Slathering on the Factor 50 sunscreen and making sure I had long sleeves as well, was a good thing, as my meeting this morning ended up as almost two hours al fresco at a well known coffee shop chain a couple of minutes from the church I was visiting.

My meeting was with the person who is designated as 'Pastor of Young Adults' in a team ministry in a relatively large Baptist church.  Out of their 200-ish folk around 40 are in this category, many, but not all, students at their local university.  They are a 'student church' (i.e. one that the CU funnel people towards, though to be fair one of a number in that city).  Proportionally, then, not so different from us, though we are not a student (or any other demographic label) church.

It was interesting to hear of the work they do - pretty similar to our own, if a deal more formalised in terms of organisation and more explicitly resourced, in terms of people and pennies.  There were a few useful ideas to ruminate upon, which is a good thing.  Overall, though, I came away encouraged that we are doing a very similar thing.  The big difference, inevitably, is that they have strong links with the CU, which we don't, and that they are seen as a student church, which we aren't.  I suspect there is scope for us to develop links with the still very small and fragile SCM work in Glasgow, and to be a little less reticent about who and what we are.

Good practices we seem to share include:

• Freshers' week events
• Student lunches (though they are far more developed in this)
• Knowing students names and fields of study early on
• 'Spotting' students and linking them in
• Involving students, who are happy to, in the 'normal' life of the church
• Trying to listen to want students would value

Things we might want to consider are:

• Use of social media (secret or closed FB groups)
• Links to church families as well as general student stuff (i.e. small number of students having lunch/dinner in people's homes now and then)
• Is there a place for student/young adult Bible study/home group?

Things where we may be doing especially well are:

• Relating to overseas students, including those with limited English
• Keeping long term links with our 'alimuni' - though I expect we could develop this further

So all in all, a good morning's work.  Now I am free to melt a little!!

Off this morning to vist the first of the 'churches in vibrant urban contexts'... in a city about an hour's train ride from here.  Feels a long way to go for an hour, as that is all they will give me, but I am genuinely interested to learn from them about their work with students and young adults.  I had hoped to set up another meet in the same place, but this turned out not to be feasible, so I guess I may just have to make the most of a restful day!

Things I want to chat around...

• what is the demographic of their students? (home/overseas, under/post-grad, mature/young art/science etc)
• how do they reach out to/make contact with students?
• how do students find them beyond that?
• what specific student activities/events do they have?
• how much are students integrated into the overall life of the church?
• how do they relate to their local university?  ...and will the chaplaincy let them in?!

All good stuff.  Will report back later!