How To Be The Best Volunteer Youth Worker In The History Of The World

When it comes to the teenagers in our ministries, giving our best matters. The reason why is simple: "Getting better at youth ministry is worth the effort because teenagers are worth the effort," writes veteran youth worker Kurt Johnston. With that in mind, he put together this compact, practical, and approachable book for youth ministry volunteers, brimming with insights and wisdom from his decades in youth ministry-including some memorable and hilarious stories of the mistakes that taught him along the way. Broken down into ten essential topics, the contents here apply to all youth ministry volunteers, whether you've been involved for decades or days, and regardless of your age, gender, or the square footage and general awesomeness of your youth space. A roster of seasoned volunteer youth workers provide commentary to round out each chapter, offering perspectives and important lessons learned from their individual contexts. Whether you read these words on your own or collectively with others on your youth ministry team, who knows: what you find here just might help you become the best volunteer youth worker in the history of the world!

Thank you for making the decision to be a volunteer youth worker—you give the gospel a flesh and blood presence and show God’s compassion for students in a way no one else does. Being a youth worker can be exciting, intimidating, fulfilling and challenging, and until now there was no “manual” on how to be a volunteer in a youth ministry. After more than twenty years as a paid youth worker, Jim Hancock left and became a volunteer in a student ministry. That experience taught him things he may never have learned as a youth ministry professional, and now he wants to empower others who are passionate about being volunteer youth workers. Inside this book you’ll find practical help, like: • tips about what to do on the first day • ideas on how to build and develop relationships with students • ways to combat youth “culture shock” • how to prepare students for life after youth group • how to say goodbye when it is time to leave …and many more indispensable insights that will make your experience as a volunteer youth worker valuable and rewarding for you and your students.

Destined to be invaluable for volunteers and youth workers, this practical sourcebook will give first-time and veteran volunteers all the help they need to conduct effective youth work. Topics include building relationships with students, recruiting and training other volunteers, getting along with the pastor and youth director, and more. A Youth Specialties/YouthSource book.

Across the country, volunteer ranks continue to grow, but people are volunteering differently. They're working online, seeking flexible schedules, and pursuing a role in defining how projects should be completed. They want to feel a sense of responsibility for your organization's overall mission. Put simply, these volunteers don't want to simply make a contribution; they want to make a difference! Help to recruit, manage, and lead the new breed of volunteers. Authors guide you to a clearer understanding of what today's volunteers look like, how they want to get involved, and how you can most effectively attract, train, and unleash them within your organization.

The book provides guidelines and practical creative exercises which equip creativemajor students as well as creative practitioners with fundamental knowledge on creation methods. Combination of functionality, simplicity and aesthetics in modern design is considered a fundamental design principle in the Bauhaus School in Germany, and, inspired by the School, the creative handcrafting exercises and the concepts introduced in this book are primarily coherent with this principle. The book draws a direction between two and three dimensional material-based design and modern digital creation process. The first part of the book introduces various creative handcrafting exercises on proportion, geometry and modularity, among other fundamental design principles. The creative exercises will sensitize students on aesthetical and structural issues, and thus serve as an essential building block for application of the design principles to computer-based creative processes, which are introduced in the second part of the book. Published by City University of Hong Kong Press. 香港城市大學出版社出版。

"There's a kid in your youth ministry who hasn't somehow been affected by crisis. There's not a youth worker on the planer who won't benefit from the principles and practices in this book." -Kara Powell, Ph.D., Executive Director, Center for Youth and Family Ministry at Fuller Seminary Because when it comes to crisis, it's not a matter of if, but when Anyone who stays in youth ministry very long will encounter significant crises. Family break-ups, substance abuse, sexual assault, eating disorders, cutting, suicide, gun violence... But without proper and immediate care, crises like these cause years of emotional pain and spiritual scarring in students. Rich Van Pelt and Jim Hancock want to help you prevent that from happening. Through their experience and expertise, you'll learn how to: - Respond quickly and effectively to crisis - Balance legal, ethical, and spiritual outcomes - Forge preventive partnerships with parents, schools, and students - Bring healing when the damage is done When crises happen-and they will, ready or not-there are practical steps you can take. Van Pelt and Hancock provide field-tested advice and specific, biblically based guidance for each stage of crisis. Keep this book on hand as the go-to resource when you need it most.

An inside look at how community service organizations really work Volunteering improves inner character, builds community, cures poverty, and prevents crime. We've all heard this kind of empowerment talk from nonprofit and government-sponsored civic programs. But what do these programs really accomplish? In Making Volunteers, Nina Eliasoph offers an in-depth, humorous, wrenching, and at times uplifting look inside youth and adult civic programs. She reveals an urgent need for policy reforms in order to improve these organizations and shows that while volunteers learn important lessons, they are not always the lessons that empowerment programs aim to teach. With short-term funding and a dizzy mix of mandates from multiple sponsors, community programs develop a complex web of intimacy, governance, and civic life. Eliasoph describes the at-risk youth served by such programs, the college-bound volunteers who hope to feel selfless inspiration and plump up their resumés, and what happens when the two groups are expected to bond instantly through short-term projects. She looks at adult "plug-in" volunteers who, working in after-school programs and limited by time, hope to become like beloved aunties to youth. Eliasoph indicates that adult volunteers can provide grassroots support but they can also undermine the family-like warmth created by paid organizers. Exploring contradictions between the democratic rhetoric of empowerment programs and the bureaucratic hurdles that volunteers learn to navigate, the book demonstrates that empowerment projects work best with less precarious funding, more careful planning, and mandatory training, reflection, and long-term commitments from volunteers. Based on participant research inside civic and community organizations, Making Volunteers illustrates what these programs can and cannot achieve, and how to make them more effective.

A guide to assist the new youth worker on working with teenagers, as well as ideas for the professional youth worker to better reach young people.

This practical guidebook for developing an effective volunteer youth ministry team is the culmination of two decades of youth ministry experience for author Les Christie, a nationally-recognized expert in the field of volunteer youth ministry development.