How do you help jr. highers transition into high school ministry? - MinistryQuestions.com | Ministry questions, answers, advice, and input from other ministry workers

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How do you help jr. highers transition into high school ministry?

We do a great job of helping 6th graders transition into jr. high ministry, but not so much from jr. high into high school. How do you do it?

Also want to hear your percentages of how many actually make the transition for the long-haul in your ministries.

See my attached video for more info. Thanks for your help!

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2 years ago

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0 Votes We have a Club56 which is for 5th and 6th graders. The 5th graders are a little too old for Kid's Club and Children's Church so we have a class just for that age group. We have about 30 on the roll and about 20 that attend faithfully. We have our Middle School and High school together as their is not enough to have two classes. There are times that we will include 5th -12 grade together for service projects and other such events. by Pastor Joe 2 years ago by Pastor Joe 2 years ago
0 Votes Trying something new this year, so I'm not sure what the %'s will look like for this method. We're having both our high school and junior high ministries meeting on the same night. They meet separately for their own programs, until about the last half hour. During that "free" time, both groups intermingle as they play rock band, have snacks, and play our newest game "circle of death." I've also been keeping on our high school kids to encourage them and build into them. They may not be friends now, but they certainly interact more, and I think it's taken some of the fear out of moving up. We also have our graduating 8th graders come up for 1-2 nights in june, and allow them to attend either high school or junior high summer events. by Adam 2 years ago by Adam 2 years ago
0 Votes We use the summer as our transition. The way we've found it works best here is that we graduate middle schoolers to high school in September, but all summer they can come to high school events and meetings that don't conflict with what the middle school is doing. So, on Sunday mornings, they're with their middle school Sunday School class. Then they can go to the other middle school events throughout the week - keeps them comfortable with their old friends in familiar surroundings. At the same time, they can start coming to high school events throughout the week as well - allows them to test the waters a little before having to fully dive in. We've found this to be really successful in making a smooth transition. by RevLando 2 years ago by RevLando 2 years ago
0 Votes This is always a big topic of discussion at my church/among my leaders. No failproof solutions yet. We have sought to bring some of our upperclassmen to Jr High events or their group time to begin building relationships, share about the h.s. ministry, etc. Also try to invite some of them to some of our events during the spring. We typically move our Jr Highers at the beginning of summer, but they are involved in very limited ways (still trying to figure out that mystery). I think building relationships with them early on is the key, and to have some of your h.s. students catch that vision and burden to connect with them. This past year we had good success with our incoming class - still have 80-90% retention to date. by EGro 2 years ago by EGro 2 years ago
0 Votes we seemed to have had quite a few kids drop out after jr high. in the past, we kind of shut down our regular program in the summer and i have a feeling that kind of played a role in alienating many of the jr highs. once september rolled around, many felt out of place at youth group, let alone sr high youth group. something i want to do is join both jr and srs on one night in the summer and have one evening every other week. that gives leaders a bit of a break as well as still keeps kids plugged in at church. anyone else try this before? how did it work? by pjwong 2 years ago by pjwong 2 years ago
0 Votes There are a couple things we are doing. First, we have our move up day on June 7th. The following week (8-12) we have an event every day. Before we get to that point I will be assigning students who made that transition last year to this years 8th graders. They will be asked to contact and invite the upcoming 8th graders to the events for that week and hang out with the students they are assigned to throughout the summer. Hopefully through that time they will develop a relationship that will last at least through the next year. This will be my first year doing this at this church, so I don't know what our percentages are. I have taken this approach in the past and it has worked pretty well. by John Byrne 2 years ago by John Byrne 2 years ago

Votes

We have a Club56 which is for 5th and 6th graders. The 5th graders are a little too old for Kid's Club and Children's Church so we have a class just for that age group. We have about 30 on the roll and about 20 that attend faithfully.

We have our Middle School and High school together as their is not enough to have two classes.

There are times that we will include 5th -12 grade together for service projects and other such events.

Pastor Joe

2 years ago

Votes

Trying something new this year, so I'm not sure what the %'s will look like for this method.

We're having both our high school and junior high ministries meeting on the same night. They meet separately for their own programs, until about the last half hour. During that "free" time, both groups intermingle as they play rock band, have snacks, and play our newest game "circle of death." I've also been keeping on our high school kids to encourage them and build into them. They may not be friends now, but they certainly interact more, and I think it's taken some of the fear out of moving up.

We also have our graduating 8th graders come up for 1-2 nights in june, and allow them to attend either high school or junior high summer events.

Adam

2 years ago

Votes

We use the summer as our transition. The way we've found it works best here is that we graduate middle schoolers to high school in September, but all summer they can come to high school events and meetings that don't conflict with what the middle school is doing. So, on Sunday mornings, they're with their middle school Sunday School class. Then they can go to the other middle school events throughout the week - keeps them comfortable with their old friends in familiar surroundings. At the same time, they can start coming to high school events throughout the week as well - allows them to test the waters a little before having to fully dive in. We've found this to be really successful in making a smooth transition.

RevLando

2 years ago

Votes

This is always a big topic of discussion at my church/among my leaders. No failproof solutions yet. We have sought to bring some of our upperclassmen to Jr High events or their group time to begin building relationships, share about the h.s. ministry, etc. Also try to invite some of them to some of our events during the spring. We typically move our Jr Highers at the beginning of summer, but they are involved in very limited ways (still trying to figure out that mystery). I think building relationships with them early on is the key, and to have some of your h.s. students catch that vision and burden to connect with them. This past year we had good success with our incoming class - still have 80-90% retention to date.

EGro

2 years ago

Votes

we seemed to have had quite a few kids drop out after jr high.
in the past, we kind of shut down our regular program in the summer and i have a feeling that kind of played a role in alienating many of the jr highs. once september rolled around, many felt out of place at youth group, let alone sr high youth group.

something i want to do is join both jr and srs on one night in the summer and have one evening every other week. that gives leaders a bit of a break as well as still keeps kids plugged in at church.

anyone else try this before? how did it work?

pjwong

2 years ago

Votes

There are a couple things we are doing. First, we have our move up day on June 7th. The following week (8-12) we have an event every day. Before we get to that point I will be assigning students who made that transition last year to this years 8th graders. They will be asked to contact and invite the upcoming 8th graders to the events for that week and hang out with the students they are assigned to throughout the summer. Hopefully through that time they will develop a relationship that will last at least through the next year.

This will be my first year doing this at this church, so I don't know what our percentages are. I have taken this approach in the past and it has worked pretty well.

John Byrne

2 years ago

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