Entry Department Specialist 80-100%

About the job

Start date:

01.02.2027 or by arrangement

Workplace:

Gampelen

The Witzwil Correctional Facility enforces sentences and measures on 184 adult men in open imprisonment as well as in administrative detention under immigration law. The inmates are guided and supported in various professions in agriculture, trade, and supply according to work-educational principles. Around 140 employees work consistently towards the goal of reintegration and reducing recidivism of the inmates. Production goals and enforcement goals do not compete but complement each other.
The entry department accompanies newly admitted inmates during their initial enforcement phase until allocation to a regular workplace. The interdisciplinary team creates important foundations for the further stay through a structured potential assessment.

Your tasks

As an entry department specialist, you accompany newly admitted inmates during the entry phase. You conduct anamnesis interviews, analyse relevant files, and record resources, development areas, support needs, and internal risks through structured observation and appropriate survey methods. From this, you prepare internal reports with initial goals and practical recommendations for further enforcement planning, care, support, and employment. Furthermore, you participate in internal workplace allocation as well as transfers to subsequent enforcement areas.
In the daily work of the entry department, the inmates are cared for and supported and use the various work and learning fields specifically for your assessment work.
As a member of an interdisciplinary team, you actively contribute your own professional perspective to the joint assessment and evaluation and participate in the further development of the entry department. In addition, you take on specialist and additional tasks as needed and support other operational tasks within the available resources.

Your profile

You have training in social pedagogy, social work, or work education and ideally several years of professional experience in the correctional system or a comparable institutional environment.
You bring experience in working with people with complex psychosocial problems and psychological abnormalities as well as in professional communication. You work confidently according to the principles of work education and approach intercultural issues with openness and professional assurance.
As a resilient, stable, and open-minded personality, you keep a clear head even in demanding situations. You appreciate a versatile working environment and are open to flexibly deploying your resources depending on the workload.
You have very good German language skills in spoken and written form as well as good oral French skills and good French reading comprehension. English skills and other language skills are an advantage. You are proficient in using digital work and documentation systems and open to new applications.

We offer you

You can expect a varied and responsible role in one of the largest agricultural enterprises in Switzerland. In an interdisciplinary team, you actively shape the entry phase and thus important foundations for the further enforcement process. As a "bridge to freedom," you make a significant contribution to the reintegration of inmates into society.
You work in a varied environment where professional assessment, relationship work, work education, and daily enforcement come together directly. We support your professional development and enable you to acquire the necessary enforcement knowledge alongside your job at the Swiss Competence Centre for Correctional Services.
Your workplace is located on the extensive grounds of the Witzwil Correctional Facility in a unique natural landscape.

Contact

We look forward to receiving your application. Please send your application documents online by 09.10.2026.
Due to holiday absences, we will gladly provide further information as follows:

• until 24.09.2026: Melina Tresch, Entry Department, Tel. 031 636 51 52;
• 28.09. to 02.10.2026: Bernhard Gerber, Deputy Head of Enforcement Area, Tel. 031 635 75 72;
• from 05.10.2026: Andrea Steinbeisser, Head of Enforcement Area, Tel. 031 635 65 11.

About the Office for Correctional Services

The Office for Correctional Services (AJV) is responsible within the Security Directorate of the Canton of Bern (SID) for open and closed penal and measure enforcement for adults and juveniles, with around 1000 employees. To fulfil this task, the office has four concordat correctional facilities, four regional prisons, the surveillance station at Inselspital, the detention control centre, as well as probation and enforcement services at its disposal.

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