The CampHacker Podcast

As a camp director one of the big career challenges in our job is changing the culture of our camps.     I know, as a first year director, there were more things that I wanted to change than I could ever do effectively in 2 months.  I had to prioritize.   For my first summer I just needed our staff to focus on keeping the campers safe.

Every year after that we worked to make our camp the best possible program we could.   The big change was when we first implemented Beth’s 4 S Test 

Paul and Joe have some great ideas from their many years of camp.  Each has their own stories of making change as big as the whole camp culture.

Have you made big culture changes at your camp? Please let us know how you made it work in the comments

Travis: Swift Player for iOS
Joe: - Magic Plan - Floor Plan Creator
Paul: EDC (Every Day Carry) Blog

• Travis Allison, Summer Camp Consultant - CampHacker.org
• Joe Richards, Executive Director - Pearce Williams Christian Centre
• Paul Sheridan, Director - Four Winds, Westward Ho 

Podcast: Subscribe in iTunes | Stitcher App  (search for CampHacker)

One of the great tricks of being a good camp director is finding ways to keep campers coming back year after year.

I have heard a number of directors, when I talked to them at conferences, who have said that they feel like they need to add something new and exciting to their program every year.   I know from my own experience that it was never the programs that I remembered each winter when I was at school but it was my counsellors and the other kids that I went to school with - many of whom are still friends today.

Dan, Joe, and Gab share great, easy to implement ideas from their very successful camps.

How to you make sure that as many campers as possible will return year after year?  Please leave us a comment!

Travis: Strobist Ducktape Keyfob
Joe: Google Ad Words Grant
(US - http://www.google.com/grants/)  (Canada - http://www.google.ca/intl/en/grants/)
Dan: ACA’s 2013 Emerging Issues Results
Gab: Wireless speaker Bluetooth speaker - Philips Sound Shooter
 

• Travis Allison, Summer Camp Consultant - CampHacker.org
• Joe Richards, Executive Director - Pearce Williams Christian Centre
  
• Dan Weir, Director of Camping Services - Frost Valley YMCA
  
• Gabrielle Raill, Camp Director - Camp Ouareau

Last fall I received a great email from a listener.  Ange wanted to ask us about ways to organize summer camp programs and activities.

In this episode (joined by Ange!) we talked about ways to set expectations and be able to pass on the “lesson plans” at each activity area.

Here’s Ange’s original email:

Hi Travis,

Thank you for all the work you do with CampHacker! I love listening to the podcast and reading your blog.  I have a question I'd love to pose to the CampHacker world:

Do you provide your staff with written material to run an activity? Do you use written lesson plan? Do staff write their own lesson plans?

Currently I provide staff with what I call 'Activity Guides', which provide them with a general structure of the activity for each day, must have content, and flexibility for the staff to mold it to their own teaching style.  We encourage our staff to take ownership and be flexible with their activities, so we provide them time during staff training to plan their activities based off the provided guides.  The two main challenges from this summer for our staff were time management and actually using their Activity Guide.  I would love to hear what other camps provide their staff with in regards to lesson plans.

Thank you and Happy Trails!

If you have questions please email them to [email protected] - I’m happy to focus on the topics that you need the most!

Ange was kind enough to give us a sample of her program - download it here. 

What do you do to help your staff plan amazing summer camp programs?

Travis: Visual Teams book by David Sibbet
Joe: - https://www.cloudkafe.com/home - Bring the cloud under control
Laura: Creativity in Play Podcast http://www.blogtalkradio.com/creativityinplay
Ruby: Google+ Hangout!
Ange: Training Terrific Staff by Michael Brandwein

• Travis Allison, Summer Camp Consultant - CampHacker.org
• Joe Richards, Executive Director - Pearce Williams Christian Centre
• Ange Atkinson, Program Director atCamp Lantern Creek 
• Ruby Comption, Summer Camp Program Director - Green River Preserve
  
• Laura Kriegel, Camping Coast To Coast

A Counsellor-in-Training (CIT) or Leader-in-Training (LIT) program is a great way for camps to gain confidence in their first year counsellors.   By providing a camp session for senior campers that focuses on teaching the hard and soft skills needed to lead, camps also make themselves more attractive to campers who are ready to move beyond the regular activity areas of camp and gain some training and hands-on experience.   

Travis: ProvideSupport.com
Dan: Creating Magic by Lee Cockerell

• Travis Allison, Summer Camp Consultant - CampHacker.org
• Dan Weir, Director of Camping Services - Frost Valley YMCA
• Gabrielle Raill, Camp Director - Camp Ouareau

Welcome to the first ever Camphacker Ask Me Anything About Summer Camp show. We gathered many of our past co-hosts to tackle as list of questions that had come in to us via Twitter and the Summer Camp Professionals Group on Facebook. The questions were wide-ranging from hiring to firing, program to staffing and beyond.

Do you have any questions for the CampHackers? Leave them in the comments below.