Ridley Hall, Cambridge

The Centre for Youth Ministry: Students

Students at CYM Ridley come from a variety of backgrounds. In the past this has included existing youthworkers, gap year students, graduates from other degree courses and mature students. We currently have 55 students, aged between 19 and 50, working in a variety of Professional Practice Agencies.

Graduation Day 2009
Download a larger version

 

Life at CYM Cambridge

From time to time we feature an interview with a current or recent CYM student, for an insight into life at CYM at Ridley. We recently spoke to Mark Stanyer, who graduated in 2009, and asked him about an optional module on the CYM course which encourages students to engage with the theme of "Human Personhood through Popular Art".

Art and Spiritual Insight

The Centre for Youth Ministry “Young people’s imaginations tend to get toned down these days,” said Mark Stanyer, a third-year youth and community student who was born East Africa but lives and works in Cambridge.

Mark was talking about what he had learned from an experimental art course at the Centre for Youth Ministry. Not only had it taken the group around many of the art galleries in London in the company of their instructor, but had also got them all working on art projects of their own; Mark worked with stencils.

When he realized how much the course had helped him spiritually as he used his imagination and began creating, he decided to try out some of the things he had learned on his own youth group. He set the teenagers at Cambridge Community Church to work, giving them materials and asking them to create something that reflected their own understanding of the Christian journey.

“The things they came up with were all rather stereotypical,” Mark said, “But I am certain if we had had more time and could have done further sessions they would have gone deeper.” It was particularly helpful for those who are visual rather than verbal learners, and the very act of engaging in art opened up the group to one another. Conversation evolved naturally without adhering to what was previously a noticeable girl/boy divide.

The CYM module that got Mark so animated is called “Human Personhood through Popular Art,” and is led by the priest and artist, Neil Lambert. Neil was at Ridley a few years ago and is now vicar of a parish in the Aldershot area. Mark uses words like eye-opening and prophetic as he spoke of how art had been broadening his Christian perspective, giving him other ways of exploring what it means to be Christ-like.