2022 COVID PROTOCOLS AND CONSIDERATIONS
COVID-19 is a part of our lives. We have experienced it at our schools, in our athletic programs and extracurricular activities, at work, and within our families and friends. We need to expect and understand that it will be a part of our camp life as well this summer. Therefore, we need to set goals, expectations and develop an understanding of what this will look like at camp and how we will prepare and respond to it.
Our goals and actions related to COVID-19 at camp have always been to keep our campers safe and, at the same time, reflect the actions and attitudes of our communities and the populations that we serve at camp. In 2021, that meant doing everything we could to keep COVID-19 out of camp and making this mission a top priority. This came with protocols involving a strict bubble, no outside programming, no visitors, masks, pods, cohorts and testing at camp.
Today, we are living in a much different world and our policies and procedures will hope to reflect that while taking into account the risk to our camp population (i.e. the risk that campers in our demographic experience severe illness), our high vaccination rates and the effect on our program. We will work hard to try and come to camp healthy and limit the spread of COVID-19 if it does get into camp, but it is very important to us, our campers and staff that we are able to maintain as “normal” and “traditional” of a Menominee program as possible including skit nights, socials, competitions, town day and trips.
We have taken great strides this year to develop a partnership with our first year families and grow our relationship with all of our returners. We have been working tirelessly to put together a program focused on camper goals, character growth and emotional development. We have always wanted to be that extension of your parenting and the work you do with your son every day. In the spirit of this partnership and foundation of trust, we would like to make sure we are all on the same page with the following risks this summer:
Each camper is required to have 2 negative COVID tests within 48 hours of camp arrival. The first test should be taken 24 hours before departure (flying or bus). The second should be taken in the morning before you depart. Please email info@campmenominee.com with a picture of each negative test each day. These tests will be your son’s ticket into camp. These tests should be rapid at home antigen tests.
If your son tests positive, we will follow CDC protocol as to his reentry into camp. It will depend on symptoms, vaccination status and follow up tests. Once your son clears quarantine, he will of course be allowed to come up to camp.
Should a camper test positive at camp he will need to isolate for five days, however, so long as he is feeling well this will NOT mean laying around in the health center. We will have a separate and fun program for all COVID positive campers, taking them to separate activities and making sure they have a great time! Of course, parents are welcome to pick their COVID-19 positive child up, but we would not suggest that unless his symptoms are to a point that dramatically impact his participation in camp. If he is fever free and his symptoms have subsided, then we will test him on day five and day six. If he is negative for both of those tests we will release him from isolation and back into the community.
We will handle the rest of the community as symptoms present themselves. The only exceptions to this policy will be if a camper is not up-to-date on their vaccinations (as defined by the CDC). If a camper is not up to date on his vaccinations (and has not had a confirmed positive COVID case within the last 90 days), and is exposed to someone who has a confirmed positive case of COVID-19, then we will utilize a Test to Stay policy. We will work with our medical team tele-health doctors to determine the testing cadence, but you can expect tests one if not multiple times each day, as well as additional masking protocols when inside for as few as 5 and as many as 10 days.
COVID-19 in the Summer of 2021
Hello Everyone – below you will find all of our COVID-19 resources pertaining to camp in THE SUMMER OF 2021. This information is to be used as a resource only if you are curious as to how camp ran successfully last summer.
Earlier this month we outlined our thoughts on vaccinations being available to people 12 and up in the US. You can read the entirety of that letter below but the gist of it this: we will not be requiring vaccinations for all campers in in the 12–16-year-old demographic, but we strongly encourage it for the overall health and well-being of our population.
Please note that fully vaccinated campers will still need to go through our gateway testing protocol before coming to camp. The CDC maintains there is still a risk of breakthrough cases in which a vaccinated person contracts the virus. As such, we will take these precautions to better protect our community. However, they may not be subject to rounds 2 and 3 of testing at camp. We will update this page when we have finalized our policy.
What is a pre-summer quarantine? This is a 7-day period before camp starts where we will ask campers and parents to make smart decisions to help avoid any breakthrough cases or undetected COVID-19 cases from getting into camp. How do we do this?
What if this is not possible for our family? Are there exceptions? Let’s not think of certain actions as “exceptions”, let’s think of them as “making the best decision we can in the moment for not only our family, but the entire Menominee family.” We understand that there is a difference between a perfect world and the real world. We ask that all of us do our part with entire community in mind and comply to the best of our ability. If your son plays team sports and the season leads up to camp, please wear a mask on the bench (or even while you play if necessary), always avoid locker rooms, and if the team dinner is at a restaurant, please skip it this year. If extended family want to say goodbye before you leave for camp, give them a big wave and “air hug” outside from 6-feet apart instead of hug inside.
