Assignments for this course take the form of written summaries, research, and analysis. They are designed to help us work through the course objectives, while keeping a focus on our spiritural growth through conceptual learning.

For each assignment, please develop a document and submit it to me in either Microsoft Word, RTF (rich text format), or HTML format (your word processing software should permit you to do a "save as" and choose either of those formats).

For each assignment, please be sure to that your responses indicate that you have read and carefully considered the resource material, as assigned.

Assignment 3

Assignment: Report from the Front Lines

This assignment is Part 2 of a two-part series that began with the last assignment. The last assignment was focused on understanding the foundations of youth culture through the eyes of young people and also through the eyes of an observer.

For this assignment, we will become more practical. Our corresponding course objective is to "understand challenges facing youth ministry."

Please use the information you gleaned from the last assignment’s research and develop a paper entitled: "Report from the front lines: The real challenges facing youth ministers."

Your material should come directly from your last submission. Please do not search on the Internet or elsewhere for others’ opinions about youth ministry challenges. We will work with external resources for the next assignment.

Your assignment is to glean from direct observation and first-hand research to profile challenges faced by youth ministers.

Developing the paper
As you put together this assignment, please pull directly from your last assignment, analyze the information you gathered and, more important, the implications of the things you observed.

Then extrapolate the “data” into its repercussions for youth ministers.

Expected format and length
Because this paper is an extension of your last assignment, it can be quite short (perhaps 2-3 pages). Be sure to do the following:

Identify the issue involved (ex: teenage sexuality)
Identify the source of your information (ex: over 40% of the posts on “X” Web forum were sexual)
Challenge for youth ministers: (ex: figuring out how to relate to teens in a way that encourages purity)