It doesn’t take long during Sunday registration to figure out not everyone at camp hails from the good ol’ USA. Last year many of our kitchen staff came from Eastern Europe, our ski program director hailed from New Zealand and our waterfront director called England home. These are just a few examples of the diverse backgrounds of our staff who arrive from all over to include Australia, Brazil, Poland, South Africa, Germany, Great Britain and Ireland just to name a few countries.
Kirstie from Australia was one of our ski instructors last summer.
As far as campers go, in the past years we’ve had a growing contingent from Barcelona, and they add so much spirit and spunk to camp’s personality. We love having them. Returning counselors will see “The Spaniards,” (their term of endearment) names on their cabin list and smile and share stories. The now legendary Mocker game, our huge North Teen Village Counselor vs Camper soccer game after Mock Rock, grows more exciting every year with all these international camper faces from Taiwan, Finland, England, the Dominican Republic and Mexico taking the field. It’s one of my favorite activities to watch as a mom.
Thursday Nigh Mocker – A North Teen Village Tradition
Camp Crosley works with a third party organization that recruits, screens and trains mature students from other countries to come work at US summer camps. It’s a win/win situation as most other countries don’t have summer camps so these young people get the opportunity to not only live in another country, but also for most of them, get to experience camp for the first time themselves.
Nora from Germany (top left) helped with our equestrian program.
Many of our international campers’ parents request that their children fully immerse themselves into American culture to include English only communication. We are especially sensitive to these kids’ well being as we understand they have to work through some big adjustments not only with language and culture, but also just camp life itself. It’s amazing to see how well and how fast they adapt. By the time they leave, most of our international campers are usually in tears hugging their counselors and American friends with fierce love, promising to come back again next summer.
Mark from Great Britain was one of our most popular counselors at North Teen Village.
We recognize that sending a child to camp in a foreign country for several weeks at a time brings the need for parents to communicate with their children. We work with international parents to arrange times for them to talk/Facetime/Skype, etc., time with their children several times throughout their stay especially on weekends.
Haylee from Liverpool taught our dance classes, and always brought a smile to campers’ faces last summer.
We are excited to welcome visitors from all over the world, and love it when we see videos and pictures posted from staff turned teachers sharing camp songs and chants with their students. It’s just another way we take the Camp Crosley spirit out into the world.
I hope parent to parent this gives you even more information to make the decision to send your child to camp. Please feel free to send me any questions at priscilla@campcrosley.org, and if you have any questions about international campers, please contact us at Camp Crosley, and we’ll be happy to assist you.
Counting down the days to summer camp!
Priscilla aka Camp Mom