group benefits once you have passed the probationary period (three months).
• Your employment contract is issued for the province you live in.
• Because most of the work happens during the school day, this role is hard to combine with a full-time job. If you have another job, we will talk at interview about how to avoid any conflict of interest.
• Check your employer's outside-work policy before you apply. After a conditional offer you will be asked to complete a police information check through a third-party service, with your written consent.

About Chapter One Canada

Chapter One Canada is a registered Canadian charity (No. 73848 6117 RR0001), part of a global education non-profit working in Canada, the US and the UK. In the 2025-26 school year, Chapter One Canada supported 2,090 children. We currently work in nine provinces and territories and are expanding quickly. Besides one-to-one tutoring in schools and at home, we run an online reading volunteer program, and we co-create original storybooks with Indigenous writers, illustrators and Elders, which anyone can read for free in our Global Free Library.

Diversity, equity and inclusion

Chapter One is an advocate for equity and is committed to ensuring its community is diverse and inclusive. We welcome applications from First Nations, Inuit and Métis candidates.

We also welcome people whose experience does not look like a straight line.

How to apply

Apply on our website only: https://jobs.chapterone.ca/outreach

Upload or paste your résumé, then answer five short written questions. The first is a cover letter. Allow about an hour.

Write the answers in your own words. We would rather read something specific and real than something formulaic or overly polished by AI. When you apply through the form on our website, you can leave and come back on the same device; your answers are kept in your browser until you send them.

Apply by Monday 30 November 2026. We read applications as they arrive, so applying early helps. If you ask us for an accommodation or a different format, we treat your application as received on the day you wrote to us.

If we invite you to interview, you may be asked to do a short case exercise on an invented school board. We also check references, including someone you reported to, and we ask you before we contact anyone. If we share internal material with finalists, we ask them to keep it confidential.

This posting is for an existing vacancy. We use artificial intelligence to help us screen, assess and select applicants, including to summarize and rank applications against what this posting asks for. A person makes every decision; software never turns an application down on its own.

Within 45 days after your last interview with us, we will tell you whether we have made a hiring decision.

If you need this posting, this form or any part of our hiring process in a different format, or an accommodation at any stage, write to jobs@chapterone.ca and we will arrange it. Asking will not count against you.

See all our jobs at https://www.chapterone.ca/jobs