Economical, Versatile Room Dividers – Made in USA!

Your ministries are growing which is good news.  But the bad news is that you lack enough separate areas to handle more Sunday School Classes, the new Day Care Ministry and all other programs common to growing churches.

You do have large open areas in your gymnasium and fellowship hall.  Can these possibly be utilized to help with your “growing pains?”

This was a very difficult question to answer prior to the late ‘80’s. Thanks to the creative work of a church architect who dealt with the growing needs of churches for years, his idea was to build versatile, flexible, portable room dividers which were made of sound absorbing, tackable panels and were easy to use.  Open areas can now easily be used by two, three or more different ministries all at the same time.  The most widely used line of these dividers folds for storage to fit in an area no larger than an office chair, storing them is easy.  All dividers use hard rubber casters so they easily glide from one area of the church to another.

Freestanding, Wallmount, and Portable Classroom are the three basic lines of Portable Room Dividers in the family.  Like the auto industry each line has different makes, models, and options and the same is true for the Portable Room Divider industry.  Here are some details as to the differences and which line of divider best satisfies certain needs within a church.

The Freestanding line is the most popular line of Portable Room Dividers for growing churches.  It is a self contained divider which does not need to be installed in tracks in the ceiling or floor for support.  Freestanding dividers can be rolled easily into position in the Fellowship Hall, Gymnasium etc.  Once in place, a simple latch is unlocked and the dividers unfold “accordion style”.   They can be set up in virtually any configuration, the most popular is a simple straight line, or with one ninety degree turn.

Why is this line of dividers the most popular?  The answer is simple, its freestanding condition with casters allows it to be rolled from one room to another, or from one part of the room to another part in seconds.  A growing church can use these dividers to subdivide the Fellowship Hall in the morning for the Child Care and in the afternoon, the dividers can be used in the same room to create separate areas for the Men’s and Women’s Clubs which need to use the room simultaneously.  In the evening the divider can be rolled easily out of the Fellowship Hall and into the gymnasium where they can be used to create several classrooms for Bible Study.  It is amazing how participation in classes increases when students, children and adults alike have the privacy of their own classroom!

An example of how Freestanding Room Dividers are used is Cannaan Baptist Church in St. Louis, Missouri.  Their large, high school gymnasium was absolutely perfect for sporting events, and their Sunday School/Bible study ministries were growing.  Could the large, gymnasium be quickly turned into classrooms, and back into a gymnasium for the youth sports ministry just as quickly?  Yes with versatile, flexible room dividers.  Every Sunday morning the teachers simply roll out the dividers into the large gym from their storage area and set up 20 Sunday School Classrooms in minutes.  When class is over, the dividers are folded and rolled away to be used during the week to make efficient use of the space in the Fellowship hall where other programs are held.

Church leaders know sometimes that they will need versatile, tackable, sound absorbing dividers in the same room for many years.  It’s been shown that the number of classrooms needed and the approximate number of students remain reasonably consistent.  In this situation Wallmount Dividers can be the divider of choice.  One end of the Wallmount divider is mounted to a wall where the folded panels stay in their stored condition.  In this situation the wide open room and can be used for choir practice or any other ministry requiring open spaces.  When the room is needed for class or for any other purpose…blood drive etc…the dividers are unfolded easily on their casters and set up in the desired configuration.  Wallmount Dividers are more economical than Freestanding Dividers, but since one end is fixed to a wall they lack the mobility of the former.

Lastly, what do you do when your church is growing and needs dividers to provide the privacy for a class, a markerboard to be used during the lesson, and a cabinet to store the Sunday School materials?  You could buy all the component parts separately.  But, the most popular method church leaders use to combine all of the above is the Portable Classroom line of Room Dividers.  Just imagine rolling piece of furniture with a height of approximately 6’6”, the bottom half is a cabinet with adjustable shelving where materials can be stored.  The top half is a 42”x36” markerboard for writing.  Now, where are the dividers?  Cleverly concealed inside two hidden chambers…one on the left and one on the right side of the cabinet are where the dividers reside.  To access the dividers simply roll up the Tambour doors on either side.  Once the tambour doors are open you can easily extract 16’6” of the versatile divider out of each chamber.  The total dividing capability of the Portable Classroom is amazingly 37 feet (a 4ft. wide cabinet and two 16’6” tackable dividers).  For those who “want it all”, the Portable Classroom line of Portable Room Divider is just what you need.

There are 3 basic lines of versatile flexible room dividers administrators of churches use to help manage their space in an efficient, economical fashion.  Each divider comes in a variety of heights, lengths and colors to match the needs of any church:

 1)         Freestanding:  can glide easily throughout one room or from room to room.   The divider unfolds in seconds in any configuration that you desire.

