Summer Camp Is Fun, But It Also Imparts Children With Lifelong Lessons and Skills

Parents looking at the vast array of summer camps available in Central Ohio might be overwhelmed trying to decide if they want their children to become budding actors, mathematicians, basketball players or chefs.

But camp organizers know the truth: While kids do soak up subject matter at camp, the bigger dividends are the intangible skills they gain. “The greater advantage to camp is children understanding how to live, work and play in a community with others they don’t know and with people who are not their parents or their teachers,” says Marci Hasty, executive director of camping services for YMCA of Central Ohio. “Being at camp fosters a sense of independence, of understanding their own self in the group.”

Hasty has worked with camps professionally for 25 years and helps oversee 1,800 day campers and about 500 resident campers each summer, from ages 6 to 16. YMCA camps, which are held throughout the Columbus region, focus on swimming, creative arts, sports and outdoor exploration.

Allison Sullivan, education program coordinator at the Ohio Wildlife Center, says day camps are a place where kids can step out of their comfort zone, something she learned when she attended Girl Scouts camps as a child. “Being pushed to introduce myself to other people was something I had to grow into, as well as being confident enough to raise my hand,” says Sullivan. “Sharing something in front of a group was nerve-wracking for me.”

Most kids come to wildlife center day camps because they’re intrigued by animals. Each day, they get to interact with an animal visitor—such as turtles, snakes, owls, opossum or skunks—and have hands-on experiences caring for animals and their habitats. “Some come and they like one family of animals and they’re afraid of another, like a skunk or a snake,” says Sullivan. Counselors don’t force interactions, but campers often warm up to animals they’re leery of after seeing other campers engage with them.

“If we can set the kids up for success, they have a choice if they want to push through,” Sullivan says. “We try to instill a sense of advocacy for our natural habitat, which is something they can take home with them and be a voice for the environment.”

While the Ohio Wildlife Center is on the smaller end of the spectrum, with about 200 kids attending throughout the summer, the Columbus Recreation and Parks Department serves about 17,000 campers (some of whom attend multiple weeks) in the 72 programs it offers. These range from community recreation center camps to sports, nature, performing arts and visual arts themes. The department also offers a variety of therapeutic recreation camps for children and adults with special needs.

Kenton B. Curtis Jr., assistant director of community centers, says each camp emphasizes summer enrichment. “Even though we make it fun, we put a lot of components in to reduce the summer learning slide and improve life skills like self-control,” he says. Surveys before and after camp bear that out, with 89 percent of kids last year reporting better self-control of their feelings following a week of camp.

Counselors also foster friendships among campers, who often are culturally, economically and racially diverse. “Kids don’t have the biases that adults have, and our camps offer a chance to develop friendships with others across the realm,” Curtis says. Many youngsters return year after year and look forward to seeing friends they made the summer before.

Kate Mason, arts education coordinator at Columbus Children’s Theatre, has found that CCT’s camps widen youngsters’ friendship base. “I grew up doing CCT camps and having a broader community than just the people I went to school with, and that gave me so many valuable life skills,” she says. “Friendships are usually by convenience, but at camp children are making their own choices and choosing their own friends. Giving children autonomy in their relationships is something important to come out of summer camp programing.”

Directors say learning how to make friends is one of the most valuable lessons camps offer. “If they make friends easily, that’s fantastic,” Hasty says. “But if they don’t, they’re going to learn, and counselors will help them.”

Those friendships are often intense. “At school you might be with the same kids all day, but you’re concentrating on doing your math or your reading,” says Raeann Cronebach, camp director for the Jewish Community Center of Greater Columbus. “Here, they’re playing together for eight hours a day for five days, singing and dancing together and forming a community.”

Camp Helps Children Build Independence

The JCC offers Camp Hoover (situated on Hoover Reservoir) for older children, with a high-ropes course, archery, swimming and other active pursuits. Camp Chaverim for younger kids offers activities such as swimming and singing at the community center. About 375 children, both Jewish and not, participate in these programs over the course of the summer.

