The Student Room Group

Camp America Leaving Dates

I am interested in doing a Camp America style summer, but all the organisers state you need to be ready from 'early-mid June'. A couple of my prospective universities have term finishing around 20th - 25th June. Has anyone been able to negotiate around a situation like this, or can anyone suggest/clarify anything?

Cheers.
Reply 1
i finish uni on 9th june but i read - i think on Camp America website, that Camps start 26th June or something.
Hey there :biggrin:

Last summer, when I did Camp America, they had the last available date down as the 27th of June, and because I was looking after my parent's business, I put my latest availability date down as the 26th of June.

In the end though, the Camp that I ended up being at for the summer mailed me and asked if I could be ready to fly out to the States on the 22nd. I ended up doing this, and when I got to Camp on the 23rd, the other international staff had already been there for 2 days, the majority having flown out on the 19th.

I think the earlier you're available, the better chance you have of being placed, but so long as you're available by the last date that Camp America suggest, you'll be fine. One staff member arrived at Camp 2 weeks into the season, so I wouldn't worry too much!
Reply 3
Ah, thats cool!

Cheers for that. Winner.
mattye
I am interested in doing a Camp America style summer, but all the organisers state you need to be ready from 'early-mid June'. A couple of my prospective universities have term finishing around 20th - 25th June. Has anyone been able to negotiate around a situation like this, or can anyone suggest/clarify anything?

Cheers.



It's always a tad interesting, your "term" will be scheduled to finish for those dates, but that will be the end of the exam period - you could indeed finish earlier, but wouldn't know until your exam timetable comes out - I know mine comes out in April.

What I did last year was give the last day of the exam period as the earliest possible departure date, and then when the draft timetable came out at the start of April, emailed them to have it amended according to when my last actual exam was.

Always think the worst - ie you could have an exam on the last day of the exam period - until you know otherwise !

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red_roadkill
i finish uni on 9th june but i read - i think on Camp America website, that Camps start 26th June or something.



You won't have any issues. The earlier you can leave the better, but that should be fine.

The date of the 26th June is normally around arrivals day for the campers (Saturday 24th June for mine), so camps will start Orientation around a week earlier (17th) - so it looks like you'll be OK.


I know that in the ideal world my camp want me to be onsite on June 5th, but until I know the summer exam timetable can't promise any arrival date except for saying that the exam period finishes on the 10th June, and so would travel over and upstate on the 11th at the very latest.
Reply 5
Expression


You won't have any issues. The earlier you can leave the better, but that should be fine.

The date of the 26th June is normally around arrivals day for the campers (Saturday 24th June for mine), so camps will start Orientation around a week earlier (17th) - so it looks like you'll be OK.

I know that in the ideal world my camp want me to be onsite on June 5th, but until I know the summer exam timetable can't promise any arrival date except for saying that the exam period finishes on the 10th June, and so would travel over and upstate on the 11th at the very latest.


EEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

W0000!

I'm excited already and I haven't even got onto it!

Omfg *dies*

Expression - are there many fit students who go on Camp America?
I hope so :eek: :p: :redface:
red_roadkill

Expression - are there many fit students who go on Camp America?



Camp isn't like Wet Hot American Summer (spoof summer camp film); it's not all sex.

The female staff don't wear bikinis, the guys don't wear speedo's.


However, it's a good place to meet some fantastic people - and yeah the vast majority of the international staff will be students - the Americans/Canadians may or may not be students, but they tend, excluding the full time staff, to be Under 27.

In any population there will be stunners; other people who you may not regard as A1 for looks, you'll think of in different ways because you all already have one thing in common, summer camp.

The challenge often comes when trying to find some quiet time, and to be honest this is normally off-site, during the Staff Transition (for us 10 PM - 1 AM), and at a bar - and we all know what happens with a bit of alcohol, especially when you realise that this 300 or so population of adults is all there is.

Otherwise you're kinda limited to your days off; and alot can happen; think, a group of you take a car ride up to Montreal, book out 2 rooms; have a night out on the lash and come back to the hotel - anything can happen, either in bars, nightclubs, or back in the hotel room.


There's normally decent eye candy though; the good thing about having a staff uniform is that you end up talking and getting to know people that maybe you wouldn't because they dress differently in the real world. The end of season staff party comes as a massive shock that way.

You'll have some fun and some wild nights - that I promise you.
Reply 7
Well! It sounds completely ghettofabulous to me! Just need to get my application in now....:smile:
Wow Expression, you had a staff uniform?!

As far as mine went it was a white t-shirt with the camp logo on the front and 'STAFF' across the back - and that we only had to wear on any days the parents would be on site, or where we were taking the kids off site to a theme park, or baseball game lol.

Any other time we could wear what we liked.
red665
Wow Expression, you had a staff uniform?!