 2)         Wallmount:  likewise unfolds in seconds in any configuration that you desire…with  one end affixed always to a wall. 

3)         Portable Classroom:  combines a storage cabinet, markerboard and a total of  37’ of dividing capability in one beautiful piece of equipment. 

If you want to get the most use out of your valuable floor space while your ministries are growing at the same time, consider versatile, flexible room dividers!

The good news is that you have done a great job in helping your ministries grow.  More and more children are attending Sunday School more and more adults are learning in Bible Study.  The youth minister reports that there are also similar gains in participation of programs for teens.  The bad news is your available space is not growing to keep up with the demand.  You have begun a fundraising campaign to help expand your current facility.  But it will be at least 2 to 4 months before the new space can be occupied, and 4 or 5 months after that for completion.

What can you do? 

The answer is to make much better use of your existing space with Portable Room Dividers.  These types of dividers can be efficiently used to help you solve your space and time needs and also budget problems during your current “crisis”.  Then the dividers can be moved easily to your new space and utilized there after the construction is done.

Portable Room Dividers can easily be used to set up “instant” Sunday School Classrooms, Bible Study areas, to create VBS rooms, or to solve a great number of other space issues.  These dividers can most commonly be used in fellowship halls, family life centers, converted sanctuaries, multi purpose rooms, and other open areas.  Many creative ministers and pastors have expanded the roll of Portable Room Dividers to be include in their use in gymnasiums.  Why not?

Besides having the added advantage of being portable, Screenflex Portable Room Dividers have another important and often forgotten advantage.  Other “fixed” dividing means such as drywall walls or dividers which lock into tracks at the top and/or bottom of the ceiling/floor cannot be changed.  Portable Room Dividers can easily change both the size and the shape of the room on a moment’s notice.  On any given Sunday you may need a half dozen Sunday School Classrooms in the fellowship hall in the morning, and then split the room in half for different family events in the afternoon, and then into quarters for a CPR class that evening.

In essence, Screenflex Portable Room Dividers are available in two basic types:  with casters or without casters.  A divider on casters is easier to move from one end of the room or facility, to the other.  Who ever first invented the wheel must have had Sunday School teachers in mind.  Screenflex Portable Partitions of Lake Zurich, IL has taken the concept of a rolling divider several steps further.  Screenflex has taken a series of sound absorbing, tackable, lightweight panels and affixed casters to feet on the bottom.  A 29 ½” wide steel end frame is attached to either end for strength and stability.  Being on casters, the entire assembly can be easily rolled into position in seconds.  After unlocking a simple latch, the flexibility of the panels can be set up in any configuration to create a classroom, portable bulletin board, or even a maze for the youth in the ministry!

Regardless of whether you decide to use Portable Room Dividers with or without casters, the fact remains you will obtain the most efficient use of your valuable floor space with Screenflex Portable Room Dividers.

 The administrators at an Elementary School in Washington had just received a hard worked for grant to purchase some needed computers for the school.  Their efforts were very successful, and now the hunt was on to find an appropriate space within the school where an additional computer lab would be housed.

No space was available in the current computer lab, all the classrooms were occupied.  There was space available in the library; .

Putting up permanent walls was discussed as an option.  That idea was quickly dismissed. The project would involve reconfiguring heating, lighting, and electrical systems in addition to adding a doorway.  This would involve investing much more than was available to spend.

The search for a solution continued.  The administrators found that the solution they sought was offered by Screenflex Portable Partitions of Lake Zurich, Illinois.  Screenflex manufacturers a line of versatile, portable room dividers which are also sound absorbing and tackable.

The dividers can be left in place for entire semesters and set up in seconds. The can also be moved at will to another location, within the room or school.  Of the different lines of dividers which Screenflex offers, the administrators chose the Freestanding line. These are available in six lengths, six heights, and 31 fabric/vinyl colorsbut the space was within full view of the busiest parts of the library.

The ceilings at the Washington Elementary School library are 8 feet tall.  The administrators chose Screenflex Room Dividers which are 7’4” in height.  They will provide for a  maximum visual block and sound absorbency, but will not interfere with lighting, heat, or the ventilation systems.  As you can tell, Screenflex Room Dividers are the perfect solution for creating additional learning areas, in this case a computer lab.  An efficient, cost effective manner.

How to create more room with adaptable partitions:   Because churches are often open to their communities, most usually have at least two large open rooms.  The first is the sanctuary where the congregation worships and holds various ceremonies.  The second open room in churches is often referred to as a fellowship hall, family life center or a multipurpose room.  These rooms are typically used for church based events other than worship such as, large gatherings including Cub Scout meetings, dances and wedding receptions.  These large rooms can be made more functional if they are divided into several smaller rooms for classes or other purposes.

