Summer Camp capped with olympic games
Dustin Wilson receives a medal during the closing ceremonies of the olympics at the North Fort Myers Recreation Center’s summer camp program. It was the last day of the 11-week camp. CHUCK BALLARO
Summer camp at the North Fort Myers Recreation Center was different — and longer — this year but successful nevertheless.
Lisa Weaver, supervisor at the rec center, said the longest summer camp in its history — 11 weeks with an extension — was a successful one, even if it was graded on a curve.
“It was probably one of our best summers. Having to limit group sizes made us give the campers more individualized attention and build better relationships,” Weaver said. “We had more kids here all summer rather than just for a week or two.”
Due to distancing requirements caused by the pandemic, the usual 15-to-1 ratio between counsellors and campers was reduced to 9 to 1. Weaver said that to accommodate that ratio, many parents got turned down as space for children was very limited, especially the final four weeks when many counsellors had to leave since they were also teachers and had to get back to work.
This left much of the full- time staff in charge of what the campers did, especially in the last two weeks. The use of the rec center was limited to a few rooms, though the kids could do anywhere outdoors.
There were no field trips because the pandemic shut everything down, which gave the counselors the room to improvise activities both indoors and outdoors, ever mindful of the social distancing guidelines.
“This year we really focused a lot on lesson planning so we could have a good jump start. Obviously the last four weeks of extended camp were different,” Weaver said. “We did a lot of the activities like in the past, but with a lot of modifications.”
For the final week, that meant holding the Olympics at the rec center, since the real ones were postponed for a year because of the pandemic.
Teams from Italy, China, Jamaica and Australia competed for the right to be named a gold medalist in events like soccer and basketball and, while not everyone got a trophy or medal, they all had fun.
The kids got their medals Friday during the last day of the extended summer camp, with the first day of school taking place Monday.
Weaver said it is very difficult to predict the future. Maybe next year things will return to normal, or maybe camp ends up starting in May or not at all.
“I’m sure there are different options being drawn up. We’re reopening an afterschool program and the rec center is not reopening at normal capacity,” Weaver said. “Once we see what happens at the schools and see what that looks like, then we’ll see what our programming looks like.”