Add This to Your To-Do List!
by Danielle Wood
Michael Eisner did it. So did Albert Einstein, Prince Albert of Monaco, retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Conner, Chelsea Clinton, and Norah Jones. Not to mention Natalie Portman, Reese Witherspoon, J.D. Salinger, George W. Bush, Katie Couric, and Condoleezza Rice. They all went to camp. And more likely than not, their parents didn’t have to sign them up by Christmas of the previous year.
If you’re like me, a procrastinator, it’s time to get on the bus, people. Summer may seem far away, but it will be here before we know it. This became abundantly clear when I finally got around to calling around to a few camps a few days ago. Most of them were already full.
Don’t know where to start? Well, it’s no wonder. There are over 12,000 camps in the U.S. alone—about 7,000 of the sleepaway variety and another 5,000 daycamps—and it can be intimidating figuring out where to begin. I come from a camp family, but there wasn’t a whole lot of choice involved when I was a kid. We always went to the same old camp, which fit like a familiar, if not too clean sock.
With a five-year-old in the house, I’m not quite ready to ship him off, suitcases in hand, so I’m thinking day camps. But regardless of whether you’re a fan of sleepaway camps (can you say “adult-only vacation time?”) or daycamps, the American Camp Association (www.acacamps.org) is a good place to dip your toe in the water. You can search through their database of 2,400 accredited camps, either by location, type, age of child, specialty, whatever floats your boat.
But whatever you do and however you do it, get started! From one procrastinator to another, I can say that it’s a pain to get organized. But camp only comes around once a year. And once you start doing the research, you’ll be amazed at what’s available. There are rock and roll camps where your kid can plug in an electric guitar and turn up the amp, speed racer camps for the hotrod enthusiast, camps for the gifted and talented, camps for weight loss, camps for diabetics, camps for nature lovers or die-hard water sports fans, camps for Broadway wannabes...
There’s just one type of camp you won’t find: camps for kids whose parents forgot to sign them up in time. So let’s get on this one, shall we?
Danielle Wood is the Director of Editorial for Education.com. You can reach her at editorial@education.com
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