Room Dividers offer churches an opportunity to make better use of space with a variety of options.  There are three types of room dividers used commonly in churches today.

 1. Portable Room Dividers on casters:  These stackable, sound absorbing dividers can easily roll into place, unfold accordion style, and can be set up in any configuration.

 2. Office style cubical dividers:  These dividers can be dragged or carried from the storage closet and placed as desired.

 3. Floor to ceiling dividers:  These dividers are installed in tracks in the ceiling.  When needed, they can be pulled along the track to divide the room.

The most common use for room dividers are Sunday school classrooms.  Room dividers are an easy way to eliminate visual distractions and decrease extraneous distracting noise by creating a division between the different classroom spaces.  Dividers can help cut down distractions resulting in increased concentration in religious education classes for all age groups.

Recognizing different spatial needs:   More churches are offering day care and child care ministries.  This is the second most common use of room dividers within a church.  Oftentimes such programs minister to children ranging from infants to pre-school.  While the range of age is only five years at a maximum, the difference in spatial needs at that young age is much more different than a five year span as adults.

Any open room can be divided into three different sections: nursery, playroom or reading area and sleeping area.  Larger programs can have several rooms for each area.  Many states have rules and regulations to help  ensure that the certified instructors in the child care areas can see the tasks being performed by noncertified instructors/helpers.  The height of the room dividers and whether or not they are equipped with windows is an important consideration.  Maintaining a clear line of site between areas is important when setting up dividers for child care.

A room with several dividers in use during the day may need to have the room dividers taken down and put away when the last children leave so that the room is available during the evening for a meeting, congregation meal, or some other ministry.  The ease and flexibility to transform a space makes these room dividers valuable to churches maintaining multiple ministries.

Manage multipurpose rooms:  The third most common use for room dividers within churches is to help administrators manage the use of the multipurpose room.  Sometimes multiple groups need to use a room at the same time, usually on weekends.  Depending on the room size, the dividers can easily be used to help ensure that groups can efficiently use the same room at the same time without interfering with each other.

Certainly a small group of a half dozen members who wished to discuss a book they all read do not need the same size room as groups having a wedding shower.  The same is true for any number of ministries.  The names of the user groups may change, but the concept is the same, Room Dividers can help manage the space needs in a multipurpose room.

Manufacturers such as Screenflex offer Room Dividers that perform a myriad of useful functions to churches.  These dividers have been used as welcome and bulletin boards, backdrops for speakers for the church play, and to help guide the traffic flow.  One clever youth group in Little Rock, AR used their dividers to create a maze for their Haunted House during Halloween season.  However, the three most common uses of Room Dividers remains to create Sunday School classrooms, divide open rooms into smaller rooms for child care and to set up various size rooms for other ministries as needed.

Church Leaders who want to make the most of their facilities to extend their ministries and more opportunities for their congregations should consider using Room Dividers.

As the younger generation ages, they will not recognize the homogeneous unit principal that was championed in the early years of the church growth movement.  This principal states that people desire to worship in church with other similar people, and the best way to reach people, is with other people who are similar.

 The younger generation as an ethnically diverse group, will not know homogeneity the same way as previous generations.  Some of the younger generation are third culture worlders.  Third culture is a sociological term used to describe a person who has spent significant time in another culture, thus incorporating their birth culture with a second culture and creating a third culture.  This is typically attached to children spending portions of their developmental years outside of their parent’s home culture.  Churches should be the forefront of breaking barriers associated with differing races and ethnicities.  It is these churches that the new more diverse generation will see as normative and culturally relevant.  A new US demography is on its way.  In many ways, these changes are upon us.  There’s much to take with us from previous decades and generations, and there is also much we can do in order to reach a changing culture for Christ.

Not only will older adult ministries change, but children’s ministries as well.  As diversity spreads out geographically, and preschools become more diverse, churches will prepare for a different type of childrens ministry.   Specifically within predominantly white churches, ministry leaders will begin to think about how to accommodate for an influx from differing ethnic backgrounds.  While the year 2012 is over a decade away, many communities are beginning to see these types of changes in the pre-schools and grade schools.  Now is the time to begin to prepare on how your church responds to the unique make up of  your entire community.

With waves of boomers rushing towards the senior adult life stage, churches will need to adjust how they minister to the first suburban generation. Many churches are already experiencing the “I’m not part of that group” mentality with existing senior ministries trying to get older Boomers to join. In short, there is a generational divide.

