Best Practices: Church & School Staff Retreats

For some churches with schools, the start of another school year is a great time for the staff to get away and prepare for the upcoming year. Although there are many ways to do this, here is one example of how this is done. St. John’s Lutheran Church & School in Napa, California shares their format for a staff retreat that has been seen as an essential way to begin a new school year.

The St. John’s staff retreat marks the beginning of a new school year for the St. John’s staff. It includes all the church and school staff. The staff arrives at a retreat center about an hour and a half away on Sunday afternoon and leave on Tuesday morning around noon a week before school starts. The main purposes are bible study, spiritual growth, fellowship and some planning. This event is key to getting the year off to a good start, and an important part of building team cohesion, alignment and friendship.

One of the purposes of the retreat is to familiarize the staff with the school theme for the coming year and its biblical basis. Monday morning is devoted to Bible study. The ultimate purpose of the bible study is the personal application of the theme and verse, leading to plans to integrate the theme and its lessons in our lives. There will be time for classroom application later; our first focus is our own discipleship. This is also a time when a new song is introduced relating to the school theme. There are also times of prayer and devotion on Sunday night, Monday morning, Tuesday morning and at closing.

A second purpose is to devote time to a particular topic, usually something related to the upcoming school year. It may be additional study on a relevant topic, introduction of a new curricular element, or discussion of a change.

The other main purpose of the retreat is fellowship. The Staff enjoys being together, catching up with each other, playing games during break time, and getting to know each other better. There is a tradition of putting new staff members on the “hot seat” on Monday evening. This is a friendly time when other staff can ask the new staff members questions with the purpose of finding out more about them and getting to know them better. It is light-hearted, fun, and usually involves lots of laughter. Another tradition is a singalong. They have a song sheet list of close to 100 worship songs to choose from, including 28 school theme songs from the past. Staff members are invited to pick a song of their choice.

Regardless of how or when a retreat is done, retreats can be a powerful way to bring a staff together to focus on growing closer together for the purpose of team ministry.