Partnering with Post-Pandemic Parents - Gabz's Summer Part 2 - Camp Code #127

Parents, Caregivers, Camper’s, Grownups, How Have THEY changed since the pandemic?

Just as our campers have undergone a serious shift post-pandemic, so too have the caregivers.

We’re back to pick Gabz’s brain to hear more about the summer of 2024 at Camp Ouareau and how she’s looking to 2024 with a new lens.

If you missed part 1 - check it out here: https://www.camphacker.tv/camp-code/kids-these-days

Whether your summer felt like a success or not - these episodes will help you not only hear the raw honesty of a fellow camp director, but will help you start thinking about what you can do now to make summer 2024 excellent.

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We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

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Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Beth Allison

A good mindset to have (especially with parents) - that difficult people all have a story. Stop seeing parents as an issue to deal with and start seeing them as people to fight for.

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Preparing for Post-Pandemic Campers - Gabz's Summer Part 1 - Camp Code #165

Can you really prepare for post-pandemic children?

To kick off season 11 of Camp Code, Beth and Gabz take the time to debrief the summer at Ouareau. Part one will focus on the campers - what Gabz and her team did to meet the needs of campers (and the staff) and be successful.

Whether your summer felt like a success or not - these episodes will help you not only hear the raw honesty of a fellow camp director, but will help you start thinking about what you can do now to make summer 2024 excellent.

Tune in to hear about the changes Gabz made to leadership training in 2023 to be able to better support campers and how did she have to pivot once campers arrived and she was met with their needs?

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Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Gabrielle Raill

Also a brother-sister tip! If you have access to a freezer, get some fun ice-cube molds! It’s a fun and silly way to add some joy and take care of people. Who doesn’t love some a cool-burst in their water-bottle!

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The Industry is Struggling…What’s Next? - Camp Code #109

This needs to be sustainable, for us, for our staff and for our organizations.

Sometimes it feels like the challenges of being a camp professional are too impossible to overcome. You are not alone in feeling this way. Today, Gabz, Beth and IRubytalk about the ever-changing and uncertain landscape of the world and how camp can survive as we move forward.

The world around us continues to get busier, with increased tensions both socially and culturally. Yet, we continue to believe that the camp experience is one of the most life-changing opportunities in a young person’s life. Camp allows individuals to be loved for the person they are and allows people to adapt, grow, change and learn from their mistakes. 

If you have a story, share it! Camp stories allow you to connect with others, it allows people unfamiliar with camp to learn about the opportunity for their children. Camps also need your help! If you have a story you are willing to share, please bring it to https://Thankstocamp.ca

As we close out the latest season of Camp Code, we wish everyone a fun summer filled with magic and adventures for your campers. As leaders, go out and help to shape the future of your new staff and create new memories for your campers. Thanks for the season, friends! 

We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Ruby

You owe it to yourself to be organized! Create yourself a spreadsheet of everything you order, complete with notes, current prices and links to the product. Your future self will thank you! Ruby usually builds her lists in the fall once camp is done and when it comes time to order supplies, the links are readily available, making the process much easier for you!

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9 Things You Must Do With Your First Year Staff - Camp Code #108

You probably have more new staff than ever, here’s how to set them (and yourself!) up for success!

Training season is almost here. This summer, we want to be sure our new staff members are set up for success. Here are our top tips for doing just that.

  • Make them feel like you’ve been waiting all year for them to arrive. Send a link the day before with instructions for when they arrive on the camp road. 

  • With return staff, reverse engineer and imagine what the last day of camp will look like AND THEN, have them think through how do we accomplish that vision starting with when staff arrive

  • Give them space to let home know they have made it okay and then take away their technology

  • Bring your returning staff in before the new staff

  • Create times for new staff to show skills that they have

  • Have multiple avenues for asking questions

  • Provide them with a support system!

  • Reinforce the idea that not everyone will remember everything from staff training, then show them the transformation of what they learn now compared to before training

  • Do camp chores together!

We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Gabz (Borrowed from Claudes Cameron)

Bring your staff together! One thing you can do is offer old camp swag to new staff members. Staff could donate what they wanted to the campership fund. The asking price was $1. Doing this gives new staffers old camp swag, giving the perception that they have always belonged to that camp.

