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Peer Ministry Leadership

Leadership Training

Peer Ministry Leadership – High School

Youth are the front lines of ministry! They do far more youth ministry than any of us professionals! Youth simply know more youth than we do. They know when friends are facing tough choices, changes, and life stresses. People should not have to go through life’s icks alone!

Peer Ministry gives youth the relational leadership skills to know how to listen, care, help, when to seek help, welcome, the very skills needed to love every neighbor. The skills to be a real friend.

It is the Good Samaritan story but, instead of preaching and teaching it we give skills to live it!

Why? Because youth are either leading or, they are leaving!


TRAINING OPTIONS

Consider the following options. Let’s find a time to talk!

Schedule a time. We will give you a call.

CALANDLY

OPTION #1: We send a trainer to you

In person with your group, or possibly a couple churches coming together. This can be with just adults or churches often add in a mix of key youth.

Our hope is to leave you with adults who will continue with more training opportunities, be available to encourage and mentor youth, as well as help with youth plug into relational projects.

WHAT

  • We send a trainer to you! 
  • View this Peer Ministry Leadership flyer

WHO

  • Our main goal is to train you and your adults to facilitate and support your own youth.
  • Include key youth who become your first group of relational leaders.
  • An option for you is to combine your group with several other churches and split the cost.

COST

  • $1,900 for training (day or weekend) plus facilitator expenses.
  • Adults will want the training manuals.
  • We can work with you to find a time that works for your church or group. Contact us to find a time:

Our favorite way to help you get started is to be with you and your group. Experiencing the training in person, practicing the skills, motivating your adults and a group of key youth is a combination for success.

OPTION #2: Video and Live Facilitator Coaching

Let’s imagine you and I are sitting in my office and you asked, “Can you walk me through this session?” I would say, “Let me tell you all about it.” These video clips will have that personal vibe. I get to share a bit of my wisdom, experiences, suggestions and enthusiasm on each of the twelve sessions.

In addition to session by session instruction I also get to share…

  • An introduction for Peer Ministry
  • The skills needed for facilitating Peer Ministry sessions
  • Thoughts on what youth get to do once they have some skill training.

BONUS: At least two phone or Zoom coaching sessions.

We will…

  • talk through your group and plan how your youth will use this training. 
  • help you strategize the practical applications for what your youth can do with the skills they acquire.

Click to learn more about this option in the

RELATIONAL

SKILL STORE

This is a great option for becoming an expert facilitator for your group! No travel involved. Learn not only from the manual but also from short video as well as personal coaching calls. “Youth always know if you are just teaching from a manual. Peer Ministry requires more. It requires that you teach it from your life experiences.”

OPTION #3 Youth Training for Your Town or Community

This is perfect for communities with ministerial groups that work together to support their community. Imagine a core group of youth learning the skills to care, support and help fellow students in the midst of life stresses. Imagine these youth being an influential source for health and wellness motivated by their faith. What an amazing gift this could be to your community.

Let’s imagine an event that includes key high school youth from various sizes and denominations training together for a day. We will provide a PML trainer as well as on going coaching support.

Applications? Certainly youth will use their caring skills every day, everywhere and in every relationship. We hope also to find a community application such as Peer to Peer.

PEER TO PEER is a model of youth that meet before school.  The purpose is to be a support to the health and wellness of participants as they also support the health and wellness of their classmates. The morning consists of personal check-ins followed by a youth presenting a common concern, followed by Topical-Talk-Time-Trios, which brainstorm how youth can be most helpful. Other days consist of learning new skills or guest presenters from the school staff or community.

Cost

Cost: $2500 – Includes training day, manuals for adults from each congregations, Video coaching package for each congregation, pre-and post coaching including guidance for setting up a Peer-to-Peer group.


SAMPLE SCHEDULE

  • 9:30AM – 10:15AM Opening Energizing Fun
    • Samaritan & WHEAT experience
  • 10:30AM – 12AM – Session one
    • PML High School (ASK  – Personal and Open Questions)
  • 12: Lunch (Sponsored lunch or bring a bag lunch)
  • 12:30PM Ice-breaker game
    • Adult meeting with PML Guest Trainer
  • 12:45PM – 1:45PM   Session two
    • Circle With-in A Circle (Four Listening Mirrors) 
  • 2:00PM – Session three
    • PML High School  (The Helping Model) 
    • PML Advanced (Optional)
  • 3:30PM – 4:00PM
    • Heart Ignite Candle Experience
    • Last words, and sending sticking singable song!

Imagine multiple churches in your town or community coming together, combining your youth to become a critical care force for wellness and human connections. What an amazing gift your churches will be giving to your community.

OPTION #4 Customize for your project.

You want the your youth team to know that relationships is a key leadership element. We would love to work with to help your group be successful in welcoming and caring for everyone.

