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Benefits of Summer Camp

As camp Director along with my wife Lonnie at Swift Nature Camp we constantly are surprised by the wonderful world of summer camp. Each day we see the Benefits
As camp Director along with my wife Lonnie at Swift Nature Camp we constantly are surprised by the wonderful world of summer camp. Each day we see the Benefits of camp and wonder how much better the “real world” would be if only everyone acted like they were at camp. Here are a few attributes that the rest of the world could adopt:

1. Respect.


Daily we see campers from all over the nation and the world come together with mutual respect and understanding for each other. You might not see this on the first day but after a few trip where it is a cabin group versus nature you realize that everyone in your cabin has you back and is going to watch out for you and respect what you stand for.

 

2. Equality.


Camp provides an equal playing field for all. Makes no difference if your dad is the Ambassador to Guatemala or if your parents run a restaurant. At camp all children are equal. This goes for staff as well. Counselors receive their power from the friendships they make not from the authority of a “counselor”.

3. Real Communication.


In this world of texting and highspeed internet summer camp provides an oasis where adverting and pop culture have no impact. Being away from the “outside world.” only brought people closer together. Conversation were more real, more open leading to the development of better friendships, even closer than some friendships back home. Amazingly, each summer I hear children say “It will be hard with out my smart phone”, yet at the end of camp I hear”it was freeing not having to answer every text and be on call 24/7”.

4. Activity.


In a day and age when working out for children is placing 50 text message, summer camp activities of running jumping, swimming and just playing are a wonderful thing. At our camp we mostly compete against ourselves making camp a place where kids stress free about WINNING. It’s kinda old school to think kids can play outside in a safe child friendly place. The interaction between age groups is amazing older helping younger and Gals being the adopted Moms for the youngest boys. It’s like having one big family that get together every summer.

 

5. Encouragment.


Camp is a place to build each other up. It is a place where children are taught how important their actions are. They learn that one cranky word can bring down the whole cabin. This encouragement takes campers and staff far beyond what they thought they could do. Camp provides the opportunity for people to realize its ok to make a mistake, we all do it. Regroup , apologize wait for forgiveness and move on. When we get encouragement from those around us we are open to reinvent ourselves and better see how we want to be seen in the “real world”.

Camp is not of this world it is like living in a dream where we are each challenged to stretch and grow and be better than when we first arrived camp. Each summer I have staff and campers tell us how they wish the world was more like a camp... Maybe we all just need to try a little more. One last thing, do not assume that all camps are the same. It is important you look for a camp that promotes the values discussed earlier. This can only be done by talking with the director. Read more about this special place Summer Camp. I want to learn more bout How To Find A Summer Camp go Summer Camp Advice and learn more

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Summer Enrichment Programs

So it is that time of the year again when parents start to wonder how to make their child’s summer fun but also educational. Summer camp has often been thought of taking care.....
So it is that time of the year again when parents start to wonder how to make their child’s summer fun but also educational. Summer camp has often been thought of taking care of the fun part of the summer but not necessarily enriching the child. Summer is the perfect time to stop worrying about grades and let your child socially develop with higher self esteem, greater leadership skills and how to make friends. Not all camps believe they enrich a child’s personal development so be sure to ask the director their goals before you rush to sign up for a camp that your family friend is attending. To Find The Best Summer Camp it is important to get the right information.
Summer camp and summer enrichment programs do come dearly, but it is important to realize that benefits your child will develop for the rest of their life. Be sure that when doing your investigation you chat with the Director to be sure you are both on the same page. Some summer enrichment camps are little more than a expensive vacation.
Camp activities that promote camper enrichment are important. But equally important is that children get an opportunity to use these skills daily. Does the camp have a well panned schedule? Or are the children just hanging out most of the day? Look at the stated benefits of a program and at the summer enrichment camp sessions offered. Do the activities match your child’s areas of interest? Will the instruction enhance your child’s personal development?

Staff training is a key. It is important to again chat with the camp director and find out the training his staff has. Do they have certifications in specialized areas like ropes course or archery? You may have hear the fact that often camps scramble at the last minute to get staff and sometimes use international staff. These staff are often more interested in seeing the world than seeing to campers needs.
We all know children do not want to go to school during the summer. Therefore it is important that staff do their best to incorporate learning in to games. When campers enjoy the process they learn alot more than behind a desk in school. Camp is about hands on learning. Learning socialization skills is a contact sport.