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Setting Guest Speakers Up for Success - Camp Code #107

You treat everyone in your camp community with intention and care…do you do the same with the guest speakers you bring to training?

If you are utilizing guest speakers this year, you want to listen to this episode. As folks who have both hosted guest speakers and people who HAVE BEEN the visiting speaker, we have some opinions to share.

We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Gabrielle Raill:

When you are planning, compare your core objectives with your list of training sessions. If a session doesn’t meet at least 70% of your core objectives, then don’t do it during training or change HOW you run it so you meet your core objectives.

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Acknowledging White Privilege in Training - Camp Code #106

Our staff are ready for this conversation…are you?

White privilege is real and it’s everywhere, even at summer camp. Join us today as we talk about what we can do about it. But first, here’s our disclaimer: We are looking at this through the lens of three white individuals and our focus today is to encourage white folks to do the work.

We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Beth - Credit to Peggy McIntosh

Peggy McIntosh is the founder of the seed project and says that in order to understand the way privilege works, you have to be able to see patterns and systems in social life but you also have to care about individual experiences. One’s own individual experience is sacred, testifying to it is very important but so is seeing that it is set in a framework outside of one’s personal experience that is much bigger and has repetitive statistical patterns in it. In an article by Harpers Bazaar, Peggy shares 20 everyday examples of white privilege that are taken advantage of to shed light on some of the realities experienced in real life. The full list of examples curated by Peggy McInstosh can be found at nationalseedproject.org. Have your staff break into small groups and talk about these examples. 

Another example is Learningforjustice.org which has a toolkit and resources that can be used to help facilitate camp training.


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Mid-Season Inservice Training - Camp Code #105

One of the best ways to dedicate your team to continuous improvement!

Believe it or not, staff training doesn’t end on the last day of your orientation. In fact, a great strategy to keep staff engaged, motivated, and excited throughout the summer–and fight off those mid-summer-slumps–is to continually offer training and learning opportunities as the season progresses.

Today’s episode focuses on some of our best ideas for conducting training throughout the summer.

We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Ruby

Collect information from your staff! One way that I did it was that I would put up a piece of paper that is in the staff lounge/workspace within easy access for all staff and ask the questions “What would you’d like to be discussed during the next staff meeting?” By doing it this way, staff could anonymously fill them out and then I could choose things that were important for the next meeting. Often, I would bring up the topics and check them off on a list in front of the staff to show the staff that I value their feedback.

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What to Do When Your Lose Your Dream Team - Camp Code #104

It’s one of those, not “if” but “when” types of situations…

As camp directors, we’ve all had THAT summer where many of our senior staff and our reliable leaders have started their life beyond camp. When we lose our reliable staff, we have to reset and revisit our needs at camp. Beth, Gabz and Ruby have all been there and have curated a to-do list to help leaders adjust for a summer with new staff.

Below are a few highlights and to take in all the insights. Have a listen today! 

  • Revisit your job descriptions and evaluate the needs of what you are looking for

  • Adjust the positions and required training to meet your realities

  • Reach out to those dream team employees to learn what did/did not work

  • Leverage online meetups to train new members of your team and develop your foundation

  • Prepare to provide extra support to new leaders

  • Use mentorship (previous staff members) who can come in to support the new leaders

  • Consider dynamic duos for leadership roles

We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Gabrielle:

Before Gabz comes to camp, she writes down the names of staff members on a thank you card and then set a timeline on when she needs to distribute them. Writing the names at the beginning of camp training helps keep her accountable on reflecting and thanking each of her staff members and recognizes how grateful she is to be surrounded by your staff.

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Do This Now to Prepare for Staff Training - Camp Code #103

Prioritize to Stabilize - Let’s get ready for the summer!

Up north here in Canada, our friends on the west coast are already enjoying fantastic outdoor spring weather and golf. In Ontario, we continue to be fooled that spring is here with warm weather followed by another dumping of snow, but one thing is for certain; spring is around the corner. What that really means is that the camp season is quickly approaching so we as camp leaders need to start pretty for staff training (if we haven’t already started!)

