susankenny Posted April 20, 2012 Share Posted April 20, 2012 I know that youth ministries can fire people up here, so, if your church is anti youth specific activities, I get that. But please let others answer my question so it doesn't derail. How big is your youth group? What ages does it include? Is it parent led or volunteer led or is an actual staff person over it? All of the above? My daughter is going into our youth program next year, which is for middle school through high school. I'm curious what other churches do to meet the needs of their youth (not planning to change our's - just comparing by contrast). Do you have specific meetings and/or activities suited to them? Thanks, Susan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris in VA Posted April 20, 2012 Share Posted April 20, 2012 We have 3 groups--one for 5th/6th, one for 7th/8th, and one for 9-12th. Each has two volunteers, or more, and there is a youth minister who is paid that oversees the entire program. Every adult takes sexual misconduct training, and they all have meetings for planning. The youngest group meets twice a month, on average, and the others meet every Sunday with some exceptions. They go on retreat together in one group--dd is going tonight for a two-night retreat (SO excited! lol). The oldest group gets to participate in a mission trip every summer if they want to (rising 9th graders thru rising college freshmen). Anything else you want to know about it? You can find our policies and calendar here. HTH Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
happi duck Posted April 20, 2012 Share Posted April 20, 2012 How big is your youth group? 4-10 kids, two leaders What ages does it include? jr hi and high school combined Is it parent led or volunteer led or is an actual staff person over it? All of the above? lay people but not parents, one man and one woman Do you have specific meetings and/or activities suited to them? they meet a couple times a weeks for bible study, lessons and games They also do some fundraising for various things Thanks, Susan our youth group is very separate from the church and has been a good outlet for our kids Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rockhopper Posted April 20, 2012 Share Posted April 20, 2012 basically non-existent. very small, mostly older parish. one teenage girl comes in addition to my son. they have their own SS. he sits in on the adult Wed night class, she helps with their younger sibs during that time. i'm not huge into youth group stuff but i wish there were a little more going on for ds Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SweetBean Posted April 20, 2012 Share Posted April 20, 2012 basically non-existent. very small, mostly older parish. one teenage girl comes in addition to my son. they have their own SS. he sits in on the adult Wed night class, she helps with their younger sibs during that time. i'm not huge into youth group stuff but i wish there were a little more going on for ds That is pretty much our situation as well. Our chruch is tiny, and we hate to leave it, but we are coming to the conclusion that our kids need more opportunities to be with other kids. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
susankenny Posted April 20, 2012 Author Share Posted April 20, 2012 Thanks everyone. I'm just curious to see what it looks like in other churches. I'm feeling nervous about the transition. I'm thinking about volunteering the first year just so I can see how things run. Susan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MegP Posted April 20, 2012 Share Posted April 20, 2012 (edited) nt Edited April 23, 2012 by MegP Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
raceNzanesmom Posted April 20, 2012 Share Posted April 20, 2012 6th-12th grade boys, 7th-12th grade girls (the girls have an extra class for 6th grade, we haven't found a man that will step up and do the same with the boys). We have a youth pastor that leads along with his wife. Then the rest of the staff is about 1/2 parents, 1/2 younger adults (college'ish age). They meet on Wednesday the same time as everyone else (we have activities for everyone from 6-8 on Weds). Our average is 60'ish, with 100 or more for special events. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AndyJoy Posted April 20, 2012 Share Posted April 20, 2012 (edited) My church is pretty small (maybe 100? on Sunday morning) but we have a very active youth group right now. We usually have 25-30 attendees, ages 10-17. Approximately 1/2 are from our church and 1/2 were invited by our youth. We didn't set a specific minimum age/grade since we are 90% homeschoolers and not hung up on such things. We give parents a heads up the week before if we are planning to cover any content that might be more suited for teens than the 10-11 year-olds. This is rare, because we aren't focusing on teen issues per se, but rather general biblical topics and their biblical questions. We just finished up a study on Heaven. It is lead by our pastor (father of 3 teens) and me. We meet on Sunday nights (no evening service--just women's Bible study) and have: Game time: 6:30-7:00 Singing: 7:00-7:15 Lesson/discussion: 7:15-8:00 (we sometimes split the genders for discussion time to encourage the more shy girls/guys to contribute more and it works well) Final game/hang out time/cleanup: 8:00-8:15 For our next study we are thinking about splitting the boys and girls for the lesson time to cover different gender-related material. Right now we're doing car washes and other fundraisers to go to a weekend conference in June. Edited April 20, 2012 by AndyJoy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MamaAkins Posted April 20, 2012 Share Posted April 20, 2012 (edited) I know that youth ministries can fire people up here, so, if your church is anti youth specific activities, I get that. But please let others answer my question so it doesn't derail. How big is your youth