Many students spend their summers as campers, doing crafts, spending time outdoors or bonding with their cabinmates. However, a few have returned back to camp to become counselors.
Junior Ashton Pliskin said he spent eight years as a camper at Emma Kaufmann Camp in West Virginia. He spent the past summer working as a Staff-In-Training at the camp, he added.
“For me, camp has always been like my second home, so just going back, seeing familiar faces, I had a sense of familiarity of like I know how this works, and I’ve seen people go through this before, so I know how to do it,” Pliskin explained.
Senior Brooklyn Binsky said she spent two months this summer as a Counselor-In-Training and pottery specialist at Camp Wise, in Chardon, Ohio. Being a CIT came with more freedom, she added.
“We didn’t have a counselor with us at all times, so it was a lot more independence and responsibility,” Binsky said.
Senior Maddie Merzel was a CIT at Camp Livingston in Indiana, where she had been a camper. Merzel said being a CIT was the next step in her journey at camp. Many of her friends from camp were also CITs, and she got to experience the change with them.
“I got to learn alongside the people that I’ve been going to camp with because they were also counselors,” Merzel said.
She had many interesting experiences at camp, such as building a fire circle and benches from scratch, Merzel said.
“It was interesting to see how the kids’ personalities developed in such a short amount of time,” she added.
Pliskin said one of the benefits of becoming a SIT was the staff’s trust in his choices
and reasoning, which he hadn’t experienced as a camper.
As a SIT, he was able to use his phone at camp, which helped him be less homesick, Pliskin explained. Merzel said she was also able to use her phone, as well as her laptop at camp, though it increased her stress about school.
Pliskin also had more opportunities to make new friends as a SIT, he said.
“I met new people who’d gone at different sessions of camp in previous years, and I’ve became really good friends with them,” Pliskin said.
One thing Pliskin said he realized was that he could look at all the different age groups as a unified group.
“When I was a camper, all the other age groups seemed so foreign, but once I became an SIT, I really got a good look at all age groups and it reignited my love of camp and the community it created.” Pliskin said.
Binsky explained one of the benefits of being a CIT was earning service hours. As a CIT, she had the responsibility of serving lunch and dinner, she said. Another benefit was increased independence, she added.
“We had a lot more time to do as we please,” Binsky said. “We could just go around with our friends.”
Merzel found she was able to form deeper relationships with other staff members.
“Now as a counselor, the other staff respect you and they’ll talk to you and be more friendly to you,” Merzel said.
Pliskin said the experience was really fun, and he is planning on being a normal staff member next year.
“I was always excited,” Pliskin said. “Even if I had to wake up early or deal with a crying kid, I was always excited just to be getting the experience.”