In this episode, Beth, Gabz and Ruby are here to remind us of all the things we should be doing to help us better prepare for camp. Below are some of the topics covered, and to know why they are important, you will have to listen to what our camp pros are saying! 

This list will get you started:

  • Start journaling at night

  • Create your categories and sort the “Good to know and Glad I did”

  • Put mints in your pocket! 

  • Do your research!

    • What issues could come up for you at camp this summer?

    • What’s going on in your local communities

    • Anything different you should know about the city, public or government land that you normally use?

    • What’s the buzz in professional development?

  • Update staff evaluations

  • Collaborate with camp colleagues to build training

  • Review and reimagine the way you do things currently

  • Check in on your own professional development

  • Whatever you need to organize, do it now

  • Build your staff community

We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Ruby:

This practice is borrowed from Organize 365 and is called the Sunday Basket. Put a basket in your office that is all of those maintenance tasks, bills, correspondence, subscription renewals. Throughout the week, fill that basket and on Sunday (or your day of choice), go through and do all of those tasks. This saves you the mental guilt of “I should be doing this task” because you have set a time later in life to do it!

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Wouldn’t it be refreshing if your registration software gave you MORE time? With UltraCamp, you can track attendance, manage staff applications, streamline registration, and much more. Get back the time you need to focus on what is really important: CAMP! Find out more at ultracampmanagement.com/campcode/

9 Things You Might Be Surprised You Need To Teach Staff - Camp Code #102

Chalk it up to the pandemic, but it’s time for some re-teaching.

In this week’s episode Gabz, Beth and Ruby recognize that as we get closer to the summer camp season, camp directors are already planning out their summer. To help camp leaders, our pros are here to break down 9 things that we think every camp leader should be prepared to teach!

  1. The ability to talk to strangers. This includes parents, campers, vendors, shop owners in town. Developing “small talk etiquette” will help your camp staff be more confident, demonstrating that they are leaders within your organization

  2. How to have a successful day off. Some of your staff might be new, teaching them where they can go and what they can do on their time off is valuable for your staff. Helping your staff to set their boundaries and using language such as “During downtime, I like to…”

  3. Matching/mirroring - finding new ways for your staff to build their own rapport with other people

  4. Life skills! Teach your staff how to use the basic tools around camp including screwdrivers, wrenches, plungers. Take it one step further, how to turn off water at camp, how to use a fire extinguisher or maybe even how to change a tire! 

  5. Teach staff how to do laundry. This sounds self-explanatory, but your staff may have never done laundry before in their life. 

  6. Silence is okay - become comfortable with the silence

  7. Teach staff that there is life beyond camp and that be real with your staff that they will not be able to respond to family and friends in real-time. Teaching staff to connect in new ways, like written letters are important.

  8. Learn a morning routine and how to conserve your energy to last all day

  9. Play, play, play - Camp is supposed to be fun. 

We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Beth:

Staff need to know what to do offsite and onsite. We need to talk about staff behavior on their day off because even when they are not working, they are representing camp. I used to love when I got calls from cottagers and shops telling me that staff were being respectful to others. One thing we should focus on is ensuring our staff knows what to do if they run into trouble while offsite. To help, give your staff business cards with camp phone numbers, addresses or any pertinent information that may be needed during an emergency.

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Wouldn’t it be refreshing if your registration software gave you MORE time? With UltraCamp, you can track attendance, manage staff applications, streamline registration, and much more. Get back the time you need to focus on what is really important: CAMP! Find out more at ultracampmanagement.com/campcode/

Boundaries and Building Community Norms - Camp Code #101

More on boundaries - because we all need to hear it.

Happy post-valentine’s day camp pros! In this episode (and as always) our hosts are here to spread their love and joy for camp. After celebrating 100 episodes, we are back to our regular programming. This week, we continue from where we left off in episode 99, focusing on boundaries and building community. If you haven’t listened to episode 99 perhaps have a listen to that first. 

Today, we explore what boundaries are, what they look like, defining the difference between healthy and unhealthy boundaries and their related effects. Afterwards, we dig into how exactly boundaries at camp can be used.