Again , it is important to understand that camp teach “Life Long Learnables” the things they just do not teach you in school. So when you hear “summer enrichment” its not all school. Camp benefits children by providing them with:Confidence, motivation and self-esteem, as well as their communication and leadership skills. These are the things that really help a child excel in life. 

So you have found the right place, How long should they stay? As a camp Director I believe that longer the better. However, many children have scheduling conflicts and maybe too expensive for many parents. The truth is the shorter the time the less impact a child will have. 

Finally, be sure to investigate your summer enrichment options thoroughly because sending your son or daughter to the right summer enrichment camp will offer long-term benefits for the entire family. As well as making the wrong choice on a sumer camp can have negative impact as well. Remember increased motivation and confidence can translate into better grades, and lead to new academic and personal interests.

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Camp Is More Than Fun

Often I speak with parents that ask “why should I send my child to a traditional FUN summer camp rather than all those other EDUCATIONAL programs” I often tell them how SNC is educational and helps children in their own the personal growth and that the life skills that a residential summer camp creates last far after camp. However, Michael Ungar, PhD tells the story far better than I ever could. He really understands that the benefits of summer camp to children and to society. It goes far beyond the fun.

Camps Help Make Children Resilient


Michael Ungar, PhD
When Jacob arrived at his city’s day camp for his third season, the camp director was determined to avoid the problems Jacob was experiencing at school. Now eleven years old, Jacob had grown into a heavy child who spoke in a squeaky pre-pubescent voice. He had been tormented by bullies who thought him effeminate. The other boys in his group occasionally did the same, at least until staff intervened. Jacob’s parents weren’t his best allies either. A business woman and a university economics professor, neither seemed to have very much time for their son. Eight weeks at camp, five days a week, was supposed to be an experience that would be good for Jacob. His father insisted it was time away from the kids who teased him at school. A gruff good-bye each morning in the parking lot suggested to Jacob’s camp director that maybe the little boy dragging his lunch bag into the recreation center would have liked a little more time at home and a few more connections with someone who loved him.
There are many children like Jacob who come to camp with problems that threaten their psychological and social development. Fortunately for most of these vulnerable individuals, a camp experience, whether a wilderness residential experience or an urban day camp, creates the perfect blend of conditions that give children what they need to be more resilient. Jacob may not have wanted to be at camp, but with the right programming, his camp could compensate for what he wasn’t getting at home.


Why Camps Make Children Resilient


We’ve lived with a resilience myth since the concept began to become popular in the 1980s. We naively believe that resilient individuals are those who overcome adversity because of special individual qualities. Studies from fields as diverse as child development, cultural anthropology, epigenetics, and neuropsychology are all proving that resilience depends much more on what others do to shape the world around us than our own rugged individualism. When it comes to resilience, nurture trumps nature. Camps, like good schools and loving families, immunize children against adversity by giving them manageable amounts of stress and the supports they need to learn how to cope effectively and in ways that are adaptive rather than maladaptive (e.g., delinquent) over time.
In fact, a less blaming, more ecological understanding of resilience is showing that resilience happens when our interactions with others make psychological, social, and physical well-being possible. What we call resilience is actually the ability of individuals to navigate their way to the people and experiences they need to do well, which means families, schools, communities, and camps must provide what children need when children ask for help. It’s a complex set of interactions. The better a child succeeds at finding the experiences that bolster his well-being, the better he will be able to cope with life stressors.


