The following are portions of a paper I wrote for my undergrad about the CIT program at Camp Calumet.

During, the summer of 2000 I was the co-leader of the Counselor in Training program at Camp Calumet.  We designed and implemented an eight-week leadership program for fifteen and sixteen year olds.  This specific program has been established at Calumet since the mid-seventies.  We were basically handed a staff manual and were told that we had to teach the CITs everything in the staff manual in eight weeks, plus we assisted in training them to be lifeguards, and teach them the basic principals of working with children 8 years old to 15 years old.

Purpose

Calumet Lutheran Camp and Conference Center is a year round Lutheran camp for boys, girls, families and adults.  Part of their mission is to support the Lutheran Congregations in New England.  That includes a summer camp program for kids and a summer campground (with program) for families and adults.  The Counselor in Training Program works with both programs and  is designed to help transition the participants from being a camper to becoming a staff member.  It is equips the participants with skills to become better leaders.  There is also a Leadership and Service program that is a four week program.  This is a similar program but has different aspects to the program but I did not have major involvement in this program.

When the program started we wanted to strengthen their inter and intra personal skills.  At the start of the summer there were twenty-four sixteen year-olds who do not know each other, and they are put into a situation where they have to live together in a confined space.  For most of the youth this is their first experience away from home.  They are going to have to learn to get a long with each other and eventually start becoming their own person.

The first two weeks of their summer  are spent in meetings.  We tell them about the rules and regulations.  We also teach a Bible curriculum and how to take that information  to make lesson plans for when they teach the kids.  Development of activities and flow of lessons is also an essential part of the program and something that the youth do not have much experience with.

After they are done with the program, one goal is to have each youth excited about their faith and able to be confident about their skills and gifts that God has given them and to share  these with others.

Participant Recruitment and Retention

The majority of the youth who participate in the Counselor in Training Program are youth who in some way or another have participated in a Calumet run program in the past.  Most of the youth say that Calumet is an addiction  because once you attend a program you will tend to participate in Calumet programs the rest of your life.  The freedom of expression of who you are and your faith is amazing to those who participate in the program.

The average career of a camp counselor at Calumet is around six summers.  It is not the pay that makes the counselors come back year after year but it is the history of relationships, the fellowship between staff, the ability to grow in your faith and the beauty of the camp that attracts them to come back.

Leadership

Throughout the summer the leadership and decision-making time become more and more frequent for the participants in the program.  When they first come there are rules that they need to follow and structure that is set for them so they can get in a routine and become comfortable with the situation  in which they  find themselves.  As the summer progresses they become more independent and make decisions for themselves and for the entire group.  What they do reflects positively or negativity on the whole group.  This builds a sense of togetherness and makes each of them accountable with one another.  As the group begins to gel the participants become more comfortable with their surrounds which in turn helps them become more comfortable and confident with themselves.

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I never imagined that life in ministry would ever be so busy, especially this time of the year.  I thought that after Christmas there would be a lull until Lent starts.  Boy was I wrong.

Amidst he business of ministry, family obligations, and whatever else comes up I am really excited about the prospects of the year.

First the prospects of ministry:

We have some new blood on the church council – and by new blood I mean people who have never served on the church council before.  Also there is new leadership — people who have never been in leadership on the council.  This is an exciting thing for me.  I love the ideas, I love the passion and I love the direction that we as a  church are headed.  One of my goals for the year is to establish a strong foundation.  Not only in the infrastructure of the church (getting committees to meet again, establishing strong communication between the council and the lay people, ect) but I would also like for our council to establish a strong foundation in the word of God.   It is through God that we are getting our strength and passion for ministry.

I am also about getting out into the community more and getting involved with different organizations within the community.  I recently joined the chamber of commerce and I want to be involved with that organization.

At St. Mark’s we have a Community room where we once had a nursery school program.    That stopped meeting in 2007 and now we are in conversation as to what to do with that space.  I want to see what the community need and I am excited about those possibilities.

Family:

This is going to be an exciting year for our family.  Our kids are going to be at an amazing age (5 and 2) this year.  They are the joy of my joys.  Also my wife and I are dedicated to get healthy and get fit and we are off to a good start.

We also are living in a great area where we can be active outside.  It is a little hard now because of the snow but we are excited overall.  We hope that we will find a place to live by the end of the year where we can stay in one place for a long time.

Finances are always a challenge but we are better off in that area than we ever have been and we are paying down debt and starting to get some savings.  I know by the end of the year we will have at least our credit cards paid off and we will be on the road to only really have student loan debt.  This is happening even faster with YNAB (for more information visit the link on in the sidebar).

I know there will be bumps in the road, there always are but I think this is the first time in my life when I have really looked forward to the upcoming year and I am confident that this will be a great year.

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