Finally, we explore the terms ‘consent’ vs ‘cooperation’ and what this all means at camp. The most important piece to all of this, is to examine what boundaries look like with staff. Developing training sessions with your staff to help define boundaries and letting them know that it is okay to say ‘no.’ In parallel, take a moment to make things perfectly clear that boundaries will be crossed and people will make mistakes.

We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Ruby (From John, Director of Camp Kadesh)

In any conflict, there are three types of people; red, blue and gray people. Red personalities are angry and aggressive and often do not think before they speak. Gray people ignore the conflict and pretend it does not exist and blue people are perfect, wonderful and kind. Be the common ground in a conversation, always be blue.

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100 Episodes Later: What We've Learned So Far - Camp Code #100

100 Episodes!? Thanks for being along for the ride, friends!

100 episodes into this journey, our camp pros have led us through over 60 hours of leadership gold. This episode is all about reflection. As much as our hosts have taught us all, they too have learned from one another. Gabz, Ruby and Beth share their most memorable Camp Code moments and reflect on what they have learned from one another and how those teachable moments have been applied throughout their own training sessions.

To the listeners, it continues to be you and your passion for camp that keep our hosts motivated to bring new content. When this podcast was first created, Beth, Gabz and Ruby all thought that this would last at most; two seasons. Here we are, eight years later and the reach and success that we have had with Camp Code should be celebrated.

  • 100 Episodes and 60 hours of professional develop content, focused on designing intentional staff training

  • Over 31,000 downloads over the last two years

  • Over 50 5-star ratings in podcasting apps

  • Over 2500 cities, towns, municipalities across the world: top 6:Toronto, Columbus OH, Montreal, Sheboygan WI, Manhattan, Chicago

  • Listeners on all six inhabited continents - so if you go to Antarctica, throw us a download while you are down there!

  • Listeners in 75 counties

Most recent popular episodes: 

We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Beth Allison (borrowed from Gabz!)

Young adults do not see the world the same way older adults do. Gabz came up with a way to frame the younger generation of staff to help older staff take in their perspective. Gabz has named them the WTF generation. These younger adults are a generation of humans that want to make an impact and they also need support. So in the WTF, it stands for multitude of things; What to fight, what to fund, what to follow and what to fear. If I ask myself these questions, it helps me to better prepare when I have to run a session, a program or how to write a message on social media so that the younger generation will understand what I am trying to communicate.

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Wouldn’t it be refreshing if your registration software gave you MORE time? With UltraCamp, you can track attendance, manage staff applications, streamline registration, and much more. Get back the time you need to focus on what is really important: CAMP! Find out more at ultracampmanagement.com/campcode/

How to Set (and Keep!) Personal Boundaries - Camp Code #99

How can you expect your team to have healthy boundaries if you don’t?

In this episode, our hosts Gabz, Ruby and Beth hone in on the B-word. Boundaries act as an internal guide between good vs evil or right vs wrong and can be felt as a knot in your stomach. Setting boundaries also allows you to define expectations with others while keeping your needs in check. For Gabz, boundaries are all about focusing on Angela Duckworth’s concept on Grit vs Grind. Grit can be seen as perseverance and Angela Duckworth has a great TED Talk that goes into more detail, and can be found here.

We can also all interpret the word boundaries to be slightly different from one another. For Beth find that the definition from Out of the Fog aligns with her thought process. That definition is that boundaries are guidelines, rules or limits that a person creates to identify for themselve what are reasonable, safe and permissible ways for people to act around them. We encourage you to listen to the great advice that our camp experts are sharing in this episode! 

We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Gabrielle Raill

As a leader, it is extremely valuable for you to talk to your staff on day one about your own shortcomings. Talk about what you, as a director, need assistance with or something your struggle to work through. Explain WHY you have these shortcomings. Be honest, tell your staff that you are great with some things but at times, also need help with other things and empower your staff to support you throughout your own development.