Recently we have been invited in to work with…

  • a group of youth preparing for a national youth gathering.
  • two camps to develop a set of caring skills that staff could equip their campers with.
  • a church staff on deeper listening skills.
  • a lay team of care-givers teaching a our helping model.
  • an organization that trains youth who lead devotions before school starts.

Let’s talk through your project and options!

We can weave in our relational skill work, customizing to equip and train your people to fit your projects and needs.


ALL ABOUT PEER MINISTRY

The Doable, Repeatable, Livable Skills

  • LEADERSHIP  –  WHEAT skill for initiating conversations 
  • ASK  –  Personal and Open Questions for broadening and deepening conversations
  • THE WELL  –  Four Listening Mirrors for better understanding
  • SPIRIT NUDGES  –  Observe, Wonder, Ask for accuracy of non-verbal clues
  • DECISIONS  –  The Helping Model forallowing people to find their own decisions
  • LIMITATIONS BOUNDARIES & REFERRALS  –  knowing responsibilities, risks and limitations
  • IDENTIFYING VALUES  –  Aware and respecting our own and other’s values
  • WELL AWARENESS  –  The Helping Model applied to wellness issues
  • PLAN  –  Creating a personal and group mission statement
  • INVITE  –  Invitation skills for including others
  • WELCOME  – TheDos and Don’ts for welcoming group and 
  • HURT  – Skills for including those who are often not included
  • OPENING  –  Creating an accepting, inclusive, and diverse culture
IT'S ABOUT...
  • “Friends helping friends.”
  • “The Good Samaritan story, with real skills added.” 
  • “An education of the heart, loving as Christ first loved us.”
  • “Peer Ministry is not just for church but for every day, everywhere and every relationship.”
  • “When a friend talks suicide I know how to listen, what to ask and how to seek help.”
  • “It is not another program. It’s the foundation of every program.”
  • “The skills from saying hi to the skills for saving lives.”
  • “You are not doing youth ministry until youth are doing the ministry.”
  • “Peer Ministry. It’s not a job, it’s an attitude.”
  • “We make loving one’s neighbor doable.”
EXPECT

Expect highly experiential real life people skills learning together with the wisdom of each other. No smoke machines or laser lights, no lectures or power points. Creatively learn a skill and then practice the skill in real heart-to-heart conversations. You will leave with the confidence to be the real friend every one needs.

“PML training is intimate, funny, fun and important for the everyday needs of youth ministry. Youth desire to help their peers and this gives them the basis of how to be the Good Samaritan in a hurting world.” – Diana Esposito

WHO

We train adults who:

  • Learn how to train Peer Ministry and will lead your next trainings.
  • Mentor individual PML youth to review and support their leadership.
  • Spread the good news to other adults about your amazing youth. 

We train students who:

  • Create an infectious relational culture in your church of caring, welcoming and affirming others.
  • Apply relational ministry skills with friends every day, everywhere and in every relationship. 
  • Understand all leadership tasks. 

WHY TRAINING
  • Peer Ministry is taught from your life. Youth always know if you are only teaching from a manual.
  • Learn the skills, use the skills, then teach the skills. 
  • Having a PML trainer will kick-start both youth and adults creating a solid foundation to build on.
APPLICATIONS
  • Creates a caring and welcoming atmosphere in all your programs.
  • Youth feel valued and needed by their church.
  • Youth understand ministry as something that is lived every day.

In-House leadership roles:

  • Peer Ministry Leaders use relational skills within various church programs. 
  • Creates a caring and welcoming atmosphere in all your programs.
  • Youth are part of a meaningful and purpose-filled ministry.
  • Small groups.
  • Mentoring.
  • Meeting one-to-one with new member youth.

Out-House (I amuse myself when I write that) ministry roles:

  • PML is meant to be lived every day, everywhere, in every relationship.
  • Listening to friends.
  • Respond to Spirit nudges, the concerns they see, hear and sense around them in school, teams, work, neighborhoods and family!

“A program can only be as good as the training the leaders receive.”

– Barbara Varenhorst


RESOURCES

Peer Ministry Training Manual

Train your youth leadership team or weave in to existing programs with all your youth. Designed for both high school and young adult groups. Leader’s manual for 12 Peer Ministry Leadership Training sessions.

Buy
PML Travel Guides

Peer Ministry Leadership Travel Guides

Three booklets to accompany Peer Ministry Leadership training. Enhance participants’ experience during your training times.

Reflect back, review, and use to continue to learn and practice after your training.

Two formats:

  1. Ready to print and fold in horizontal half page size
  2. Full page for digital uses on tables, smartphones and other screens.
Buy

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Peer Ministry Leadership

PML works with all denominations. The theology is Christian, and flows from the Good Samaritan Story, with an emphases on relational caring, welcoming and affirming skills. PML is a good fit for many denominations and adapts well for various settings.
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