group? What ages does it include? Is it parent led or volunteer led or is an actual staff person over it? All of the above? My daughter is going into our youth program next year, which is for middle school through high school. I'm curious what other churches do to meet the needs of their youth (not planning to change our's - just comparing by contrast). Do you have specific meetings and/or activities suited to them? Thanks, Susan Our 'youth group' is for grades 7-12 (they divide into "middle school- 7/8th and "high school- 9-12th). We have well over 100 youth that are registered for youth group. On average, there are about 75 youth there each Sunday night, with more attending the outings and retreats. Our youth meet on Sunday nights for 2 hours and other various youth activities (game days, service projects, outings, mission trips, etc). They also have LifeGroups (small groups) where there are about 10 kids with 2 adults. They meet for an hour and a half per week (mid-week) and focus on faith formation, Bible study, issues that teens encounter, strengthen relationships with peers, etc. All of our youth programs are overseen by a full-time youth pastor, plus numerous volunteers. I would say the ratio is 1 adult to 8 youth, although everything is done in larger groups so that there is always a minimum of 2 adults with each group (safe sanctuary rules). At our church, the 6th graders are in confirmation (religious education). When they complete that (spring of 6th grade), then they join the youth group. We also have programs for 4th/5th and 2nd/3rd graders, but on a much smaller scale. Edited April 20, 2012 by MamaAkins Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mytwomonkeys Posted April 20, 2012 Share Posted April 20, 2012 our church is fairly large. we have 2 campuses. at the campus we attend, the youth group averages between 150-180. i definitely plan to move over and serve in that area when my daughter is in 6th grade (she's only in 4th now). it is led by a staff member (the families ministry pastor) and there are so many volunteers that commit each week to create a safe environment. i believe they have a corporate time and then they break into small groups with assigned leaders. i imagine they are boy only, girls only, etc (i *think*) because we break them up by gender and age in the 1-5 classes. honestly, i am a little nervous when my daughter switches over because the youth group is quite large. my husband and i definitely want to serve in that area & serve as leaders on overnight trips, etc. we also have a youth camp that begins for 7th graders each summer. one of us will definitely volunteer as a leader on that as well. when my daughter is in middle school she will also become a junior helper and start to serve each week. she's very excited about that!:) ETA - i'm sure they have other things going on throughout the week or trips, but i don't serve in this area currently so i'm not as familiar now as i will be when my daughter switches over. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Candid Posted April 20, 2012 Share Posted April 20, 2012 We are a very large church and have separate Middle School and High School pastors on staff. I have no clue how to estimate numbers but I would say each of these levels have a minimum of 100 kids and probably approach 200. Each programs has some moments where the whole large group is together and other moments when they are in small table sized groups. In the Middle School group on Sundays the children self-select tables and leaders, on Wednesday night they have an assigned leader who often goes through all three years with them. High School has small groups that are assigned and their leader is expected to be with them for all four years. The small group leaders are volunteers. My husband and I found the Middle School room chaotic, but both our boys have mostly loved it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cortana Posted April 20, 2012 Share Posted April 20, 2012 We have a small youth group. The youth runs about 15-20 kids, regular service is on Wednesday nights and then there is cadres (small group Bible study) on Sunday nights with about 10 kids attending regularly, cadres will suspend over the summer. Dh teaches the youth Sunday school class and LOVES it! He has about 8-10 kids coming. We also have programs for boys and girls on Wednesday night that go all the way through high school. There are 2 boys and 1 girl that are doing the boys and girls program instead of youth group. The age range is 12 and up, no seperation of middle school and high school. We have a paid youth pastor and several adult volunteers, including my dh. I used to help but I left to help with the preschool program when nobody would do it. The youth staff meets once a month to go over goals and ideas and upcoming events. The activities are pretty limited, nothing in addition to regular weekly stuff other than summer camp and winter retreat and occasionally an outing for a fun day (they went bowling as a group last week). They really don't do any outreach stuff or missions or anything like that, which is a shame. We've had a real problem with the youth pastor and his wife and their attitudes and it's damaging the youth group (at one time we had 50-80 kids attending). I wish our youth group was better, dh and I have been volunteer youth staff together our entire marriage (we met when we both started volunteering after high school) and have been in some wonderful youth groups. Our oldest son just turned 12 but dh refuses to let him be in the youth group due to the issues going on, one of the biggest being the youth pastor doesn't really want to deal with a developmentally disabled kid in the group. Thankfully the leader of the boys program is a fantastic leader, loves having ds in the program and is more than happy to accomdate ds. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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