Seven Experiences Children Need


So which experiences, then, are most likely to make children resilient? The best camps do not provide cookie-cutter solutions to what kids need. Instead, great camps understand that the factors that make children resilient are cumulative. One experience contributes to others, expanding a child’s psychosocial resources exponentially. In practice, this means camps need to offer children healthy amounts of some or all of the following seven experiences:
  • New relationships, not just with peers, but with trusted adults other than children’s parents. These new relationships teach children social skills to cope with new situations. A cabin full of awkward kids can give them each a chance to play both leader and follower, depending on the activity they’re doing. The adults who kids encounter at camp also offer the chance to learn how to deal with people different than their parents. A counselor that a child doesn’t like needn’t mean a failed camp experience. Instead, it can present an opportunity for the child to learn how to advocate for what she needs and get along in a tough situation. Just think about how useful a skill like that is: being able to negotiate with an adult on one’s own to get what one needs.
  • A powerful identity that makes children feel confident in front of others provides children with something genuine to like about themselves. A child may not be the best on the ropes course, the fastest swimmer, or the next teen idol when he sings, but chances are that a good camp counselor is going to help a child find something to be proud of that he can do well. The camp experience not only helps the child discover what he can do, it also provides him with an audience that shows appreciation. Identities that fortify a child during times of transition and crisis are those that have been acknowledged by others as positive and powerful.
  • Camps help children feel in control of their lives. Those experiences of self-efficacy travel home as easily as a special art project or the pine cone they carry in their backpack. Children who experience themselves as competent will be better problem solvers in new situations long after their laundry is cleaned and the smell of the campfire forgotten. The goal here is to encourage a child’s sense of internality, their perception that they have some say over their world and that the sources of the problems they encounter are properly attributed to either themselves (when they are to blame) or others (when, in truth, the child is an innocent victim of someone else’s mistake). The child who has some say over daily activities at a camp and learns to fix problems when they happen (cleaning up a mess when a group of campers get too rowdy) is the child who will take home with her a view of the world as manageable the next time she encounters trouble.
  • Camps make sure that all children are treated fairly. The wonderful thing about camp is that every child starts without the baggage they carry from home or school. He or she may be a geek or the child with dyslexia. At camp, both find opportunities to just be kids who are valued for who they are. Of course, for camps to achieve this, they must actively encourage the engagement of those who are more vulnerable or marginalized. The more inclusive activities are of individual campers’ cultures, and the more activities show, rather than tell, each camper that they have something to contribute, the more children will feel fairly treated. The goal is to strive not only for equality, with every child treated equally, but also to instill a spirit of equity, in which each child receives that which she needs individually to feel valued.
  • At camp, children get what they need to develop physically. Ideally, they experience fresh air, exercise, a balance between routine and unstructured time, and all the good food their bodies need. Not that s’mores don’t have a place at the campfire, but a good camp is also about helping children find healthy lifestyles. Counselors that care enough to look after a child’s physical health, bringing out the child’s best by encouraging manageable amounts of challenge, are also conveying to the child a belief in the child’s physical capacity to cope. That’s important for children’s long-term physical development. We now know that early experiences of exposure to risk, and poor health resulting from too little exercise when young, have long-term consequences for the child’s healthy development.
  • Perhaps best of all, camps offer children a chance to feel like they belong. All those goofy chants and team songs, the sense of common purpose, and the attachment to the identity that camps promote go a long way to offering children a sense of being rooted. For children from the most risky environments, it’s this sense of belonging to a prosocial set of peers and the institution of the camp itself that is a buffer against future feelings of isolation. It’s this isolation that contributes to substance abuse and other problem behaviors.
  • Finally, camps can offer children a better sense of their culture. Camps are places where children can think about their values and share with others the everyday practices that make them feel a part of their families, communities, or ethnic group. It might be skit night or a special camp program that reflects the values of the community that sponsors the camp; or maybe it’s just a chance for children to understand themselves a bit more as they learn about others. Camps give young people both cultural roots and the chance to understand children who have cultures very different than their own.