As far as mine went it was a white t-shirt with the camp logo on the front and 'STAFF' across the back - and that we only had to wear on any days the parents would be on site, or where we were taking the kids off site to a theme park, or baseball game lol.

Any other time we could wear what we liked.



Staff uniform:

White tee-shirt, logoed up on the front with a big logo on the back "Dedicated to Human Development" - these have to be worn at all times from breakfast through to showers prior to evening line-up. After which you're free to wear "camp appropriate" clothing.

We're given 6 tee-shirts at the start of the summer.

They also had what they called "Abercrombie-esque" style "Camp Echo Lake 1946" tee-shirts that we were given one of each.

Following that, and due to high-demand they also had some tank tops made which made evening out that tan far easier.

Any of the above could be worn as "Staff Uniform".

At the end of the summer, each of the Village Head of the Girls Village, Boys Village, and Senior Village design a teeshirt and have it made for the staff of that village to buy for like $12 at the end of the summer.
Each year those tee-shirts are unique, and so I look forward to something totally different this year.
Reply 10
On a related, but different point (dont wanna open up a new thread).

What have people done with the travelling time after the camp finishes, and how flexible is the leaving dates and return flights?

I was thinking of travelling over to Lake Michigan perhaps (as it looks nice, and not an untravlable distance)...
mattye
On a related, but different point (dont wanna open up a new thread).

What have people done with the travelling time after the camp finishes, and how flexible is the leaving dates and return flights?

I was thinking of travelling over to Lake Michigan perhaps (as it looks nice, and not an untravlable distance)...


With these agencies you always book your return flight date before you leave the UK; these are flexible in that upto 4 weeks before that date is hit, you can change it to sometime else, but it costs around $75 to do so.
Then around 18 days before your flight date is upon you, you confirm with your agency the precise flight details for your return journey so that you can relay that information to your folks back home.

Effectively you have to think, how much money you're going to have available to you; how much that will leave you with each day, and book your return flight for a day that isn't going to be too late for you such that you're struggling for cash for the last week.

--

As for your travelling time, you can't leave camp early, you're under contract. But yeah you're likely to get a lift to the nearest Greyhound or Amtrak or airport dependant on what your plans are, after which you're on your own (ish) - it's likely a few of you will be on the same bus, train or plane anyway.

--

Lake Michigen is beautiful, I saw it from Chicago, and it's amazing - I got totally lost in the fact that it is indeed a lake, as it looks nothing like !
Chicago is as far west as I got - travel time by Bus and Train to Chicago from NYC is around 18-23 hours.
Reply 12
Expression

Lake Michigen is beautiful, I saw it from Chicago, and it's amazing - I got totally lost in the fact that it is indeed a lake, as it looks nothing like !
Chicago is as far west as I got - travel time by Bus and Train to Chicago from NYC is around 18-23 hours.


That was my thinking. Looks more like the seaside with the beach and all that! Looks lovely....hopefully I can pool together money with friends who are planning on going to rent somewhere for a couple of weeks....that'd be kick ass! :biggrin:
Hey there Mattye :biggrin:

My camp finished on August the 13th and my flight was originally booked for flying home on September 28th, but I ended up changing this to September 13th.

In that month post-camp, I managed to get all the way round the states. A huuuuuuuuuuuge great lot of us from Camp went to NYC for the immediate weekend post camp, we rented an apartment and just de-camped ourselves! lol. Then a smaller group of us went down to Washington for 2 days. That was where the last split happened and left me with a great mate I'd made in Camp. We went from Washington DC to Vegas, where we had 2 days, San Francisco where we had 3 days, LA where we stayed for a week, then she flew home and I went to Chicago for 3 days and Boston for 3 days before I headed back to NYC for 3 days.

Was great, by the time I got to Boston though I was totally travelled out and fed up with lugging around my bag - was great in NYC though, I just
pampered myself for those 3 days! hehe.

Edit: I was gonna post a picture of Chicago taken from the ferris wheel on navy pier, but it's too big to upload :frown:.
Reply 14
I'm American and I have never heard of Camp America...what is it?
SlyPie
I'm American and I have never heard of Camp America...what is it?


Have a looksie at www.campamerica.co.uk :smile:

Basically, it's a scheme that operates all over the world allowing people that aren't American to go to America and work in a summer camp there.
Reply 16
i put my leaving date as the maximum date coz i have an exam that day, so dont worry, they rang me and said they r placing me :smile: weyyy!
lil_lloyd
i put my leaving date as the maximum date coz i have an exam that day, so dont worry, they rang me and said they r placing me :smile: weyyy!



Excellent stuff, congratulations. Don't expect things too soon, there are likely to be alot of camps that won't hire you because of your needs back here; but don't panic either there are many camps that start a little later than average and you should have no problem.

What position did you apply for ?