Let Them Be Kids
When my husband, Carl, and I became the directors at Camp Southwoods, the first decision we made was how we would divide our responsibilities. It shocked everyone when I excitedly volunteered to head the cultivation and mentorship of our Upper Camp community. I have heard more times than I can count, “Do teenagers really go to camp?” coupled with anecdotes about the difficulty of reasoning with our middle-school aged campers. My response is always the same: let them be kids and they’ll be kids. In an ever changing world that demands more and more from our children, their grasp on childhood slips away earlier each year. Add the impact of social media on their social-emotional health and you have the perfect storm of young minds feeling the pressure to age before their years.
Enter camp stage left.
Camp gives our teenagers the ability to see themselves for who they are, liberated from the pressures of competition or the fear of failure. I am continually blown away by the ways modern children are vulnerable to the mental onslaught that is scoring and ranking. Everything is graded, test scores now equal opportunities later, and the competitive lifestyle begins earlier than ever before. The intentions are good, we all want our children to have every advantage in life, and parents work so hard to make sure their kids have access to every possible resource. But what effect does that have on their perception of self? The way they connect with others? Our kids have marinated in the pressure of achievement, and therefore, struggle to see themselves outside of their accomplishments. Just this last summer I had a call with the family of a teenage girl. They said they were not sure they could commit to a whole session because she needed to be focusing on one-on-one soccer coaching in order to make the three teams she was eligible for. Ultimately she came to camp, and in the beginning wouldn’t go anywhere near soccer (who could blame her?) What happened eventually is she would play with the girls in her cabin who only signed up so they could be together, even though their soccer experience was just about zero, and on the last day of camp when she was going home, she said something that will stick with me as long as I live, “I think I like soccer again.” Here is this girl whose achievements are so significant and yet her joy came from playing World Cup with a bunch of her friends who have no aspirations of greatness. That’s what camp is to our teens - a place where they can find joy away from the fear of failure or the pressure of accomplishment.
Camp is a place with face-to-face connections
without the influence of screens.
Take away the phones, social media, iPads, and Tik Tok dances and what you’re left with is a fertile ground for learning how to communicate and build organic relationships. While every parent I know tries to limit screen time, parents of teenagers have it the hardest. So much of their day is spent being self-sufficient or out of the home, it’s impossible to regulate how much of their time is spent staring at the bluelight of an iPhone. At camp, we are completely screen-free, and while it may take a little adjusting, when asked every camper says they love being without their phones. One of my favorite parts of my job is age-appropriate arguments. I know, I know - hear me out. An astonishing number of kids have only disagreed with each other by text message. They have time to prepare their responses and can choose not to read what’s being said in response, or in most cases, assign tone to responses to support their argument. When you have to sit down, look somebody in the eye, and talk about how you feel it creates a vulnerability that allows for true empathy and understanding. Active listening, the safety to communicate freely, and a little coaching from staff, and campers learn how to navigate social dynamics away from the safety of their tech. It’s a crucial life skill and it’s one our teens get by continuing their summers at camp into middle and high school.
Camp provides a safe landing place that allows for the “let your hair down” freedom to be excited, and much to the surprise of parents, silly. The further the phone gets away from their experience the more our kids live in the moment. Nothing at camp is going on an instagram story - it’s all just being lived. When our teenagers aren’t busy curating their image they’re able to discover who they really are. Try telling this to your fifteen year old at home and they’ll roll their eyes, but at a sleepaway camp where everyone is in the same tech-free boat, we see our teens stand up straighter, laugh louder, and care less about what they look like when they’re being present in their own life. I think the hardest I have ever laughed in my whole camp career is when the fourteen year old boys did a skit where they were pretending to be Carl and I. The boy who was playing me was giving it 110%. He even had a hilarious blonde wig that he tried to put into a messy bun. I cannot imagine him committing to the bit this hard in front of his lacrosse team, but for his cabin? He was more Maddie Acosta than I was. The freedom to go all in without fear of judgement is one of camps most magical gifts. Lower Camp kids rarely worry about the implications of being silly, but our Upper Camp teens live their lives from one “what will they all think?” moment to the next. Watching them shed their worry and sing with their whole heart, laugh with their whole belly, and, in some cases, adorn the world’s worst wig, is a beautiful thing.
Arguably most important of all, the most impactful thing camp gives to our teens is a prolonged childhood, even if it’s only by a few weeks each year. In interacting with thousands of teenagers over my career, I cannot think of a greater gift than giving them permission to enjoy a few more sweet moments of youth before they embark as adults into the world before them. Most of our lives are spent as grown ups. They have so much time to learn the ins and outs of navigating the world as the captain of their own ship. Don’t we all wish we had just one more summer to let the glow of youth shine on our faces? When we choose to send our children to a sleepaway summer camp into their teenage years, that is exactly what we’re giving them - a few more bites of the sweetest peach. I cannot think of a more beautiful gift a parent can give their teenager.
So yes, teenagers absolutely still go to camp and no, it doesn’t take bribery to get them to enjoy it.
AP Courses, drivers tests, SATs, sports try outs, tutoring, applications, internships - they’re going to come regardless. We cannot slow down time, what we can do is give them permission to be their age for a few precious weeks a year. We can look at the list of things that must be checked off to move on to the next milestone and say, all of this can be done and still keep their childhood sacred a little longer. As caregivers, we can give them the greatest gift: We can let them be kids.