The Impact of the Seven Experiences on Children


Research on resilience (see the additional resources below) shows that the impact of each of these seven experiences will, first, be greatest for children who face the greatest number of challenges. This is the principal of differential impact. For example, while all children need a secure attachment with an adult, for a child such as Jacob, the impact of a summer spent with a counselor who engages him and helps him feel special is more important than it might be to a child who already has the attention of a caregiver elsewhere in his life.
Second, we know from the research that resilience factors are cumulative. One of these seven experiences will benefit a child for certain, but as the child has one experience, other experiences tend to come along, too. For example, a child who can show her talents at camp will likely be one who feels more in control of her life and that she belongs at her camp. She will know that she has something special to contribute, which brings with it a powerful sense of one’s self as someone valued by others.
It’s for reasons like these that camps can become places for personal development, especially for children who face the most risks. While it is easy to see how camp can offer a child who self-identifies as lesbian or gay or is from a minority racial group a safe (or at least, safer) place to grow up, even children from contexts in which they are privileged can also find at camp opportunities to learn how to cope better with the risk factors that sometimes accompany privilege.
For example, Veronique was a spoiled fourteen-year-old whose divorced father “dumped” her at camp four weeks of every summer. At least that’s how Veronique described it. The camp was sponsored by a religious group to instill values in the campers while letting them have a summer of good fun. Veronique did whatever she could to belittle others’ beliefs while breaking as many rules as she could get away with, but, curiously, never enough to be sent home. To make matters worse, almost all the campers came from wealthy families, which meant that, often, Veronique’s cabin mates had an upside-down sense of entitlement. Veronique quickly turned them into followers by painting herself as a revolutionary resisting the control of the staff.
Thankfully, Veronique’s counselor was a calm young woman with a healthy sense of humor. Beneath the haughty attitudes of her campers, she could see children desperate for some positive attention. The older Veronique became, though, the harder it had become to see the softer side of this emotionally neglected little girl, especially when she preferred to model herself on Hollywood brats with too much fame and no responsibility.
Instead of getting angry with her, Veronique’s counselor offered her opportunities to help with the younger children so that she wouldn’t feel so much like a kid herself. She engaged Veronique in mature conversations about what Veronique believed and why. She let Veronique tease her and the other staff, as long as Veronique did it respectfully. And she made sure Veronique had one-on-one time with her to show Veronique she really mattered. It wasn’t always easy to like the girl, especially as it got closer to the end of her four weeks. It was as if everyone could feel the girl’s anxiety about going home. Her counselor promised to write, but that did little to calm Veronique or help her behave.


Structured Interventions


It would take a book to fully describe how camp counselors can work effectively with children like Jacob and Veronique. However, interventions that build resilience generally reflect efforts by staff to structure a camp experience so that children can access all seven of the experiences discussed earlier. Those experiences, of course, must be tailored to the developmental stage of the child and the contextual risk the child faces. For example, based on our understanding of resilience, a child’s need for an experience of belonging at camp is going to change depending on the child’s age and level of neglect or attachment elsewhere in his life.
Younger children tend to feel a greater connection at home and may not need, nor want, as strong a connection to their camp counselor. Ironically, it is the younger teen, preparing to slowly disengage from her family, who may appreciate the inclusive feeling of belonging at camp. Likewise, the neglected child may find his counselor a rare adult he can trust and cling to him with a death grip, while the child who has suffered more severe and prolonged neglect may so lack the skills to join with others, or be so insecure, that counselors are rejected no matter how caring they appear to be.
It’s this complexity that makes giving children these seven experiences challenging. While camps can’t provide every camper an entirely individual program, bolstering resilience does require some intentional strategies to tailor programming to a child’s needs. It might be just a few hours engaging a shy but artistic child in painting props for the end-of-camp festival, or offering a particularly skilled athlete the chance to do a lake swim that is reserved for only the strongest swimmers. Whatever the plan of intervention, camps offer children the foundation stones for resilience when they match programming to the child’s psychosocial needs.
Michael Ungar, PhD, is a professor of social work at Dalhousie University and scientific director of the Resilience Research Centre. He has published over 100 peer-reviewed articles and chapters and eleven books on the topic of resilience and its application to clinical and community work with children and families with complex needs. His latest work includes a book for parents, We Generation: Raising Socially Responsible Kids, a clinical textbook, Counseling in Challenging Contexts, and a novel, The Social Worker. Visit www.michaelungar.com.
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Summer camp Trends

These days the trend for summer camps are more nature based programs. It seems we are heading forward by going into our past. What are children missing today?
Among the growing trends that summer camps offer are Grow your own food, Save the environment and Be in Nature. These are all retro terms that seem to be missing from our every day life.

Today “camp” means more than it did 100 years ago. Today it’s traditional camp and sports organizations, parks, museums, schools and colleges, dance troupes, arts centers, animal shelters, heritage groups and churches and synagogues computers, shopping, makeup and Lego Camps.

