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Discover 33 different ways to partner with local schools to make a positive impact in your community!
Partnering with one of the schools in your community can make a lasting and even eternal difference. By building relationships with a local school, consequently, a small church can show its local support, increase its visibility, strengthen its reputation in the community, and build trust with the parents, students, school employees, coaches, and many others.
Your Small Church Can Make A Difference
Many can benefit when a small church partners with the local schools:
- Church as a whole
- Individual church members
- Teachers
- Students
- Administrators
- Students parents
- Community
- Neighborhoods
Top Ways Your Small Church Can Partner With Local Schools
Try these ideas for teachers, students, parents & families, classrooms, sports and arts, and school employees. This list covers ideas that extend beyond teachers because everyone at your local school works hard to provide goodness for your children. Employees who aren’t teachers will appreciate your recognition and thoughtfulness for their efforts.
These easy outreach opportunities are perfect for small churches. Start with one and add more as time, volunteers, and budget allows.
7 Ways To Support Your Teachers
- Bring goody bags to teachers on the first teacher prep day before the school year officially starts for students. Think about including a thank you card, a mini lint roller, a red pen, a black sharpie, mini lotion, vitamin C packets, a stain wipe, a granola bar or trail mix, and additionally a few assorted chocolates and candies.
- Provide muffin baskets for the teachers’ lounge during the first day of school.
- Toward the end of the school year, bring in or pay to have catered a luncheon for the teachers.
- Offer a monthly Teacher Appreciation lunch on the 2nd Friday of every month. Set up a salad bar with a 7-layer salad, chicken salad, crackers, potato salad, pasta salad, fruit salad, etc.
- Celebrate your teachers with cards for their birthdays. Put a signup sheet where all teachers will see it. Then ask for their name and birthday (just month and day). Leave it out for a week and ask them to spread the word so everyone knows it’s there.
- Host a monthly Teacher Appreciation breakfast. On the 3rd Monday of the month, set up a breakfast bar in the teachers’ lounge. Bring in bagels, cream cheese, muffins, cheese cubes, and a tray of fresh fruit or a fruit salad.
- Choose a day, once a month, to fill a basket in the teachers’ lounge or other central location with prepackaged healthy snacks.
3 Ways To Encourage Students
- Find volunteers in your church to have a homework helpers club. Identify subject areas your volunteers have knowledge in. Then contact the principal at the school and offer to host a homework club at the school or at your church.
- Host a Back to School Giveaway. Collect school supplies and backpacks to give away.
- Choose a classroom and also ask for a monthly list of birthdays. On a week with a birthday(s), deliver cards for birthday students with ice cream gift cards.
5 Ideas To Adopt A Classroom
- “Adopt” a classroom for the year. Accordingly, ask for a ‘wishlist’ from the teacher of items they would like to have and work on it throughout the year.
- Volunteer to read for story time in the kindergarten class.
- “Adopt” a teacher and do random acts of kindness for them throughout the year (local coffee shop gift cards, encouragement cards, holiday gifts, etc.).
- Volunteer in classrooms to help grade papers, cut materials for art projects, make copies, etc.
- Pass out “End of the School Year Goody Bags” to all students in a specific grade level. To be sure, ask the principal for permission to include a flyer for any summer activities at your church.
General Ways To Support Your School
- Gather your church and invite your community, teachers, parents, and neighbors to join you in a 15-minute prayer time on the Saturday before the first day for students. Then meet at the school or around the school flag pole. Invite the mayor, principal, teachers, and even the superintendent.
- Teacher & staff appreciation all year round! At the beginning of the year, ask teachers, counselors, secretaries, and principals to fill out a ‘Getting to Know You’ sheet. (This lets you know preferences, allergies, and if they want to join in the fun.) Then ask their name, favorite color, fave candy, hobbies, interests, allergies, birthday, favorite salad ingredients, and any other question that could affect little gifts or snacks you might give. Quarterly, choose a day to deliver small gifts to everyone. (They don’t have to be expensive, just thoughtful.)
