Thursday, October 2, 2014

Six Millennial Statistics Every Adult Should Know

A great list from Tim Elmore's GROWING LEADERS blog...

 

Staying Single

These young adults have grown up in an age when the nuclear family has exploded. They long for “family” or community experiences, but many have seen unhealthy models and now are waiting to settle down with a married partner. 26% of Millennials are married, down from 36% of Gen Xer’s, 48% of Boomers, and 65% of the Builder generation. (These numbers are based on percentage of each generation married at age 18-32.) The paradox is that Millennials long for committed relationships… but often don’t know how to experience them. Two countries in our world today have introduced legislation for two-year marriage contracts for this very reason.
Question: How do we prepare young adults to engage in long-term, committed relationships?

Jumping Ship

Millennials have claimed for years that they are entrepreneurial in nature. They don’t want a conventional “job” but one where they can work for themselves and make up their own rules. It’s not necessary wrong, but parents and culture have given them this picture of autonomy and power. 71% of Millennials at “regular” jobs would prefer to quit their current job to work for themselves (Millennial Branding is huge). 60% of them plan to jump ship in the next two years. Change is their middle name, and most twenty-somethings work at multiple jobs during their first decade as new professionals, rather than build equity at one job.
Question: How do we help them discover their identity and “niche” during their young adult years?

Well Educated

School plays a larger role in this generation of young adults than any in American history. 23% have a Bachelor’s degree or higher, making them the most educated generation ever. Obviously, some have stayed in school due to a poor economy. (It just wasn’t a good time to launch a career). Others stayed in school because mom or dad pushed them to get that college degree and a “white collar” job instead of a “blue collar” job, and parents were all too happy to have them live at home during (and after) the process. So they’re well educated but may need to take a job they are over-qualified for at first. It also may mean they take a job where they must “pay their dues” in order to make progress. This is difficult.
Question: How can we enable young adults to capitalize on their education and leverage it to take them where they’re most gifted to serve?

Multicultural

Far and away, this generation of young adults is a mix of ethnicities, with a higher percentage of them being born from an interracial marriage than ever. 38% of Millennials are bilingual, up from 22% in 2003. They are more at ease with mixing races in marriage, workplaces and friendships. They embrace the idea that they live in a society bound by a world wide web and that they’ll work in a global economy. Although research demonstrates every child is drawn to people who are “like them” (see the book Nurture Shock), this generation has been conditioned to embrace those unlike them more than previous populations.
Question: How can we help this multicultural and bilingual generation leverage their strengths in a global economy?

Angst-Filled

One of my greatest concerns for this emerging generation of young adults is their mental health. 94% of college students indicate the best word to describe their life is, “overwhelmed.” About half of them are so overwhelmed, it’s difficult to function. Nearly one in ten has thought about suicide in the last year. Dr. Jean Twenge’s newest study shows that teens now have more psychosomatic symptoms of depression, such as trouble sleeping and remembering, than in past generations. Obviously our world is complex, and all of us probably wrestle with such issues. Yet young adults today become anxious over the smallest of difficulties.
Question: How can we help cultivate resilience and coping skills in young adults so they can face greater challenges as they age?

On-Mission

This reality expands with every study. As Millennials consider work, they want to do something they feel really matters. They want a “mission,” not just a job. They desire to work in an organization that improves the world in some way. Want proof? 87% of Millennials consider a company’s commitment to social and environmental causes when deciding where to work. To retain them, companies must find ways to care about the world around them, not just the bottom line. Young adults are drawn to organizations with a mission to transform the world.
Question: How can we capitalize on young adults’ desire to improve the world and, at the same time, demonstrate that they may have to do “little” things first?
 
http://growingleaders.com/blog/six-millennial-statistics-every-adult-know/

Wednesday, October 1, 2014

ALL IN: My Night of Nets Manifesto. Or why I am slightly obsessed with bed nets…A REPRISE...

Here's a piece I wrote last year...and it rings even more true for me with a couple hours to go before our soccer match begins here at CU...I shared this with our team yesterday...and here it is again on my blog...I write it with joy and gratitude in my heart...
 
Today we host my favorite event in the Cornerstone campus calendar. We call it night of nets...and it combines two of my greatest passions in life: the beautiful game called soccer or futbal and the people and communities of a sub-Saharan African nation called Zambia...

This is the 5th year we've done this event at CU and it is now one of our best attended and embraced student activities...the event is designed to use the platform of athletics in our culture to bring awareness and real change to one of the world’s greatest global issues.  We are trying to raise funds to provide insecticide treated bed nets for families that face incredible health dangers caused by the deadly disease malaria.

We've watched this event grow quickly in the amount of money we've raised, the attention given to the issue on our campus, the number of students involved, and now this year has been exported to other university and high school sports and teams to expand the impact of these truly life changing items...