According to the American Camp Association is expecting another strong summer season. "It seems many families see value in the summer camp adventure. Although our children are heavily over scheduled summer camp provides that chance for children to just slow down and play and learn outside a class room," said Jeff Lorenz, Director of Swift Nature Camp in Wisconsin.

Parents today are coming to realize that children need to get weaned off their personal electronic devices. " With the growing concern of obesity, America is in the midst to reconnect to nature. At SNC we are electronics-free zone for kids and staff alike. We are truly living in the past,” said Jeff. 

Swift Nature Camp this summer has started a hydroponics garden. “We feel that often children don't understand how food gets to our table. At SNC, we focus in on spirit, mind and body and we feel that this connection helps kids better understand how important nature is to all of us." This is just a natural continuation of our Science Summer Camp program

Today, kids are living in a 'concrete jungle,' always indoors or watching TV, and being online not really getting outside and appreciating nature. At Swift Nature Camp we believe, summer camp is all about being outside and reconnecting with nature, this can happen in many way from just playing in it , to actually taking classes in our Nature Center and learning about nature. However, what the children most enjoy at SNC is going on backpack and canoe trips, it is a way to learn about nature and yourself.

Summer Camps are remarkable at teaching kids life skills. Camp provides aa nurturing and child centered community, filled with human relationships. The outcome from these experiences is independence, responsibility, teamwork, cooperation, communication and leadership.

If you are just starting your search for a Summer Camp please visit Summer Camp Advice a wonderful website that will give a parent loads of information on how to find the best summer camp for your child.

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Nature and Birds

It all started back in the days when American Bison ruled the Great Plains. At that time a rather nondescript grayish or black bird followed the herds around, feeding on seeds in the abundant supply of buffalo excrement. Settlers on the plains came to calling these animals buffalo birds.
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But since the birds depended on wandering herds for food, they needed to wander as well if they wanted to survive.
The problem, of course, is that wandering birds can’t tend their nests. So the buffalo birds decided to leave their young in the care of other birds, an arrangement that seemed to work, at least from the buffalo birds’ perspective.
Then, during the 1800s, the prairies and buffalo disappeared, replaced by pasture and cattle. But the birds remained and started keeping company with cows instead of buffalo, eating insects in the grass, ticks on the livestock, and seeds and grain. The buffalo bird eventually became known as the cowbird.
Today there are two native cowbird species in North America, the Bronzed Cowbird of the Southwest and the Brown-headed Cowbird common in most of the United States and Canada. Both species still lay their eggs in the nests of other birds, which is to say that both maintain the parasitic tradition of their ancestors, much to the dismay of bird lovers and conservationists.
The main reason people find the cowbirds’ behavior objectionable is that it threatens biodiversity.
Cowbirds as a whole lay their eggs in the nests of more than 200 other species of birds. And in most cases, because these birds tend to be smaller species, the young cowbirds come to dominate the nests, pushing out the other young or hoarding the food. The result is that the two cowbird species thrive at the expense of hundreds of others.
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Nature Deficit

Visit: Swift Nature Camp Website

Famed author Richard Louv, of Last Child in the Woods: is alarmed by this untouching of nature. He calls it Nature-deficit disorder and sad situation in child development. He feels there is a link between lack of outdoor play and increase in obesity, attention disorders, and depression. 

 
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Famed author Richard Louv, of Last Child in the Woods: is alarmed by this untouching of nature. He calls it Nature-deficit disorder and sad situation in child development. He feels there is a link between lack of outdoor play and and increase in obesity, attention disorders, and depression. 

 

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Outside Play

LET’S GO PLAY OUTSIDE


These days parents heavily schedule their children making it more difficult for children to get outside and play. It seems as parents, we give much more importance to technology than nature. After all do your kids see you more at the computer screen or taking a walk in Nature? Enough Said! Kids folllow their parent examples and it is estimated that most children spend nearly 6 hours a day in front of some sort of screen.

Famed author Richard Louv, of Last Child in the Woods: is alarmed by this untouching of nature. He calls it Nature-deficit disorder and sad situation in child development. He feels there is a link between lack of outdoor play and and increase in obesity, attention disorders, and depression.