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Wouldn’t it be refreshing if your registration software gave you MORE time? With UltraCamp, you can track attendance, manage staff applications, streamline registration, and much more. Get back the time you need to focus on what is really important: CAMP! Find out more at ultracampmanagement.com/campcode/

Transitioning Campers to Staff - Camp Code #98

If this is your first summer back after COVID, this may be THE focus for your training this year.

As we step into 2022, we shift our focus on transitioning CITs from the mindset of a camper, to become a staff member. As always, we recommend frontloading these potential staff members with information to ensure that these young people feel like they are part of something larger. Beth comes up with three simple rules: connect with the potential staff, communicate to them what leadership training is all about and commit to them that as an outcome of leadership training, everyone will grow. 

Gabz takes aim on explaining the “why” we work as camp leaders. Helping your new potential staff to understand the importance of summer camp leadership training. Ruby is back and comes out stating the facts. Future staff will have employers beyond camp and those employers are going to be looking for leadership skills therefore, the training your potential staff will get from summer camp will only better prepare them for life outside of camp! 

With summer camp hiring right around the corner, this episode is full of ideas on how to engage with your potential staff to help you hire the right people to start planning for a (hopeful) more “normal” summer. Have a listen today! 

We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Beth Allison

Your future camp staff members may have been your previous campers, meaning you’ve interacted with their parents throughout life at camp. As much as we advocate for summer camp training, parents will also be looking for information. Frontload as much as you can on what life as a staff member looks like at camp. Clearly define what parents can expect as their children transition into staff. 

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Wouldn’t it be refreshing if your registration software gave you MORE time? With UltraCamp, you can track attendance, manage staff applications, streamline registration, and much more. Get back the time you need to focus on what is really important: CAMP! Find out more at ultracampmanagement.com/campcode/

How to Train Future Staff (AKA - Your Campers!) - Camp Code #97

The American Camp Association (ACA) recently held its virtual staff summit. The event featured talented speaker panellists, roundtables and other learning sessions. One big topic that we’ve already covered was staffing shortages and discussing new innovative ways to recruit and retain staff. Today, we are fortunate enough to sit down with Kim Aycock, one of our industry’s experts in staff recruitment, training and development.

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The Buzz from the Staffing Summit - with Kim Aycock - Camp Code #96

The American Camp Association (ACA) recently held its virtual staff summit. The event featured talented speaker panellists, roundtables and other learning sessions. One big topic that we’ve already covered was staffing shortages and discussing new innovative ways to recruit and retain staff. Today, we are fortunate enough to sit down with Kim Aycock, one of our industry’s experts in staff recruitment, training and development.

Read More

How to Combat Learning Loss in Your Staff Team - with Kate Taylor - Camp Code #95

It’s been a long time since a proper staff training, hasn’t it?

It’s already November, which means that as camp leaders, we’re hopefully (and finally) well-rested. It also means that with winter approaching, we need to start planning for next year. Winter recruiting, hiring and planning out staff training is what awaits us! For a lot of reasons, this year feels different.

For a lot of us, camp was either non-existent or looked very different for the past two summers. If your camp was able to run, chances are you had minimal staff and for the camps that were able to take part in normal summer programs. With summer 2022 fast approaching, it means that our camp staff haven’t had a ‘normal’ camp leadership experience or that your camp is about to take on brand new staff because all of our staff resources that were planning to work at camp, are all a couple of years older. 

Our camp pros are here to help, and this time, they brought back up! We are excited to have Kate Taylor as a special guest on this episode. Kate Taylor is the Camp Director for Camp Kanawana at the YMCAs of Québec. In this episode, Gabrielle, Beth and Kate talk about ideas to combat the loss of learning that our staff have missed out on for a couple of years. One thing our experts refer to is the Summer Learning - A Bridge to Student Success and America’s Recovery by the National Summer Learning Association. Without giving away any further spoilers, we encourage you to listen, learn and adapt your teaching techniques as we all prepare for summer 2022. 

We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Kate Taylor

It is imperative that we have downtime throughout staff training. If this means making staff training slightly longer to give your staff half a day off DO IT. Taking that break allows your staff to reflect on everything they’ve been taught during training sessions. Further, when you have downtime, make sure you have some non-mandatory activities for your staff. This will help some people struggling with social anxieties practice social skills and build boundaries with their colleagues.

