By Amahlia Lena, 2013 Lexington Strong Camp Program Leader

Originally posted on July 11th, 2013

Full Circles Foundation Lexington began our debrief session on Monday July 8 with a successful program leader meeting. At this meeting we discussed our hopes for next year, which focus on expanding and improving Strong Camp. One aspect that we hope to change for next year is to tighten up the camper enrollment process, which was not as timely and organized as it could have been.

On our second day of debrief, the whole team gathered; this meeting included all three program leaders, our two summer fellows, and two of our volunteers. We went through and discussed each aspect of this year’s camp agenda, and commented on what we thought went well or what didn’t go so well for each activity.

We were all very pleased with our fundraising efforts this year, particularly with the car wash that we hosted with our campers. Due to this success, we aim to include campers in more of our fundraising efforts in the future.

One of our biggest opportunities for improvement has to do with bullying at camp. This was not a huge problem for us, but it was certainly a factor. In future camps, leaders and fellows need to clarify for the campers what exactly qualifies as bullying and why it is harmful, and then remain vigilant and attentive throughout the summer.

During debrief, everyone was able to speak their mind and talk about their future plans to help make FCF Strong Camp more stable and successful in Lexington. Everyone on our team has great community ties and we were successful at utilizing those ties to organize field trips, workshops, and presentations throughout the summer. We also were able to use our ties to local universities such as University of Kentucky and Transylvania University to secure donations for the camp—both in monetary amounts and social capital from volunteers. All in all, we agreed that camp this year was a great success. We are all proud of our hard work and dedication as a team, as well as the commitment of our campers. Thanks to our exciting discussions during debrief week, it looks like next year will be even better!