Summer Camp is just one place that can help children learn to appreciate nature as well as teach children independence and friendship....

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Connection with nature and other children are important in raising a generation that sees the importance in protecting this planet. Most camps today are specialized in sports, acting or math. Swift Nature Camp a traditional camp that encourages good values, playing outside and a focus for nature?
 

Afterall, when playing

 

Outside you get to run around, be free of all those indoor limitations, and become whoever the game requires. At SNC Outdoor play is a group activity. It is all bout you and your cabinmate not about who wins.This helps build important relationships, human connections that tend to run much deeper than other relationships. It has long been said thzt camp friends are true friends Perhaps this begins to explain why girls say their camp friends are their absolute best friends perhapps outdoor play is just one of the forces that make camp friends so strong.

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No Child Left Inside

The Wisconsin No Child Left Inside Coalition is working to develop an Environmental Literacy Plan for Wisconsin that will address the environmental education needs of Wisconsin's pre-kindergarten through twelfth grade schools and will pay special attention to creating more opportunities to get kids outside. The Plan will recommend a comprehensive strategy to ensure every child graduates with the environmental skills and knowledge needed to contribute to a sustainable future.
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national NCLI Act and its various provisions and requirements here:
The Wisconsin No Child Left Inside Coalition is working to develop an Environmental Literacy Plan for Wisconsin that will address the environmental education needs of Wisconsin's pre-kindergarten through twelfth grade schools and will pay special attention to creating more opportunities to get kids outside. The Plan will recommend a comprehensive strategy to ensure every child graduates with the environmental skills and knowledge needed to contribute to a sustainable future.

Wisconsin has a strong environmental education foundation already established, with active schools, supporting organizations, and abundant opportunities to get outside in rural and urban settings. The Environmental Literacy Plan will build upon these strengths, and suggest priorities for present and future attention. It will lay out the next steps towards fulfilling on our State's commitment to ensure all people in Wisconsin are environmentally literate.

Currently, the Wisconsin NCLI Coalition is made up of representatives from: the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, Wisconsin Center for Environmental Education, Wisconsin Environmental Education Board, Wisconsin Environmental Education Foundation, Wisconsin Association for Environmental Education, Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, Wisconsin Environmental Science Teachers Network, Milwaukee Public Schools, the Green Charter School Network, and the Environmental Education and Training Partnership. State Superintendent Evers has formally asked the Coalition to develop the Environmental Literacy Plan for Wisconsin.

Wisconsin’s Environmental Literacy Plan will be compliant with the pending national No Child Left Inside (NCLI) legislation. The No Child Left Inside Act requires States develop, implement, and evaluate a State Environmental Literacy Plan in order to be eligible to receive funding associated with the Act. Currently, the bill suggests an appropriation of $100 million to support the State Environmental Literacy Plans. You can learn more about the
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Duluth Minnesota in the Top 25

Recently Backpacker Magazine set out to find the best cities to raise kids in Nature. Suprisingly, or maybe not, Duluth was ranked in the top 25. These are the best places in America to “beat Nature Deficit Disorder.” Read more at Outdoors Camp. That’s not too surprising when you think about all the incredible fun outdoor things to do around Swift Nature camp. Remember Lake Superior, Apostle Islands, Amnion Falls, Superior Hiking Trail and THe Boundary Waters. So nest summer do What Back Packer Magazine Recommends go Play Outside in the Northwoods of Minnesota.
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Visit: Nature Summer Camp


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Environmental Summer Camp

Hey!
Jacob here, I will be in the Nature Center this summer teaching you all about the big beautiful outdoors.. I like to fish, hunt and play sports. This is my first summer at camp but at school I’m studying youth programming and camp management. I love being outside and making new friends... ( this is my new friend here in the picture :) It is going to be a great summer!

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Winter

25 Baybrook Ln.

Oak Brook, IL 60523

Phone: 630-654-8036

swiftcamp@aol.com

Camp

W7471 Ernie Swift Rd.

Minong, WI 54859

Phone: 715-466-5666

swiftcamp@aol.com

Swift Nature Camp

Parent Information

Camper Information

Returning Campers

Summer Camp Jobs