The questions they were asked to answer on the cards are as follows:
- What is the first word that comes to mind when I say "camp counselor"?
- List a few characteristics of some counselors you had as a camper.
- How did these characteristics affect your week as a camper? (or did they not affect your week at all)
- What are some stereotypes that you have of different camp counselors, either based on your own experience or based on what you've seen on TV or in a movie?
- How would you want your campers to finish the sentence, "My counselor was so ________." Fill in the blank.
For the first question, the answers were all over the place. Most were expected, words like leader, fun, mentor, and cool. Some were less frequent, but along the same lines (enthusiastic, love, etc). A few were kind of random seeming, but I appreciated that these individuals legitimately wrote the first words that popped in their heads. Whoever wrote "water" must have been pretty thirsty. My favorite answer and the one I think I agree with most was "friend," because I think that's one of the most important parts of being a good counselor.
Almost all of the counselors had something positive to say for questions two and three. The majority of the responses listed characteristics similar to the first word that came to their heads. I honestly wasn't too surprised by most of these responses. Those who described their counselor as "fun, outgoing, energetic, etc" went on to say that it made their week more enjoyable and overall a more fun experience. Several listed their counselors as good listeners and laid back. Their answer to question three was more about how it encouraged them to open up more easily and generally more comfortable at camp.
One person described their counselor as "caring and interested." Their answer to how this affected their week? "If counselor was bad it didn't effect my week, but good ones improved my week." This stood out to me. After I read that card is when I began to notice how positive all of these responses where. Honestly, what are the odds that all forty or so of these individuals were blessed with INCREDIBLE counselors every year they went to camp? I went to camp five years and at least three of the counselors I had did not really impress me. However, the two counselors that did their job well and lived out the characteristics everyone wrote for question number two are the counselors that stick in my mind. It must be true that good impressions really do carry a lot more weight than mediocre impressions. Later, this same individual finished the sentence from number five with the word "engaged." Obviously, these notecards are anonymous so I can't tell if this is someone who has worked at camp before, but part of me wishes I could walk up to him/her right now and tell them they get it.
I asked the counselors to list different stereotypes that they've noticed mainly for fun, to see what they'd come up with. Because they've all gone to camp somewhere before and some have worked as counselors before, it's not surprising that most of these answers were pretty spot on. A lot wrote about the "cool guy" counselor, the loud one, the weirdo, the athlete, etc.
The biggest thing I've noticed in my research has been that there are two predominant types of counselors, the rule-followers, and the rule-breakers. After researching, it seemed really obvious to me, and I think I'd always subconsciously recognized this dichotomy, but I was still surprised when a lot of counselors listed these two stereotypes on their cards. Later in my presentation, I showed two video clips I found from a movie portraying each of these stereotypes, but they made the observation even before these clips. I find it interesting that even without thinking about it, these two overarching categories of counselor stereotypes are fairly noticeable. These responses reinforced what I've found in my research. These two stereotypes exist because there are real people out there fulfilling them.
Toward the end of the presentation, I talked about the power we have to alter our stereotypes. The balance between being a rule-follower and a rule-breaker does exist, but more importantly, our stereotype as a camp staff should be that we are Jesus-followers. I encouraged my audience to think about our camp purpose as they filled in what they want their stereotype to be. A few stuck with their answers of "fun, energetic, etc," but I was very happy to see that many hope for this to be a summer where they can reach beyond typical stereotypes.
Today, I want to leave you with some of the words our camp staff hope will be the impressions we leave on the minds of the kids who visit our camp this summer.
- attentive
- engaging
- present
- spiritually encouraging
- Christ-like
- encouraging
- loving
- understanding
- aware
- caring
- genuine
- accepting
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