Five Roadblocks That Prevent Parent Partnership

A few years ago, the XP3 team sat down with a few influential student pastors.  In one of our creative meetings, we asked two  questions:

(1)  What are the roadblocks that prevent student pastors from partnering with parents?

(2)  How can we overcome these roadblocks?

After wrestling with these two questions for a few hours here is what we came up with:

Roadblock #1:  Disengaged Parents

Ways to overcome:

–  Encourage and equip small group leaders to communicate and connect with parents directly

–  Purposefully pursue each disengaged parent

Roadblock #2:  Technology

Ways to overcome:

–  Begin teaching parents about how to use technology and why their teen uses it some much

–  Use technology to communicate with parents

–  Use technology to help inform, equip and encourage parents

Roadblock #3:  Unconventional Family

Ways to overcome:

–  Engage single parents in community with other parents

–  Be careful with language.  Don’t always assume all kids have a mom and a dad.

–  Support groups to refer for help

–  Involve the wider church community

Roadblock #4:  Economically Afflicted

Ways to overcome:

–  Fewer but more strategic events

–  Make funds available through fundraising

–  Allocate scholarship money in student ministry budget

Roadblock #5:  Young Student Pastors

Ways to overcome:

–  Be humble and listen to parents needs and feedback

–  Outsource ministry to parents to the “older – empty nester” parents

–  Create a parent board that is compiled with key, trusted and influential parents that student pastor can consult with

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So we are going throw these two questions at you?  What are the barriers to partnering with parents?  And how do we overcome these barriers?