What else do we need to know about this?
Parents – this is the portion of our partnership that will rely 100% on your choices and your oversight. So, we ask that you do everything you can to make the best decisions for not only your family, but the camp family.
Testing will play a vital role in helping us achieve our goal of a full and healthy summer. As we mentioned in our Testing Introduction Announcement back in April, we are lucky to be partnering with the University of Illinois’ SHIELD testing program and utilizing their Saliva PCR tests this summer. You can read about SHIELD and the merits of their test in that announcement. Here we are just going to cover the testing timelines for our campers.
Test #1: Gateway Test One Day PRIOR to Arrival at Camp
CM staff will be on location at the times below collecting saliva samples. You just need to show up and drool into the vial. We’ll take care of the rest.
When/Where
Fully vaccinated campers will still need to go through our gateway testing protocol before coming to camp. The CDC maintains that there is still a risk (all be it small) of breakthrough cases in which a vaccinated person contracts the virus. As such, we will take these precautions to better protect our community.
The ONLY exception to our required gateway test is if a camper has tested positive for COVID-19 and cleared quarantine within the last 90 days of the start of camp. We will need proof of the positive test date and a written confirmation from the doctor. See below for our helpful tip and additional information.
Important Things to Remember About the Gateway Testing:
Costs
We will be charging families a COVID-19 testing fee which will include coverage of all of their camper’s pre and post arrival testing. The SHIELD tests cannot be covered through insurance as they are not setup for that. We will be billing using a cost recovery model, and once we determine our total costs, we will bill your account and add the charge to your invoice. You should expect this fee to range from $150-300 for the summer. This will depend on how many tests we run for your son. We will most likely not be testing vaccinated campers during camp (see “In-camp testing” tab). Your fees will reflect this.
Parents, here is a helpful tip: if you think your son had COVID-19 in the 90 days leading up to camp but did not get tested or did not test positive in that period, we suggest getting him tested (with a PCR test) at least 14 days prior to the start of his session. Why? According to the CDC and our medical advisors, people who have tested positive for COVID-19 and have cleared a 10-day quarantine are still susceptible to a positive COVID test. We will need to treat all positive test results the same way and we will not be allowing anyone with a positive COVID test to get on the bus or enter camp. Therefore, if you get your son tested 14 days prior to camp and it comes up positive (even though the actual infection could have been up to 3-months ago), you can have him quarantine for 10-days at home and then he will be clear to get on the bus on the first day of camp.
The Basics
Once we have all tested negative, it’s time to go to camp!! The information provided here just covers travel protocols related to COVID-19. Our Parent-HQ page has the information on dates of travel, bus departure times and we have just released our official Out-of-State Travel Guide and Policies. Please read all of that information ASAP.
The Bus Ride
Camper arrival: 8:10am
Bus Departure: 8:30am
In-Camp COVID Testing: Test #2 (Day 3 of Camp), Test #3 (Day 6 of Camp)
We will be conduction two additional rounds of testing during the first week of camp using our SHIELD PCR Saliva test. This specific test will offer us an incredibly high accuracy rate, and the timing will provide us with the best results/assurance. Our goal is to clear Day 6 and feel extremely confident that we are COVID free at camp.
Cabin Pods – Week 1
During. the first week of each session, campers will. be separated into Pods. We will have a Junior, Intermediate and Senior Pod.
The activities during the first week of camp will largely be separated by Pod. We will still structure our program in a way that gives the boys freedom of choice for their Instructional (Big 10) and League/King of the Camp activities. The only difference is that, in the past for example, an archery period could have boys from different age groups. This summer for the first week, those periods will only have boys from the same Pod.
Will there be any cross-pod interaction in Week 1?
Yes. Remember the Big 3: Masks, Outside, Distance. So if the boys want to interact outside cross-pod, they are more than welcome to at a safe distance (even without masks on). Brothers can still see each other and hang out. We will still all be eating together outside. We will also continue to do our famous campfires/skit nights as a whole group from a safe distance outside.
We hope to resume our normal all-camp schedule after the first week of camp.
Masks will be a part of our risk reduction strategy this summer. However, guidance is changing every day and we want our policy to reflect the science, while understanding we exist in a congregate living environment at camp and realizing there is a important camp culture aspect of this policy.
