Changing the Culture of UUAA Religious Education

1
Changing the Culture ofUUAA Religious Education

• Building Better Kids
• Building Community

2
UUAA RE Mission
To create a Children and Youth Religious
Education Program that is spiritually meaningful
and fulfilling to all involved
3
Beginning with the End In Mind

• Kids will have a deeper/broader program to
  develop their spiritual/religious understanding
• Kids gain friendships through being together more
• Adults gain friendships through more adult
  interaction with kids of same general age
• Adults express their spirituality in action
• More dynamic program will attract more folks to
  UUAA

4
Barriers to Getting There

• Too much work on too few people results in
• Teacher burn-out
• Less optimal lessons/experiences
• Lack of community ? lack of participation
• People dont plug in either because
• Theyre not asked to help
• They feel theyll be dumped on
• They dont feel capable of being a teacher

5
Lets Fix It

• If EVERYONE has to contribute then
• No worry about being dumped on
• Many more opportunities to plug-in (events,
  outings, service projects) that are right up
  someones alley
• Far more age-level interaction ? friendships /
  community
• Provide for more spiritual expression through
  doing meaningful things for our kids
• Dynamic program continued participation/growth

6
New Operating Principles

• One volunteer per child/youth in the program
  Shared responsibility / ownership
• Each person takes a major role every 2-3 years
  and a minor/supporting role all other years
• Draw others from non-RE adults and RE youth
  (e.g., mentoring, special classroom
  presentations)

7
Structure
CYC
8
Cluster Coordinators

• 4 Hours / Month
• Recruits teachers, event coordinators (from RE
  parents and congregation at large)
• Liaises with classroom teachers, council and MRE
  to assure issues/needs being met
• Coordinates scheduling classroom assistants
• Consults on curriculum selection

9
Classroom

• Teachers
• 4 Hours / Month
• 3 / Class
• Teach every 3-4 weeks
• Enjoy outings/events (no leadership/work)
• Assistants
• 1 Hour Every 6 weeks
• 1-2 assistants in classroom each week

10
Cluster Events

• 2 Events / Year / Cluster
• Coordinator
• 20 Hours of work
• Plan events (FNL, Outside)
• Recruit staff from parents
• Handle budget
• Staff
• 2-5 hours of work
• Help execute event (MC/assist, setup tables,
  clean floor, wash dishes, traffic cop, etc.)

11
Rover Coordinator / Rovers

• Rove 1/Month for 2 Hrs.
• 1 Rover Per Service (915-1100, 1115-100)
• Runs errands for classrooms that assistants
  cant. Deals with kids who cant be in the
  classroom. Assists with outside (onsite)
  activities/hikes when needed.
• Oversees game room from 1030 to 1100 and 1230
  to 100 and enforces its policies
• Fills in for assistants, teachers when
  unavoidably absent.
• Directs new folks to registration and classrooms

12
Others

• COA Coordinators (2)
• COA Mentors (15-20)
• YRUU Coordinators
• Special Presentations

13
Assuring Participation

• All parents will be communicated to directly when
  signing up that they must participate in
  supporting program in some way in order to have
  their kids in the program.
• Signed registration with rules of engagement and
  ways to contact
• Badges for kids (cant be in classroom without
  one)

14
Roll Out

• Recruiting for next year starts next month
• Programs worked on over the summer
• Startup in the fall

15
In the End

• Kids will have a deeper/broader program to
  develop their spiritual/religious understanding
• Kids gain friendships through being together more
• Adults gain friendships through more adult
  interaction with kids of same general age
• Adults express their spirituality in action
• More dynamic program will attract more folks to
  UUAA