Cell Phone Free Wisconsin Summer Camp 2014

Posted: June 20 2014

‘Experience is the best teacher’ Proverb

I should have written this this morning really if I was in keeping with the kind of day we’ve just had. Yes folks, we’ve just completed Backwards day. It did what it said on the tin and that is, we did everything backwards! Save for the meals the whole day was back to front, which was a little confusing at times, but fun none-the-less. It was simply a regular day in reverse.
We had to start with a campfire in Wasserman Hall because of the inclement weather, and what more fitting start could we have but a spelling bee. I was amazed at how attentive everyone was so early in the morning. Your boys can spell as well as play sports!
The rain went off so we were able to get outside later in the morning and all afternoon. It was never cold, but always cloudy. London weather I call it, and not without good reason.
We went back into the Rec’ hall this evening for a musical campfire with the ladies from Fox Valley Chorus. Dawn, our camp nurse, is a member of the group, and she invited the ladies up to sing for us and what a treat it was. I wonder if Wasserman Hall has ever been graced with such harmony and such beautiful voices. The boys were a great audience and they sang along and joined in when they had to.
As I write this, a misty, damp fog is drifting in off the lake, cooling the air and making great sleeping conditions.
Before I head off to shower and sleep there are a couple of things I need to make you aware of, just in case they might have escaped your attention.
In keeping with so many camps nowadays – both in Wisconsin and elsewhere – we have decided to go cell-phone free. The cell phone might be a very useful tool in the ‘real’ world, but it can become something of a headache here at camp. It is for that reason that we do not allow any of the boys access to their cellphones, except for the Seniors and the CITs on their nights off. No cellphones are allowed in the cabins with or without a SIM card. It is just too difficult to monitor even when the boys only wish to play their music or watch a film. We believe this blanket ban will help make the camper experience a much more fruitful and enjoyable one. As parents ourselves we know only too well the distraction that cellphones and Facebook and Twitter can be.
Could I also ask that parents and relatives and anyone else out there who is thinking of sending cardboard boxes to camp, please resist the temptation. Camps can be flooded everyday with so much ‘stuff’ that comes by way of the mail and UPS and Fedex, that we struggle sometimes to find room for it all. Not only that, but we then have to dispose of all the boxes that accumulate. Like cellphones and candy, life at camp would be so much easier without cardboard boxes. Thank you, in anticipation, for your help and support in trying to deal with the cardboard and cellphone ‘menace’.
And one more admin’ item to bring to your attention; the two week program ends on June 28th, and not June 29th as it says in the literature and the website.Our apologies for that slip.
I feel like I’m berating you, and that is the last thing I want to do, but sometimes we just have to do what we have to do in order to help everyone get the best out of their summer experience at what we believe to be the best boys camp in Wisconsin. As one old camp director once said to me; ‘would we do all this if we didn’t care’?
Thanks for all your help and understanding. It is in part because of the extended Menominee family that all is well, so safely rest.
Goodnight everybody.
As ever…WOODY!

Woody's Word,