Regardless of vaccination status, please send your son up with at least 8 masks this summer or a box of surgical masks.
When will your camper have to wear masks?
When can he take his mask off:
After the first week of camp when we have cleared our testing protocols, we will reevaluate this policy and hope to be able to take our masks off for the rest of the summer.
Overall, will be treating everyone the same regardless of vaccination status and will make adjustments cabin by cabin and activity by activity once based on the make-up of the participants.
As always, we will have our full Health Center team this summer to care for your boys. Here are some additional elements we have added this summer and how it will work:
Telemedicine with PediaTrust
PediaTrust is a group of highly respected pediatric practices in the Chicagoland area and we are thrilled to be one of about a dozen camps implementing Telemedicine through PediaTrust this summer.
During the summer, Menominee will have a dedicated MD and office staff for our campers to see for virtual visits. We will still have an excellent medical staff on site as always, but our partnership with PediaTrust will allow our campers access to trusted pediatricians without having to leave our grounds.
If your camper needs to see a doctor this summer, we will (with your consent) set up a telemed visit with our PediaTrust doctors and staff. This will be in lieu of going to an urgent care facility locally. Just like going to urgent care or the ER, the visits do come at a cost and and will be charged directly to families by PediaTrust.
Additional COVID-19 Precautions
This summer we will have our general health center, as well as COVID quarantine and isolation areas.
Communication from the health center may come from someone on our medical staff, a telemedicine pediatrician or even one of the directors. If your child complains of symptoms that are indicative of COVID-19, someone will reach out letting you know the circumstances and what to expect going forward. As always, never hesitate to call us if you have any questions or concerns about the health of your camper.
OK we have made it this far and implemented all of our roadblocks to prevent COVID-19 from getting into camp, and limiting the spread if it does get into camp. All of our decisions have been based on guidance from the ACA, CDC, our medical experts and consultation with other camp owners and directors. The reality is, despite all of the steps we are taking, there is still a chance that we have cases of COVID-19 this summer and it is important that all parents and campers understand this. Here are a few other things we thought you should know:
What if my son tests positive for COVID before or after camp? What if there is a positive case in his cabin or at camp?
If your son tests positive for COVID-19 before camp, we will reach out when we receive the results. Your son will not be able to get on the bus the next day, but we will discuss her options for getting him to camp. This includes following CDC positive case guidelines (ten days of isolation from the start of his symptoms OR from the date of the positive test, and resolution of fever for at least 24 hours without the use of fever reducing medications, and with improvement of other symptoms). We will also need a note from his doctor indicating that it would be appropriate for her to enter our camp community. If your son is close to the end of his vaccination cycle at the time of the positive result, we will likely use a multi test approach to verify accuracy.
If a camper is symptomatic during the summer, we will evaluate him and have him go through our testing protocol if necessary as determined by our PediaTrust physicians. Unvaccinated cabin mates will be isolated until we have the test results back, and if necessary, will be tested as well. Based on the results we will isolate and quarantine appropriately. You will be informed every step of the way if your son is symptomatic, needs a test, has tested positive, etc. If your son is in a cabin that requires quarantine, we will inform you of that as well.
Camp is fully prepared to program and care for campers who have tested positive for COVID during the summer. Of course, you as a parent can choose if you’d like to pick your son up from camp.
What is camp’s policy with regard to refunds if my son has to miss time at camp due to COVID-19?
Camp will not be providing refunds if your son has to miss time at camp due to testing positive for COVID or needing to quarantine because of an exposure to COVID-19. There are risks associated with camp this summer, especially in a congregate living setting like ours.
May 31, 2021: The Official Out-of-State Travel Guide and Policies
May 13, 2021: 12-15 Year Old Camper Vaccinations
April 28, 2021: Video and Podcast going over our Full 2021 COVID-19 Plan
April 19, 2021: The Testing Plan
January 21, 2021: Telemedicine at camp with PediaTrust
January 19, 2021: An Update on on Visiting Weekend
This is where we will post our full protocol guide for the summer. We will update you all as we make changes and additions. The first draft should be ready for you in the coming months.
From the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association
Guidance and resources for day and overnight camps about how to operate summer camp during COVID. This includes links to CDC updated guidance for camps.
A great source for the latest compiled COVID-19 data around the US.
ACN has a wealth of resources available to camp health staff. As we all cautiously move forward with summer plans in this time of so much unknown, look to ACN in your preparation.
