I experienced a shocking revelation my first year as a youth pastor. I assumed it would be all about connecting with students, teaching large group, facilitating small groups, and piles of pizza.

There is another key task — paperwork. In most cases, the youth ministry department collects more paperwork than any other ministry (outside of finance). Why? You are trying to create a fun, safe environment for people’s pride and joy — their kids. You should be sure you do everything safely and legally. Thus, you’re going to need a lot of forms. There are liability release forms for events, simple forms for a short car rides, complex forms for week-long trips, medical information forms, documents for the end-of-year review, photo release forms, volunteer applications, and even just simple sing-up sheets.

There are piles of paperwork in well-run student ministries.

We created this simple resource, so you can quickly grab any form you need at a moments notice. Simply copy/paste the text, insert your church name, and customize the form to match your context.

Here’s a pro-tip: Take the time to scan your forms on to your computer after they’ve been filled out. This reduces clutter, organizes them easily, and even gives you the ability to search them by keyword.

When you download these free youth ministry forms, you will receive: 

• General Consent Form
• Overnight Medical Information Form
• Short Form Permission Slip
• Transportation Permission Slip
• Long Form Legal Permission Slip
• Student Ministry Volunteer Application
• Children’s Ministry Application
• Photo Release Forms
• Short Form Photo/Video Release Form
• Youth Ministry Covenant of Community Expectations

You might also like this complete Christmas planning checklist or this Easter planning checklist.