Vacation Bible School

The one week your building fills with other people's children

More than 25,000 churches run VBS each year and over 2.5 million children go through it — most of them not members of the church hosting them. Your volunteer roster doubles for a week, and the crew leaders spend five straight days with the same small group. Screen every one for $5.

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All 50 state registries + NSOPW · Results in minutes · Credits never expire · FCRA-compliant

Why VBS is not just children's ministry with a theme

Churches that screen carefully all year often treat VBS as an extension of Sunday. It is structurally a different event, and the differences all point the same direction.

Most of the children are not yours

VBS is an outreach event by design — Lifeway Research found roughly 7 in 10 parents would encourage their child to attend VBS at a church they do not attend if a friend invited them. You are accepting temporary custody of neighborhood children whose parents have never met your staff.

The volunteer pool doubles for one week

Regular children’s ministry might run on twelve people. VBS needs forty. The difference is filled by members who serve once a year, college students home for the summer, and friends recruited in the parking lot — none of whom your normal screening process has touched.

Crew leaders are with the same kids all week

The crew model puts one adult with the same small group of children for five consecutive days, walking them between stations, to the restroom, and to pickup. That is sustained, semi-private, repeated contact — the highest-trust role in the whole program.

It is your best front door and your biggest liability

Six in ten American adults say they attended VBS growing up. It is the single most effective outreach week most churches run, which is exactly why an incident there costs more than an incident anywhere else in the calendar.

Every station, every crew leader

The rotation model means a child passes through five sets of adult hands a day. Screen the people at every stop, not just the ones with a microphone.

Bible story

Small groups, seated, adult-led

Crafts

Close contact, scissors, hands-on help

Snack

Allergy handling, food safety

Music

Large group, high energy

Recreation

Outdoors, spread out, hardest to supervise

Recreation and restroom runs are where the model leaks. Rotation keeps children visible; the walk between stations does not. Two adults on every transition, a posted restroom policy, and no adult alone with one child — those are the controls that matter alongside screening, not instead of it.

Count back from day one

A check comes back in minutes, so the eight weeks are not about processing time. They are about having room to replace someone without panic.

1
8 weeks out
Open recruitment with the screening link attached
Whatever your VBS week is, count back eight weeks and put the link in the very first ask — the bulletin, the sign-up table, the group text. Screening added later always feels like an accusation; screening built into the sign-up feels like the process.
2
6 weeks out
Screen crew leaders first
They are the hardest role to fill and the most sensitive to lose late. Knowing which of them cleared six weeks out is what lets you recruit replacements calmly.
3
4 weeks out
Station leaders, rec, and anyone driving
Add a motor vehicle record check for drivers if your insurer expects it. Confirm your teen helpers are each paired with a screened adult.
4
2 weeks out
Assign rooms and print the roster
Match cleared volunteers to crews and stations. Whoever is still outstanding gets a supervised role: registration, setup, kitchen, hallway.
5
Week of
Late helpers go to supervised roles
Somebody always shows up on Monday morning wanting to help. Say yes — to a role that is never alone with a child. Decide that role in advance so nobody has to improvise it.

The teen helper question

Almost every VBS runs on teenagers, and almost every church is unsure what to do about them. The answer is not to screen them — it is to structure the role so screening is not what protects the children.

Background checks are run on adults — a 15-year-old has no meaningful adult record to search, so screening them is not the control you are looking for.
Screen everyone 18 and over without exception, including the college students home for the summer and the graduating seniors who turned 18 in May.
Pair every teen helper with a screened adult. Teen helpers assist; they do not supervise.
Never leave a teen helper alone with a crew, and never leave a teen helper alone with one child.
Give teen helpers the same boundaries training as adults — restroom policy, physical contact, social media, rides home.

Writing this into a document once saves the argument every June. Our free background check policy creator will draft one, and church-specific policy guidance covers the ministry wording.

What children's directors ask

Do VBS volunteers need background checks if they are church members?

Membership is not a screening process. The most common pattern in abuse cases inside religious organizations is a trusted, known, long-tenured person — not a stranger. Run the same check on the deacon of twenty years that you run on the college student, and run it on everyone 18 and over who will have contact with children.

When should we start screening for a June or July VBS?

Begin no later than May, and ideally eight weeks before your first day. The check itself comes back in minutes, so the timeline is not about processing — it is about having enough runway to recruit a replacement if someone does not clear or simply never completes the form.

What should a VBS background check include?

A national criminal search across county, state and federal sources, all 50 state sex-offender registries plus the national registry (NSOPW), and federal watchlists. Every $5 VolunteerBadge check includes all of that. Churches that also run a motor vehicle record check for drivers typically do that separately through their insurer.

How much does it cost to screen 40 VBS volunteers?

$5 each — $200 for 40 — and you are only charged when a volunteer actually completes their application. There is no platform fee or subscription. Unused credits never expire, so anything left over carries into your fall programming.

Do we need to re-screen volunteers who serve every year?

Not every year, necessarily, but do not treat a five-year-old clearance as current either. Most churches run on a one- to two-year cycle, and some insurance policies require annual for roles with unsupervised child contact. Set the interval once and let the rescreen reminders handle the tracking.

What about volunteers who only work the snack table or registration?

If the role genuinely never involves unsupervised contact with a child, it is a reasonable place to put an unscreened last-minute helper. Be honest about it though — snack volunteers frequently end up walking a child to the restroom, and at that moment the role has changed.

Is a state fingerprint check better than a database search?

They answer different questions. A fingerprint check is authoritative within the jurisdiction that holds the prints; a multi-source database search is broader geographically but does not confirm identity biometrically. Many churches use the database search for the whole volunteer body and reserve fingerprinting for paid staff. What our search does and does not cover is written out plainly in our Trust Center.

Can volunteers pay their own $5?

Yes — volunteer-pays can be switched on so each person covers their own check when they apply. Some churches use it for VBS specifically, since the volunteer list is large and the children’s ministry budget is usually already spent by June.

Running a summer camp too? See camp volunteer screening, or plan the whole year with the volunteer screening calendar.

Screen the crew before the doors open Monday

Create your church's organization free, send one link with your volunteer sign-up, and know every crew leader cleared. $5 a volunteer, credits never expire.

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