Four walls and a keyboard: Co-op Camp Rocks!!

Four walls and a keyboard

'I love talking about nothing. It's the only thing I know anything about.' ~ Oscar Wilde

Thursday, July 27, 2006

Co-op Camp Rocks!!

Well, to update, I survived Co-op Camp. I must say that I have a newfound respect for those people that deal with adolescents every day, like teachers, and especially social workers. We had 39 kids at camp, and a staff of ten, so at times it got a little overwhelming trying to keep the group in control. We also had a few kids that had ADHD, and one that had that and FAS, and we had some pretty major conflicts with these kids over the week, to make a long story short. It was so bad that by Friday I had a major meltdown and a crying fit, but I guess these situations are always learning experiences, good or bad.

But, even with the bad, I am definitely going to staff camp again in the future. It made me feel so good inside and rewarded seeing these kids come together as strangers and leave as friends, and knowing I played even a little part in it. Outside of camp these kids would probably not even attempt to speak to one another and at camp they formed a solid group. One staff person mentioned that one of the participants was crying so much at the end of camp, that she had to ask her what was wrong, and she mentioned that she had never gotten so much respect from a group of people before.

And, even with the stress, they were such good kids! At our rewards night they gave me the award for 'Most Caring', and on my people poster they had the nicest things to say. I wish I had the chance to go to Co-op Camp as a kid! And I'll post some pics when I get them off of my camera.

On another note, I had a pleasant surprise from the Co-op Centre when I got back...I am now published! My compilation on data collection in the co-op sector is now an Occasional Paper from the Centre for the Study of Co-operatives. That was pretty sweet.

Now that camp is over, I can finally complete my thesis revisions, and then have some ME time. I must say I am pretty excited about that!

posted by angelina @ 1:35 PM

2 Comments:

At 11:50 PM, Anonymous said…

molding young minds into good little communists. good for you spanks.

-drock
At 2:26 AM, KeEtMc said…

Fuck you, drock!

Co-op camp is fucking awesome! It made me into a way better person and It really gave me a lot of great memories.

-KeEtMc