Summer camp jobs - a place to grow!

Welcome everyone to my blog. Running a residential camp (Maine Arts Camp), as well as MySummers (a staffing site) and Camp Finders (a summer camp referral service), I have gained a unique perspective about sleepaway camps. I first attended camp in 1970 in Maine; I'm still at camp and love it!



Rick Mades

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

marketing

As with many camps, we have been working hard to increase enrollment for the upcoming summer. As usual, we have done several camp fairs, while adding direct mail to our typical inserts in local papers. This weekend, we are trying something new which could be great. At Harvard Square, there is the Mayfair Festival, a gathering of up to 200,000 people. Hopefully, there will be lots of families at Mayfair, with children looking to go to camp! We continue to discuss ways to market our camp and are trying to "think outside the box". We have had no problem hiring staff this summer as many people are looking for summer camp jobs and specifically at our camp. We actually haven't hired any new staff since early March and are likely done hiring for the summer. If any camp directors would like to talk about marketing ideas, feel free to contact me (rick@maineartscamp.com). If potential staff are reading this, many camps, not quite as small as Maine Arts Camp, are still looking for staff. To apply for a summer camp job, just go to MySummers.

Rick Mades
Owner/director of Maine Arts Camp
Owner of MySummers & Camp Finders

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

More on bullying

While spending some time in New England in late March, we continued to read about the bullying incident at the high school in Hadley, MA, where a young girl took her own life. It is a heart wrenching and tragic story which got me thinking. Although we always devote a whole section of staff training to bullying, we need more structure from an expert so that our staff will have a consistent way of dealing with such issues. Candy Cohn, assistant director at Maine Arts Camp, found a bullying workshop for schools in Maine. Stan Davis, a long time school counselor in Maine, runs the workshop. So, we contacted Stan are delighted that he will be working with our staff during staff training. Stan's web site is Stop Bullying Now! If you're in Maine or New England, his workshop is being held in Augusta May 10 & 11. I also purchased Stan's book "Schools Where Everyone Belongs" and have some reading ahead of me in the next couple of weeks. Of course, someone asked me what I do the rest of the year since I run a camp... I'll let you all know how the effective the training is at the end of the summer. Camp is approaching quickly and I hope that lots of parents start to think about camp in the next 6 weeks. Spread the word about the power of camp.

Rick Mades
Camp Director, Maine Arts Camp
Owner, Camp Finders & MySummers.com