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Wouldn’t it be refreshing if your registration software gave you MORE time? With UltraCamp, you can track attendance, manage staff applications, streamline registration, and much more. Get back the time you need to focus on what is really important: CAMP! Find out more at ultracampmanagement.com/campcode/

Part 2 - Giving Staff the Best Experience Possible - Camp Code #94

It’s STILL time to focus on the staff.

Listen to part 1 here: https://camphacker.tv/camp-code/best-staff-experience-possible

In this episode, we continue to explore how summer camp leaders can help staff achieve their best possible experience as a leader at camp. 2020 had many camps in North America shut down and in 2021 as many camps adopted programs to align with public health guidelines, camp leaders struggled to find resources and keep staff for the entirety of the summer. With the 2021 season behind us, Beth and Gabrielle have their sights on the early phases to start prepping for summer 2022. Throughout the episode, our hosts explore things that camp leaders can do today to help prepare folks to apply to camp and be ready for the camp season.

One of the biggest lessons learned is that camp staff have a strong desire to feel supported. As leaders, we need to reshape our recruiting techniques and the way we prepare and develop our camp programs next summer in a way that puts both the mental and physical health of our employees as a priority. Prioritizing employees right from the recruiting phase helps to foster a foundation of trust, preparing staff for the challenges of camp as the summer approaches. 

The lessons from this summer have created an opportunity for growth. Listen in on this episode to gain further insights from our camp pros!

We hope you love this episode of Camp Code! If you do, please consider subscribing to the show, and leaving us a rating in your Podcast app. It’s SO easy, just head to https://ratethispodcast.com/campcode

Best Practice for Leadership Training

From Beth Allison

During staff training, why not take the time to build a coping skills toolbox. It is not only good to teach coping skills, staff will realized that they need to cope. This is an idea from Baldwin County public schools in Alabama and they have PDF downloads available at Baldwin County Public Schools / Homepage (bcbe.org). A toolbox allows you to store a collection of healthy items when you are feeling stressed or anxiety to help you to build resilience. There are five tools within a coping toolbox: 

  1. Self-soothing - what can you do to comfort yourself? Examples include a stress ball or your favourite photos.

  2. Distractions - Something that will take your mind off something. Examples include a puzzle, sudoku, knitting needles and yarn. 

  3. Emotional Wellness - how can you express your feelings? Examples can be a journal or art supplies

  4. Mindfulness - Checking in with your mental state. Examples include a yoga matt, reflective prompting journals, serenity rocks

  5. Crisis plan - who at camp do you go to when your coping skills are not enough?

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Giving Staff the Best Experience Possible - part 1 - Camp Code #93

In this two-part series, we begin by exploring the topic of giving our staff the best experience possible and helping us deliver a great summer program. Coming on the high side of the pandemic, staffing and retaining staff was a challenge for many camps. We know that for staff to be committed, we have to find ways to keep our staff engaged and consistently developing.

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Does the Camp Industry Need a Union? - with Alana Matteson - Camp Code #92

How might (or might not) a union help serve Camp Pros as they navigate an increasingly stressful profession?

At the end of August, a particularly thought-provoking post was made in the Summer Camp Professionals Facebook group.

After hearing about some of the horror stories of this, and past summers, a pro posted this:

“…Its become clear to me in the last few months that the people in charge of camps are often not the people that run summer camps and this can lead to some wild expectations including around hours, pay, vacation time, parental leave, etc. because the ACA hasn’t put these things in the standards, I’m wondering if having some sort of body to educate people on best practices around expectations for staff would be helpful.”

That pro, was Alana Matteson, and she is our guest this episode to kick off our
new season of both Camp Code and the CampHacker Podcast!

Alana joins Travis and Ruby for this discussion on not just Unions, but the type of advocacy that pros need in general to have more successful, fulfilling and sustainable careers.

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What do you think? Let us know in the comments!

Tool of the Week – Make Yourself a Better Camp Director

Travis: WorkSharp

Ruby: Personal Recipe Book

Alana: Power Beats High-Performance Earbuds

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UltraCamp

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