Working at Camp Starlight for a summer is fun, challenging, and rewarding. You have the opportunity to live in a bunk with our campers on our beautiful campus in the endless mountains of Northeast Pennsylvania. You will work with campers during each of our six activity periods. However, you will be with the kids so much more often than that. In fact, you’ll be with them from wake-up to bedtime.
Mealtimes. Rest Hour. Shower Hour. Activity Periods. All-day long, you have the chance to interact with our amazing campers. And as lucky as you are to be with them, they are equally fortunate to have you as one of our amazing staff members.
Through all the time that you spend with your campers, it only takes a single moment…a single moment to change a child’s life. This may sound like something out of a fantasy novel, but it is absolutely true. We can all think back to a single conversation we had with an adult when we were younger that still impacts us today. The strangest part about this “moment”? You will never know it’s happening, and neither will the child. You may say something that seems inconsequential to both of you. Then, days later, that child is still thinking about it and you have long since forgotten about it. Years later, you’ve changed that child’s future based on a single conversation, and while they frantically search for your phone number to say “Thank You,” you may hardly remember that camper.
At the conclusion of my third summer at Camp Starlight, I received a Counselor Appreciation letter from a camper who wrote about something that had happened the summer previously. The letter detailed a very intellectual and emotional realization that the camper had due to an interaction we had. However, this interaction wasn’t a profound conversation or a disciplinary issue. This interaction was me turning off the water while he brushed his teeth. He turned it back on. I turned it off. We went back and forth several times, and, amidst our laughter, I finally convinced him to leave it off once I left the bathroom. In my mind, that was the end. However, for reasons he explained in the letter, this was genuinely a meaningful moment in his life that he still thought about over a year later. Without his Counselor Appreciation Letter, I would have never known this “moment” existed.
As a counselor at Camp Starlight, we only ask that you come as you are. Athletic, quirky, nerdy, shy, outgoing, or anything in between. We’ve seen it all and appreciate it equally. As a staff member, we don’t expect your summer to be filled with life-changing moments. In fact, looking for these moments would be counterproductive. By simply being yourself, you will build strong relationships with your campers.
So, don’t search for this “moment.” Embrace your individuality and cherish the summer with these amazing children because as much as you can impact them, they will certainly have an impact on you.
In a world of selfies, Instagram likes and Facebook’s new “love” feature, people are putting more emphasis on taking a picture of an experience than really enjoying and living in the experience itself. We participate in an event (concert, party, sporting event, social gathering) but spend most of the time trying to get the most artistic angle, the coolest filter and the best overall image quality to generate enough likes (and now loves) to make us feel valued, heard and appreciated online. As we view life through the camera function on our phones, we are missing the big picture, by trying to get a good one.
Posing for pictures at camp is beneficial for the campers’ self image. It helps them see what parents and counselors and family member see when they look at the pictures; real kids having real fun. It helps campers become more confident about who they are without the need to fix, edit, change, crop or filter anything out. Kids get so wrapped up in social media and how they are portrayed to the world, always comparing themselves to others and forgetting to appreciate who they really are. Self confidence issues happen when teens begin to think that the perfect images displayed on their friends’ Facebook profiles are real life, and they begin to compare their life with others. They forget that for the one perfect picture that was posted, there were probably 50 others that were taken that didn’t make the cut. Letting campers see what they really look like when they are really having fun will help them realize that a picture of a t-shirt stained, muddy shoe kid having the time of their lives is so much more valuable than a perfectly timed selfie in the bathroom.
Written by Madison Dratch
Ah, another summer out at camp. The twinkle of stars on a clear night. The whistle of the wind in the trees. The splashing of campers jumping in the lake.
Practicing how to plan time for cleanup, getting around camp between activities, and bringing the things you need to complete each activity doesn’t just prepare campers for sports, crafts, and sailing — it prepares them for the hectic pace of life outside camp, from school all the way to college!
Most campers choose to participate in either a skit or a talent show at some point during their session. Usually, skits and talents are created and practiced during free time and rest periods. Campers have to find a time in their daily schedule to plan their skit, create props, and practice with other campers.
As told through the eyes of someone who is glad to know…