To be honest, this little idea I shared first with a few CU soccer players in an impoverished community in the Dominican Republic has morphed into something I hoped and dreamed it could be...and with that growth has demanded more of my time, my resources, my thinking, and my skills as a leader and educator...

And this thing we dubbed night of nets keeps perhaps most importantly grabbing a deeper and fuller grasp of my heart...I am quite sure that many of my co-workers, friends, students, players, and family members wonder at times why I tweet so often about malaria, create & post a multitude of different visual pieces of promotion about NETS on our campus walls and doors, and cast vision almost hourly in classrooms, leadership trainings, staff meetings, soccer fields, and conversations in my office about the chance we have right now to change lives forever on the other side of the world...

So as we head into our final fall night of nets match for this year on the CU campus, here's a little list and explanation for why I am all in on this event, why I think it is one of the most important things we will do as a Christian college during the 2014-15 school year, and why it causes my heart to jump and my voice to speak loud as I join so many other people to try and end malaria in our generation...

1. I can't think of anything more ready to be used to invite large numbers of people in my world to do great good than the power of sport...soccer is our world’s global game and there’s something so special to connect as people and friends through a game we love to watch and play…and we have watched athletes, coaches, and fans embrace with gusto their chance to make sports something beautiful and brilliant as a tool to draw many together to both watch and do something extraordinary on and off the field of play…

2. I love the way God has given a ragamuffin group of young men a cause that unites them and allows them to come together to do something that others would never expect them to do...the driving force in night of nets has been a large crew of male college soccer players who have thrown off their selfish and entitled mindsets to be remarkable advocates for a people often forgotten and marginalized in our world…and their involvement badgering and cajoling fellow students to buy a Night of Nets shirt or fund a bed net has caused them to eventually end up in Africa where God changes them into people they could have never imagined they would become…

3. The scope of the issue is so massive that it demands an immediate and real response...malaria is an awful disease that affects hundreds of millions of lives...and as Rick Warren has said the greatest issues in our world do indeed respond the greatest responses...when you end malaria, you impact positively economics, health care, education, families, and the churches of communities in unprecedented ways…

4. Something so cheap and so simple can produce transformational change. A bed net that costs $6 can alter the life, the future, the ambitions of children and families simply because they no longer have to worry about an insect bite ruining their lives...I can’t even begin to describe the opportunity bed nets provide to prevent sickness, death, orphans, and immense heartbreak and grief…a bed net is something almost everyone I know can provide for another whose life hangs in the balance without it…

5. I love the sense of unity and connectivity that this event brings to my life and the college community I love so much...Night of Nets might be one of the very few things that can draw together students from all residence buildings, student interests, and friend groups to be part of something at CU…I love seeing hundreds and hundreds of students walking across campus to be part of something transformational for them…and our Zambian friends…

6. It's personal for me...I’ve taken hundreds of malaria pills to prevent being infected while I travel to Africa and it’s something I’ve read about in all kinds of books and journals and websites…and I am committed to trying to stop my African friends from getting infected by malaria because I’ve seen friends lose their children because a mosquito bit their son or daughter in the night as they slept…and I refuse to accept the fact that anyone dying from a ridiculously preventable disease is the way God wants our world to be in 2014…

7. I am convinced that it is something that Jesus and the Scriptures call me to do as a follower of Him and a person who is seeking to live by the words of the Bible God has written to call me to live a different life...Jesus brought physical healing, a call for justice, uplifting of the oppressed, and a love for those the world had forgotten…and He invited His disciples then and His followers even now to announce and help bring about the coming of His Kingdom…and I can’t help but want to be like Him…

The Apostle Paul in Romans 12 says it better than I could as I think about God’s call on my life to be a person who tries to have God’s love for me to move me to action…

Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. Share with the Lord’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality. Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited. Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everyone. Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
So I am called by God’s voice and moved by His Spirit to be all in…to be OK with being thought of as a little overzealous, a little crazy, and a little too focused on one thing…

And being all in means I can’t wait to invite people to share God’s blessings in their live with others in great need through the gift of a bed net at Cornerstone University and many other schools in the next few weeks, months, and years…
And being all in means I can’t help but dream…dream of providing 10,000 more bed nets via Night of Nets for families that are praying God will provide one for them tonight on the other side of the world…dream that many more college and high school soccer and volleyball teams will join us to bring Night of Nets to their campuses in the near future…and dream that one day malaria will no longer be on the minds of people in Zambia just like it is never thought about by people living in my city, my state, and my country…

I can’t wait to see friends in Zambia sometime soon again…and tell them a little story about how students over and over in Grand Rapids, MI have responded to Jesus’ call in an event called Night of Nets, and then watch them sing and dance and whoop with joy as they receive a net that ends malaria in their house…

That’s why I am all in, why I love being part of Night of Nets, and why I invite you to be part of a campaign to held end malaria…
You can check out more at: www.cunightofnets.com