Boomers are less likely to take fellowship trips or go to group entertainment events. Boomers are more likely to have experienced divorce and have differing family dynamics. Boomer women are more likely to have occupied professional and managerial positions in the workplace compared with previous generation. Boomers are more educated than previous retirees.

These reasons plus many others mean that churches will have to rethink how they minister to Boomers as they enter the retirement life stage.

Due to decreased domestic migration, some churches will need to become less dependent on new resident outreach. There are churches that have depended entirely on new residents for their outreach focus. Understandably, someone had to reach out to new people in the community. Unfortunately, these opportunities are not as great in many areas now.

Local congregations should not intentionally neglect ministering to any one segment of people, but there will be many communities that experience substantial drops in new residents. This stoppage may be temporary. During the migration halt, however, these churches would do well to refocus their outreach strategy on existing lost residents. Once migration resumes, they will be well positioned to minister to new and existing people.

Staying put – for now.
Within the industrialized world, the United States has the highest rate of internal migration. In other words, Americans move a lot. Domestic migration across state lines and to other metro areas, however, has slowed substantially in the last two years. In fact, across state movement has been sliced by more than 40 percent since the beginning of the millennium. Places that were one attracting new people are not seeing as large of influxes.

For instance, Florida saw a net decrease in domestic migrants last year, for the first time in its history. Additionally, cities that were losing people are seeing slower declines. In the Midwest, 30 of the 44 large metro areas either gained more people or lost fewer people.

Much of this pattern can be attributed to the slower economy, specifically the housing market. One markets rebound, migration will likely pick up. What is not known is where people will flock to what degree and how soon. This trend may not last in the long term, but it will still be influential in the next five years.

Diversity spreads out and gets younger.
Both the source and destination of the foreign born US population has undergone major shifts in the last several decades. In 1970 only 30 percent of the foreign born population came from Latin American and Asia. Today that number is 80 percent. In fact, half of the nation’s growth since 2000 is attributable to the Hispanic population.

Previously immigrants of all backgrounds cluster in urban cores of traditionally diverse cities. The new geography of immigration now includes metro areas that are not accustomed to this diversity. Additionally, the US population is predicted to turn minority white by 2042, but the preschool population will cross this point in 2021. Diversity is spreading geographically and it is becoming younger.

Riding the aging boomer wave.
The first of the boomers will hit 65 in less than two years. As a result of this wave, the senior population will grow 36 percent from 2010-2020. Boomers are the first true suburban generation, a large segment of them living the majority of their lives in the suburbs. It is likely that many of them will remain in suburban areas, and these areas will gray faster than urban areas.

The massive growth of aging boomers will occur in areas unaccustomed to housing older people, specifically in the suburbs of metro areas. The metro areas that are expected to gray the fastest are in the Intermountain West, the Southeast and Texas. The senior population will expand by as much as 70 percent in some of these places.

The new metropolitan demography calls for new approaches from the church. Not every change will affect individual churches or communities, but almost every church and community will be influenced by at least one of these newer trends. How might some ministries change in response to these cultural shifts?

When Crossroads Christian Church in Corona, CA, accumulated $500,000 in debt – in addition to falling behind on their mortgage payments – financial ruin and foreclosure seemed imminent. “Our loan was delinquent and the pastor at the time was avoiding communication with our credit union,” says current Senior Pastor Chuck Booher. “We were weeks away from forcing Evangelical Christian Credit Union to take action.” The church hit a new low when funds designated for an orphanage in India were instead used to bring the checking account back into the black. They were behind in every payment and utility companies were threatening to shut off water and electricity. Three steps to rescue Booher explains how the new leadership at Crossroads closely followed three critical steps to guide the church through the process of getting out of debt: “First, we got the key leaders together and explained everything in writing and verbally. We were ready to answer any questions and instituted a spirit of transparency. “Second, we created a higher level of accountability. Our executive pastor now meets monthly with three elders and goes through all of our expenses. An outside CPA also comes in monthly and goes over financials with the elder board. And I meet with the head of the accounting department monthly to see if they are concerned about anything questionable. “Third, we told our church family, ‘don’t give to the problem, give to the Lord.’ Out of love for God, our congregation brought in $600,000 over their regular tithes in a 40 day period. We paid off our debt and instituted a strict budget,” Booher says. Today Crossroads ministers to more than 6,000 people every week, an increase of 2,000 people from a year and a half ago. They hold six different services, including three in the Worship Center, a chapel service, a satellite service in Lake Elsinore, and a service in Spanish. Booher attributes the growth of the church to a spirit of truth embodied by the leadership. “God is honored by truth. That means having transparency within the body of believers. Great leaders communicate, and people will trust you enough to give,” he says.