- Celebrate all employee birthdays with cards! To be sure, ask the principal for a list of all employees so you can gather birth dates to celebrate secretaries, cafeteria workers, custodians, and everyone else! Be sure you can continue this all the way through the school year. Celebrate summer birthdays before school gets out for the year. (If you have a large school, then it might be difficult to give each person a card on their actual birthday. Consider doing a monthly celebration for all birthdays in the month.)
- Sponsor a book drive for a specific class or the school library.
- Volunteer to clean up the landscaping and do yard work before the school year begins. Offer to paint a classroom or two if needed.
- Talk with the principal about opportunities to support your school at events and other activities.
- Quarterly, honor the lunch ladies & men. Bring in flowers or other gifts to give all the cafeteria workers with a big thank you card for all they do for the kids.
- Offer the use of your church building for events such as choir concerts, after-school clubs, or special testing events.
- Plan an elementary graduation parade. Make a ‘drive-thru’ area on your church lot and decorate it with balloons and yard signs. Invite grads from the kindergarten class and the 5th-grade class to come with parents in their cars to drive thru the ‘corridor of congratulation’. Also ask teachers, classmates, neighbors, families, and church folks to line the way, cheering, waving, throwing confetti, and holding signs. At the end of the line, give each graduate a goody bag to take home and also a congrats card from the church.
- Work with local businesses to make Christmas baskets for non-teacher school employees.
4 Ways To Partner With Parents
- During Thanksgiving and Christmas, contact the school counselor for names of needy families in the school. Then put together family meal fixings for Thanksgiving. Give gifts for Christmas.
- Host a breakfast for parents. (Some parents cry on the first day of school, while others celebrate.) Have a breakfast buffet and also a time of prayer for students and parents.
- If your church is located in a heavily traveled area to & from the local school, then set up an after-school snack stop. Put a popup tent outside and serve easy snacks like popcorn and drinks or freezer pops. Parents can drive-thru with their kids on the way home from school.
- Get a list of students who recently moved to the area and are also starting new at the school. Make welcome baskets, and goodies, including some school supplies, list of fun things to do in the area, and information about your activities for kids at your church. Then hand-deliver as you welcome the families to the community.
4 Ways To Come Alongside School Sports & Arts
- Host a Kick-Off Breakfast on a Sunday for your local high school football team and families. Ask the pastor to give a message about being on ‘the team of life’. Make sports-type cards with players’ pictures with prayer requests on them and then have people in your church pray for the player throughout the year. Following, have a time of blessing on the team and the coaches.
- Volunteer to help get the equipment ready for the team at the start of the season. Clean/sanitize football, basketball, soccer gear, etc.
- Consider hosting classes at your church in the areas of music, drama, and arts. Seek people out in your church family or community that would volunteer to teach or lead a class for kids after school.
- Offer the use of your building for music, drama, or testing events.
What Step Can Your Small Church Take Today?
As church members invest in their community, they are actively living out their calling in the Body of Christ to love their neighbors, serve others, and bring the hope of Jesus. These events give your small church congregation the opportunity to show you care about the people in the community. Partnering with your local schools shows the love of Jesus beyond the inside of your church walls.
Ask another church in your town to partner with you. Simultaneously, you can double the impact on the school! Work together on a task, or choose different ways to help the school or teachers.
God gave gifts, talents, and abilities to your small church members that can make a difference in your local schools. Pray and ask the Lord how to use what He has given you for His glory. Then, choose one of these activities to start planning today.
Looking for a step-by-step guide to starting or restarting your children’s ministry?
Check out the Children’s Ministry Bundle For Small Churches!
Collaborator Thank You:
Lastly, I’d like to thank community member and content creator Becky Sargent for her input in this article. Becky is a highly valued member of Small Church Ministry and also works in many areas to offer high-quality and valued resources to small churches.
Read More:
How To Host A Community Back To School Bash
Fun All-Church Family Christmas Events
