A letter from Peg.

Pulled in All the Right Directions at Camp

While camps across the country are getting children up off the couch and into the fresh air far from their electronic playgrounds--the cell phones, television, and video games--we are increasingly aware that our roles as educators, parents, and citizens assume more of an imperative than we imagined. Play time is markedly decreasing, outdoor activities according to researchers, who monitor how our children are actually spending their time, are on the decline. Even walking is an endangered activity. "Our nation's young people are, in large measure, inactive, unfit, and increasingly overweight," according to a presidential report from the Secretary of Health and Human Services. William Doherty, a University of Minnesota researcher, reports that over the last twenty years there has been a 25 percent decline in the time children spend playing and a 50 percent decline in time spent in unstructured outdoor activities.

While fleeing indoors may not be a "Movement" in itself, there is a profound cultural shift occurring that risks leaving behind an entire generation of caretakers of the planet--those young people who find the silence, wonder, and discovery of the open air, the friendship of others in the camp setting, the self-reliance that comes from independent action who need our voices, our encouragement, and our counsel more than ever.

Independently conducted research from the American Camp Association and supported by Lilly Endowment Inc. further demonstrates the positive outcomes for youth surrounding the camp experience and confirms just how powerfully the values of the camp experience translate into children's lives--children who are more prepared to participate in the richness and diversity of our culture and more prepared to be the stewards and leaders of the planet. In the largest study of camp outcomes ever conducted, young people and their families report that following the camp experience, there were measurable gains in positive identity, social skills, physical and thinking skills, and positive values and spirituality. Capitalizing on this knowledge will help us all to advance the case for experiential education and turn it from conventional wisdom to practical wisdom.

No stranger to the outdoor life, naturalist John Muir wrote in the early years of the twentieth century, "You cannot feel yourself out of doors; plain, sky, and mountains ray beauty which you feel. You bathe in these spirit beams, turning round and round, as if warming at a camp fire." For nearly one hundred years, The American Camp Association has supported the idea that in addition to the nurturing and role modeling that occurs at camp, there is a larger force, riotous and intricate, delicate, and noisy that has such immediate power to connect children to a world of possibility and imagination, a non-stop world of growth and a way to take the outdoors indoors--directly to the heart. Every day, millions of children and adults share this connection at camp. Ultimately, camp is never about getting away from the real world; it's all about tuning into it.

Peg Smith, ACA Chief Executive Officer

A Letter from Peg

by Peg Smith, ACA Chief Executive Officer

What will it take for us to revolutionalize the effectiveness of the camp experience? Marge Scanlin would tell you it will be our ability to "listen to things we don't want to hear."

You might ask why it is even important to increase the effectiveness of what we do. I would suggest three important reasons.

1. Parents increasingly want proof, or tangible evidence, that the camp experience adds value. (Legitimacy Challenge)

2. Campers, whether kids or adults, are being seduced by increasing market competition, a fiercely competitive environment for time and resources. (Competition Challenge)

3. And finally, in my opinion, more importantly, campers deserve our best. (Credibility Challenge)

So, what did the kids tell us during the Outcome Research project? Are we ready to listen to things we don't want to hear? (Stop reading now if you can't answer, yes.)

1. Many kids told us they don't feel safe at camp.

2. Many kids told us they don't have an opportunity to experience leadership.

We learned much more, including what incredible "good" we do, but these two statements merit attention. Will we choose to rebuff and counter these findings, or will we pause, explore, question, and discover new ways to address these hard lessons? If we challenge ourselves, it could result in increasing our ability to deliver even more "good" to those who go to camp each year, advancing our ability to meet the challenges of value, time, and quality.

To meet these challenges, a number of camps have been evaluating these findings, and more. ACA plans to use these new lessons as well as to continue to gather lessons and learnings in order to position ourselves to aggressively develop education, training, and professional development services that will add support and add value to the entire camp community.

I am proud to work with professionals who are willing to listen to the things we don't want to hear. I am confident that our willingness to listen to the things we don't want to hear is one reason Lilly Endowment Inc. gave ACA its second grant in five years ... so we can do something powerful with what we are learning.

Originally published in the 2005 November/December issue of Camping Magazine.

Peg Smith, ACA Chief Executive Officer