For the first time in years, Camp Verde children in kindergarten through fifth grade can count on a place to spend their summer days.
At the Camp Verde Summer Day Camp, campers and their counselors get to partake in a variety of activities, such as play sports, do arts and crafts and go on field trips, but the bottom line is they have the chance to just have some plain old fun.
“It’s been going great. The kids are all having a great time, the parents are all happy,” said Mike Marshall, director of Camp Verde Parks and Recreation. “We’ve had a mix of some kids that are here for the whole week. Other kids are here for two or three days at a time.”
Now that it is back, kids are able to attend the camp, which runs through Friday, July 27, on a daily or weekly basis. Around five to 10 campers regularly attend daily, and each day has a different plan.
For example, Tuesdays are for field trips, and on Wednesdays they visit Heritage Pool by Camp Verde High School. The three full-time counselors and one youth volunteer keep them entertained from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. with activities of all kinds.
On Thursday, June 28, the campers played badminton inside the community gymnasium after lunch, then planted lettuce plants and made ‘rocking horses’ inside of their headquarters — a classroom adjacent to the gym.
Depending on the weather, there are enough facilities available for the camp between the classroom, field and gym. There are shuttles available for the counselors to transport campers to the library or pool.
Being that it is the camp’s first year back, there is a framework in place to guide the counselors and their days. Along with the revived source of entertainment for kids, as well as a reliable place for working parents to leave their children, comes a unique freedom. Since it is back for the first time this year, and the templates for prior camps are no longer viable, the counselors have had the freedom to do what they want, and what fits their experiences and capabilities.
“As the counselors, it’s been a really neat experience because we do have that artistic freedom kind of a thing, and we have backgrounds in different things,” head counselor Sabrina Wilson said. “One of our counselors loves sciencey-type of things, and another counselor of ours really finds joy in literature and reading and getting the kids in plays and things like that.”
Wilson, Coleen Stone and Jennifer Bebee are the full-time counselors, and Emma Wilson is the youth volunteer. Together they spend their days with the children, trying out activities and giving feedback to Marshall. Sabrina Wilson said the sporting events have been the campers’ favorite.
They recently had a triathlon including a three-legged race and a horse race. At the end of the day, it is all about the kids.
“It’s just been fun, a combination of things, and definitely a learning experience because I think I speak for all of us when we say it’s not school. It is strictly fun,” Sabrina Wilson said. “Just trying to push the kids past what they’re used to in class, so it’s been great. It’s a lot of fun.”
Marshall estimated that the last time the camp existed was in 2008, and had disappeared due to the economic downturn and cutting of full-time parks and recreation employees. Last year Camp Verde Town Council approved the allocation of money to support the camp, and it nearly got started last summer before the plug was pulled at the last moment.
With another year of marketing to get the word out, the camp got the green light this time around.
Marshall said, like all programs, they hope it will be self-sufficient, but when it comes to children’s programs, Parks and Recreation is OK with a loss.
Since Marshall came on board five years ago, bringing the program back was always on his to-do list, but he needed a helping hand. That hand came when Shelley Figy was hired two years ago to help Marshall. Since Figy came on board, the process of rebooting the camp became feasible.
Another of the camp’s aims has been to gain accreditation from the American Camp Association. The ACA has nearly 300 standards, but not all apply to Camp Verde specifically. There are the basic safety, food, travel, operations, human resources, background checks and transportation requirements that must be met. On Thursday, July 5, the ACA will send two representatives out to evaluate the camp.
It will learn sometime in the fall if it gains accreditation.
Both Figy and Marshall received ACA training in Phoenix last year, and they must go through training annually. The camp counselors also went through a week’s worth of training before starting this summer.
Moving forward, Marshall said he would like to get around 13 campers on a daily basis, as well as expand programming at the library that includes the public.
In the mean time, some of Camp Verde’s youngest can look forward to spending most of their summer exercising their bodies and their brains.