Programs are based on the Jewish values of building community, welcoming guests, nurturing the body and soul, connecting to the Jewish people and bestowing kindness. “These are the things we want our kids to walk away with,” Cronebach says. “We do a lot of team activities because it’s such a valuable skill to be able to work with others, even at a young age.”

Independence is the most important life skill Cronebach sees campers gain. “They’re learning to solve problems, even small ones, like how to turn their shirt right side out if it’s inside out after swimming,” she says. “They’re doing more things on their own, like putting on their own sunscreen and making their own choices, then reflecting on whether it was a good choice or a bad choice.”

Overnight camps expand campers’ life skills even further. Megan Reardon, senior program manager of resident camp for the Girl Scouts of Ohio’s Heartland, ticks them off: organizing belongings, making food choices, physically caring for themselves, drinking enough water, taking showers.

“They’re responsible, maybe for the first time, for making those choices themselves,” says Reardon, who first went to overnight camp at the age of 8. An elementary school art teacher for 10 years, she is beginning her third year as camp director at the Girl Scouts’ overnight camp, Camp Molly Lauman, in Lucasville.

Hasty says overnight campers at the YMCA’s Camp Willson in Bellefontaine learn how to pick up after themselves, keep their cabins clean and help during meals. “Kids come back from camp and parents see an increase in independence and self-confidence,” she says. They learn to rely on each other.

“I remember a time when I was a camper that we had a thunderstorm and a number of us were scared, and of course our moms and dads weren’t there,” Hasty says. “We were dependent on each other.”

Even being homesick—a common occurrence at both day and resident camps—helps youngsters build independence and self-confidence, camp leaders say. “It’s not a bad thing; it’s part of the journey they are working through,” Reardon says. Counselors validate that it’s OK to feel homesick and help get children over that hump.

“I remember a young camper who was very homesick, and she wrote a very sad postcard to her mom at the beginning of the week,” Reardon says. “But at the end of the week, she was crying because she didn’t want to leave camp.”

Learning About Oneself

Kids often attend camp with a friend or sibling, but that’s not a necessity, says Reardon.

“Never let having or not having a buddy stop you from going to camp,” she says. “As soon as campers walk into their units, they meet new friends and their counselor. It’s a bigger leap without a buddy, but if they do that, it teaches them that they can successfully go into situations where they don’t know anyone.”

Mason says that at Columbus Children’s Theatre, more-confident children may benefit from attending solo. “It depends on the kiddo, but sometimes kids who come in with a friend focus more on that relationship and it’s harder to get them to participate,” she says. “But for some kiddos, having that friend with them will open them up to be more motivated to participate.”

At some camps, youngsters have opportunities to play side-by-side with children who have different abilities than they do. “We have kiddos who have autism or Down syndrome, and they’re learning right along with their peers,” Cronebach says. “We really focus on that inclusion, so that kids are learning compassion and acceptance of those who are a little different from them.”

That’s especially true at the summer day camps that Easterseals Central and Southeast Ohio operates, where children with and without special needs are welcomed. Campers with disabilities learn more independence through the camp’s daily routine, including cleaning up after snack time, says Lisa McCarty, director of children’s programs. Their peers learn patience and acceptance of others, as well as how to help those who need assistance, she says.

Perhaps the most important thing youngsters can take away from camp is a greater sense of who they are. “It’s really an environment where you meet ‘your people,’ ” Reardon says.

At the JCC, Jewish youngsters are in a space that celebrates them, Cronebach says. “A lot of our kids go to public school and hear all about things they don’t celebrate, like Christmas and Easter,” she says. “Here, we talk about their heritage and their religion, and they get to make connections with other kids they may not make during the school year.”

Because Girl Scouts camps are female only, campers may be more comfortable and feel their voices aren’t overshadowed, Reardon says. “It’s a supportive environment and different from what kids experience at school or on social media,” she says. “At camp you feel much more confident, like you can be silly and be yourself.”

In Hasty’s mind, no matter what program they attend, camp is a time for children to step out of their regular lives. “The magic of camp is that you can show up and nobody knows you and you can be who you most want to be,” she says. “You can be yourself.”

This story is from the Columbus Parent section in the March 2024 issue of Columbus Monthly.