Rick A. Mills – America’s Youth Pastor Coach
National Director of FUEL-Youth Ministry Specialists

For more than 25 years, author, speaker and “youth pastor coach” Rick Mills has been equipping youth leaders across the country with strategies and programs to reach this generation of students. His unique approach to ministering gives students and youth pastors the insight to find and understand God’s purpose for their lives. Author of The Big Turn Over—The Revolutionary Plan of Student-Led Youth Ministry, Rick says this book, “Is changing teenagers from youth group spectators into youth ministry leaders.”

In The Big Turn Over, Mills explains that “Student-Led Youth Ministry” is the way today’s young people can have real ownership of their youth groups. Preparing our youth to lead and disciple as students gives them the confidence and skills necessary to serve in their local church and community right now…and therefore providing churches and ministries with strong leadership in the future.

Rick is the National Director of the FUEL-Youth Ministry Specialists, and is known as the “architect” of Student-Led Youth Ministry. He has spent more than 18 years giving youth pastors the blueprints and direction to allow teenagers to lead the youth ministry in their churches. As a former youth pastor, after learning that more than 80 percent of young people raised in church leave it after high school, Rick sought God for a more fruitful way to reach this generation.

Rick travels extensively throughout the U.S. and Canada, speaking to thousands of teens and youth leaders at national conferences and meetings including Teen Mania’s Acquire the Fire events, where he is known as “America’s Youth Pastor Coach.” A pastor from Marion, Ill., recently stated, “I believe Rick Mills has the cure for youth groups in America’s churches—that cure is Student-Led Youth Ministry!”

Prior to becoming FUEL’s National Director, Rick worked for more than six years with Dr. James Dobson’s organization, Focus on the Family. There he collaborated with several departments including the youth culture department, Adventures in Odyssey, and their teen publications, which have reached more than 250,000 young people per month. Breakaway magazine editor Michael Ross said, “Today’s teenagers are needing more than a program. They need something that leads them into true discipleship and causes them to follow Christ for a lifetime. Rick Mills has put together an incredible step-by-step process to help you lead your teenagers out of the grandstands and into the life-changing world of real ministry. I believe the philosophy of Student-Led Youth Ministry is what America’s churches have been looking for and what our young people need. It’s time for every church to experience The Big Turn Over!”

Studies are now showing that more than 95 percent of teenagers involved in a youth ministry that is “student-led” are still attending church after high school, 75 percent of them are involved in ministry, and less than 12 percent of these students have become sexually active. My goal is to teach youth pastors, church leaders, students, and parents the philosophy of “Student-Led Youth Ministry,” the result of which is changing, growing and developing successful futures of our local churches all over the world.” – Rick A. Mills