If I Had Three Wishes
Help campers learn the skills of friendship

By Gary Forster

There’s only one reason kids want to return to camp--friends. Yet when I tour camps and ask what staff members do to specifically help kids make friends, I find out why the average camper-return rate is so low. We think it happens automatically. We focus on “fun” instead.

Kids have been making friends “automatically” at camp for decades. But in an effort to be safer, our risk managers have eliminated many of the times and places where kids and counselors used to make friends. We took out a lot of the “down time,” where they sat and talked with each other. We fill the days with activities so kids can’t “get into trouble.” These are all worthy goals, and I’m as glad as any parent that camps are safer, but as camp professionals, we should be smart enough to figure out how to do both.

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