Camp Looked a Little Different This Summer

BY CARLEY GILBERT

As COVID-19 continues to cause canceled plans and social isolation, one demographic that has been hit particularly hard by the situation is school-age children. Academic skills can be learned online, but how are young children supposed to develop social skills when school has been replaced by a Zoom conference? One answer to that question can be found at Camp Shalom at the APJCC in Los Gatos.

While day camp looks quite different this summer, Camp Shalom chose to continue with an in-person day camp program. With strict cleaning schedules, mask policies, and cabin “bubbles” in place, the camp found ways to allow children to interact with others their own age in a relatively low-risk environment.

The structure of camp completely changed this year, starting with drop-off. Families were assigned to one of several different 20-minute time periods for arrival at the beginning of the day to control the flow of traffic and allow for social distancing.

Instead of the traditional all-camp morning song circle with the entire camp together on the outdoor blacktop, counselors led songs from the doorways of their cabins, staying in sync with each other while maintaining the distance between groups. Diligent planning and programming went into making sure cabins alternated frequently between inside and outside activities, allowing cabins to air out, and no two cabins were ever in the same outdoor space at once.

Campers ate lunch inside in their own cabins, instead of all together outdoors, and camper cooking activities were adjusted to include only recipes that can be done inside the cabin, with as little oven or microwave use as possible.

All of this, along with weekly COVID testing for camp staff, allowed the APJCC to cautiously move forward with Camp Shalom 2020.

With all of these changes, you might think Camp Shalom would be almost unrecognizable, but the campers’ smiles and excitement were the same, if not bigger than in previous summers. The joy that Camp Shalom brings its campers was not lost in the shuffle of the new regulations -- in fact the campers were overjoyed to be able to mix with the other kids in their cabins, which were limited in size to stable groups of 12 campers.

Highlights of the summer included an all-camp sports competition (socially distanced of course), virtual dance battles, and a community garden that the middle school age campers planted.

In many ways, camp is much less than what it was, but in other ways it has become so much more. More exciting, more appreciated by the campers and parents, and in some ways far more impactful.

Nothing is a greater measure of how important an experience like this was for the kids than the smiles on their faces and the emails the camp received from parents. One camper told her mother that she’d “rather go to camp than Disneyland.”

While everyone, parents and counselors alike, were initially nervous about holding an in-person camp, in the end the reward outweighed the risk. With most of the campers heading back to virtual school this fall, being able to enjoy a summer of fun, friends, and in-person memories was truly a gift for all involved.