"Never before have we been able to Disciple, Train, Resource and Staff our Churches like this. WOW"

Has your church...
*    Struggled to find leaders, train leaders and resource leaders.
*    Experienced loss of young people to other churches and para-church groups?
*    Seen ministries flounder because of lack of resources?
*    Felt frustrated and overwhelmed as leadership by challenges that you know you cannot meet, but would like to?
*    Worker harder and harder and have yet seen decline and people disheartened?
*    Perhaps even sensed a decreasing vision, direction and energy for gospel ministry?

Ministry Internships offer a unique and attractive way for us to be able to train and disciple our congregants well.  Internships are flexible, where you the church can negotiate with your intern about where the practical work is spent and what subject material they do (new subjects are being added annually, if you supervise and assess interns you can actually write your own.)

As a church you can offer ongoing training for leaders, enjoy the rewards of the practical work they must do in your church and better equip your people for serive in the Kingdom of God.

Hosting an intern is not complicated, however there are official requirements. 

How do I get this up and running in my church?
Firstly I will explain in three paragraphs how the system works.  The CRCA Resource Centre as a registered training institute provides distance based (+ two residencies) education material (competencies) which are supervised and assessed locally.

In each local setting one person who is supervising has to have a Cert IV in Training and workplace assessment.  (Most Tafe and some high school teachers will have one).  That person becomes an official assessor of our training institute.

The intern receives the material and practical requirements from CRCA Resource Centre, the local assessor tracks with, coaches and assesses the interns competencies locally and upon informing the CRCA Resource Centre of their satisfactory completion we graduate them through our RTO which is the Australian College of Ministries.

Find Interns
Obvious I know.  Interns can be anyone, full time or part time, here are some suggestion for how to fish for interns.
*    Have all the year 12 students over for coffee and recommend they take a gap year to become better equipping in Kingdom service and strengthened in faith before they take another step to Uni, work or travel. Then follow them up.
*    Approach people that you think would benefit greatly from this and who’s gifts you think this program would help you nurture effectively.
*    If someone is thinking of studying for ministry to encourage them to give this a go first to experience whether they are built for it.
*    Advertise in your church letter.
*    Encourage exisiting leaders to enrol as a intern so they get better training and support while using their everyday volunteer work to count towards their practical requirements.
*    If you wish to host an intern in your church but can’t generate interest, inform the CRCA Resource Centre and if we hear of someone seeking an internship then we can connect them with you.

Supervising an Intern
To supervise an intern involves a rewarding amount of work.  The critical thing is that someone in your church who is the supervisor has a Cert IV in Workplace training and Assessment.  Any Tafe teacher in your congregation should have one, alternatively you might organise for the Pastor or capable other to acquire the qualification.   

If you would like to gain the qualification yourself, please contact your local training institute or TAFE to find out more about how to do that.

What Practical Work Will They Do?
Every subject has practical assessments.  If your intern is serving primarily in the area of children’s ministry most of the practical can be done in that area.  While there are practical requirements the hours that the intern has to do is more then the set tasks.  They will need also to operate normally in a church ministry.  The full time internship requires about 16 hours of service in the local church per week.

How Demanding is the Role of the Assessor?
The assessor will meet weekly for 2-3 hours with the intern to coach and supervise their learning and development.  The assessor has to be present when required tasks are being performed to assess their competency (eg, leading a bible study, training leaders, sermon, etc.)

Funding an Intern
This is totally between you and your intern.  Some options:
*    Some interns will be able to get Austudy and we recommend that you pay $6000 on top of that to help them and also invest in their development (this will not effect their Austudy) as well as pay for the course fees and travel to residentials.
*    Where there is no Austudy you can negotiate a package.
*    Some interns especially older people might be very happy to have you pay the fees and travel and not want an income, just happy to learn, serve and gain a qualification at no expense to them.

CRCA
Resource Centre
Training and Resourcing Churches in
Missions, Church Education,
Youth and Children’s Ministry

Ministry Internships is provided by the Christian Reformed Churches Resource Centre,
as a member of the Australian college of Ministries training network.