The Youth Work Charter

It may surprise some of you to find this out, but currently the church is one of the largest employer of youth workers in the UK, with an estimated 8,000 full time employees on the books. These individuals are responsible for much positive work with young people that would not otherwise happen and make a huge difference in the lives of those they work with. The vibrant, exciting reality of Christian youth work is often very different from the gloomy picture painted by the media and pessimists in power.

The trouble is youth workers employed by churches do not have many of the safegaurds and protections that are afforded to those employed by councils, and in fact are subject to many other pressures too, such as a congregation to be accountable to as well as a line manager, a potential lack of professionalism/experience in their employers and the desire of the church to see increasing numbers in youth groups, a constant stream of conversions, baptisms and an abiliy to work 25 hours a day!

In response to these, and other issues, the Youth Work Charter has been commissioned and launched by Youthwork the partnership, a collection of various Christian agencies involved in youth work such as Oasis, Alove, Spring Harvest, YFC and Youthwork magazine, who aim to resource, support and encourage youth workers up and down the length of the UK.

According to the blurb "The Charter is meant to be a helpful way for churches to think through the key issues in employing a youth worker. It contains seven declarations churches make about these issues.

The seven areas come from the very real experiences of youth workers up and down the country: they reflect situations where youth workers, and the churches that employ them, can often find frustration, conflict or simply unmet needs."

The basic 7 points churches would commit to following are as follows

We will pray and support

We believe that our youth worker needs spiritual support in their work with young people.

We promise to pray for our youth worker and keep their needs a high priority in the church’s prayer life.

We will give space for retreat and reflection

We believe that taking time to think and pray is just as essential for our youth worker as organising events and meeting young people.

We promise to encourage our youth worker to use part of their schedule to give space for retreat, reflection and personal development.

We will provide ongoing training and development

We believe that learning the skills of youth work is an ongoing process and that it’s important to continually invest in professional development.

We promise to set aside time and money to provide this for our youth worker.

We will give a full day of rest each week

We believe that taking regular time off helps maintain our youth worker’s passion and energy for their work with young people.

We promise to actively encourage our youth worker to take a day away from their role each week to do something different.

We will share responsibility

We believe that having a youth worker does not release the rest of the church from our responsibilities towards young people.

We promise to encourage everyone to play a part in volunteering, praying for or supporting young people.

We will strive to be an excellent employer

We believe that it’s important to have clear structures and procedures for recruiting and employing a youth worker, and to provide supportive management structures.

We promise to follow good practice guidelines in the way we employ our youth worker.

We will celebrate and appreciate

To see the details in every point and find out more in general, please visit the website and have a read! There is also a campaign running alongside the launch of the document called We Love Our Youth Worker which aims to resource churches and help them put the charter into practice.

Now, feel free to call me biased, but I think this is a really positive document. I am genuinely blessed with a fantastic working environment, brilliant colleagues and plenty of support, however I am aware that this is not the case for all church youth workers. On average we burn out after 18 months, suffer from stress and many church youth workers are managed poorly due to a lack of professional structures.

Yes, the positives of the job generally outweigh the negatives, but its worth making people alert to the downsides of full time Christian youth work and how to deal with them. I believe this charter could go a long way towards that, and I hope that as many churches as possible take it up when it is officially launched on Monday...

How the congregation can help with youthwork

One of a series of cartoons about Youthwork by the brilliant Dave Walker. Any fire eaters out there for the return of Ignite in a couple of weeks?!

Some great youth work books

I've read quite a few youth work books over the past 3 years, and I know a few of you who read In the Room are also involved with youth work too, and so will hopefully find this useful!


Mend the Gap by Jason Gardiner
I bought this book at Soul Survivor this summer, and have been reading since. It has taken so long not because it is a terrible book and I had to work to get through it, but because it has changed and challenged me on so many levels that it takes a month or so to process a chapter and put it into practice. The basic premise is that the generation gap that is pulling society apart is doing the same in the church, which is a tragedy and strikes at the very heart of what church should be- a united family. This book is a call to mend that gap, to unite the church and to undo the compartmentalization we bring into church. The first half of the book lays down the sociology behind the generation gap, and the second half is Gardiner's call for radical change to combat the fissure developing between ages. His arguements are compelling and have led me to think seriously about how our services work, our isolation of our youth groups from the rest of the church, and how the youth engage with the rest of the congreation and visa versa. This book has the potential to change everything about how you do youth work. Get your hands on a copy ASAP!


Christian Youth Work by Mark Ashton
This book is an excellent guide to how to make your youth work biblically centred and driven by theological principles. One of the things that really challenged me was the call to develop a deep and meaning discipleship amongst a few rather than looking to get as many young people into church and youth group as possible. This flies against the expectations of many in church, but is based on the way Jesus worked and seems to me to be a liberating idea for the youth worker. Christian Youth Work very obviously comes out of a fairly conservative evangelical viewpoint, and reflects the values that come along with that. Most of the time that is great, but on occasion it limits the scope of what the authors have to say on a given subject, for example the importance of engaging your young people in social action or what to do with young people other than 'preach the gospel'. Obviously that is critical to all we do as Christian youth workers, but there is more to the job than purely preaching and bible study. Overall though this is a great reminder to trust God, to stick to basic Christian principles and not get carried away from keeping The Main Thing, the main thing!

Joined Up: An introduction to Youth Work and Ministry by Danny Brierley
This was one of the first books I read when I became a youth worker, and it proved a really good foundation for what was to come. Danny Brierley outlines the basic components of secular youthwork and Christian youth ministry, and how the two differ. He then argues churches today need a combination of the two, a level of professionalism and good practice combined with an incarnational ministry that seeks to show young people Jesus and all he has to offer. This comes together in his 5 core values for Christian youth work. I'm not sure I agree with every point he makes, but if nothing else this book makes you analyse what you do and why, especially if you haven't been previously trained as a youth worker. I think this book is currently unavailable, but can be found 2nd hand on Amazon and various other sites.

If you have any suggestions beyond what is here, then feel free to comment and let us know what you think!