I’ve been getting a lot of questions about our multisite strategy for children’s ministry at 12Stone Church. Currently we have 3 campuses, with more on the way. The most common questions I get is, “what is our model for multisite?”

Before we talk about our model, let me identify the three main ways I see churches structuring their multisite children’s ministry and then I’ll explain our model and why.

I have observed three basic models for structuring your multisite children’s ministry.
1. Independent – This is where your multisite children’s ministries are actually autonomous ministries. Each campus has the freedom to choose their own curriculum & their own branding. Each campus has their own identity and creates their own separate environments for kids. Often times, there is very little collaboration between campuses. Whether it is intentional or not, there is not a lot of synergy across campuses. If a family moves from one campus to the next, they will have a different experience at each campus. It is basically like a separate church plant, not necessarily a multisite.
2. Centralized – This is where churches replicate their children’s ministry at each campus, typically under the direction of a central staff team. Each campus is identical to the original campus. Typically this happens when churches plant campuses of similar size want to create the exact same experience across campuses. The branding is the same, the environmental design is same, even the staff structure is the same. In this model, there is a lot of synergy across campuses.
3. Decentralized – This is where there is a transfer of authority from the central campus to each multisite. This is a move away from a single central staff/main campus to the other locations, thus granting each campus some autonomy. Some churches use this model to allow campuses to choose from a list of different curriculum options that are preapproved by the church. Still other churches use this model to share the same Children’s Ministries name, but there are different ministry directors who use different curriculum and have different themes.

Our approach at 12Stone is a hybrid of a centralized & decentralized model. I refer it to as a Collaborative Model. While our central staff is responsible for the overall direction, vision, systems, & philosophy of the children’s ministry across all campuses…the campus staff in charge of children’s ministry report directly to their Campus Pastor. In other words, I am not their boss. We are decentralized in that they don’t report to me at all. As the Children’s Pastor at 12Stone, my role is to lead the various teams through influence & coaching.

Each of our campuses use the same curriculum & collaborate together to create the best Sunday experience for kids and families. We do this through idea sharing, but allow the interpretation of those ideas to take place at each campus. In other words, we work together but allow each campus to play to their strengths. Our goal is not that each campus delivers an identical experience but that the DNA of 12Stone is consistent across our campuses.

So far this model has served us well. We meet twice a month with the children’s ministry staff from each campus in a meeting we call CREATE. This is where we design our Sunday services, share creative ideas, & monthly parent partnership tools. At the end of the day, we give each campus the freedom to implement the strategy so they maximize their strengths.

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