June Newsletter - Summer Staff

Giving Teachers a Break While Maintaining Momentum
by Keith Johnson

Ah, summer vacation! SUVs are packed high and the summer cabin is cleaned for business. But you still have to staff the Vacation Bible School, keep the weekend Christian education program strong, and maintain the great day camp and summer camp schedule for children and their parents.

We usually struggle with two tough alternatives. Either we surrender—cancel Sunday school, provide a finely tuned but greatly reduced program, and take a vacation ourselves—or we ignore reality and load people up with guilt and staff our ministries with reluctant, unhappy workers. But what if you could allow your people their much-deserved break and provide your church’s children a truly great program that builds their faith? You can, with creative staffing, compelling programming, and advance planning.

Creative staffing begins with recruiting. The staff at 2nd Baptist church in Houston, Texas, recruits for a nine-month commitment with the summer “off.” They let their team know that summer is simply a break and not a conclusion. That distinction is critical to maintaining a fresh staff for the fall without recruiting three sets of volunteers: the first for the fall, winter, and spring; the second for the summer; and the third for the next fall, winter, and spring.

Another creative staffing alternative is to give a one-month break in the summer for your team. This would mean that August (for example) is the only time you have a new team—but this team is made up of parents who’ve signed up in advance to assist your modified program. In addition to parent volunteers who sign up for a two-week (not necessarily consecutive) commitment, you may want to introduce summer interns to your program.

Compelling programming can let you allow for summer attendance patterns, while maintaining momentum for the fall. At Wooddale Church we average a nearly 30 percent attendance reduction in July and August. So rather than having lessons based on a series, the team came up with Super Summer Sunday School Spectacular. Each Sunday had a separate theme, with a rotating staff that put together the programming. Parent helpers and summer interns alternated in order to focus on just two or three separate weeks through the summer.

And don’t forget to plan for the future. Short-term problems can preoccupy us, but failing to do long-term planning just means you’ll have new short-term problems in the future. While you’re staffing for VBS, think in the back of your mind about those volunteers who are untapped and talk to them about your need and their potential for fall Sunday school. Test their interest and begin their training in small summer tasks. Have them lead the VBS registration staff one Sunday morning, or allow them to plan the music portion of your children’s worship.

Observe your summer workers closely, and identify those who clearly enjoy building relationships or who have an intuitive liking for children. Tell them that you think they’d be a fantastic addition to your fall programming, and find ways for them to hone their skills.

Giving teachers a break while maintaining momentum is possible with a small amount of creative “near-sightedness” in your summer staffing and “far-sightedness” in your fall planning.

Keith has been a children’s pastor for 20 years, most recently at Wooddale Church in Eden Prairie, Minnesota, and has served as the director of children’s ministry for the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, International Division.