In 2008, my 10-year-old son sent the following letters home from his first summer at a Jewish sleep-away camp: “Pick me up TODAY!!! This is the worst place in the world.” And then: “Friday night was a little bit fun, but Saturday was the most boring day of my life. We just sat around and talked about Jewish stuff and it was soooooooooooo boring!!! Pick me up!”
Needless to say, when I finally did pick up Jake from camp at the end of his session, his first words were, “I’m never coming back to this place.” This was followed by two weeks of constant positive chatter about camp. Still, when it came time for Jake to re-up the next summer, his decision was final: “I am not going back to a Jewish camp.”
And he didn’t. Last summer he went to River Way Ranch Camp, the summer camp that my husband attended with glee when he was a kid, and that some would argue should not be called a “camp” at all because its bunks are nicer than most three-star hotels, and the roster of activities rivals the offerings at Club Med. And because Jake didn’t hate River Way, he has graciously “agreed” to allow his parents to spend a small fortune so he can return again this year.
There is no question that for certain kids, Jewish summer camp is pivotal to their ultimate identity as a Jewish adult.
If you ask people who study this sort of thing, they will tell you that just like E=MC2, Jewish day school plus Jewish summer camp equals one Jewish adult. (For you math geeks, that would be JDS + JSC = OJA.)
According to a 2001 study that looked at 1,400 kids who spent their summers at Camp Ramah, those campers “were more observant of Jewish ritual, more positive about Jewish and Zionist identity, more inclined to date and marry Jews, and more active in Jewish life on campus.” And I know plenty of kids who attend Jewish summer camps who start counting down the number of days to camp even before they unpack their filthy camp T-shirt from their duffel bag.
Boston philanthropist Harold Grinspoon believes the entire future of Judaism rests on Jews sending their children to Jewish summer camps: “The Jewish people today, we are in trouble — our demographics are in horrible condition. Jewish camps are one of the fundamental places we have to put our emphasis. If we’re going to keep ourselves from dissipating in this marvelous democracy, it’s going to be because we put our kids around [a Jewish] campfire.”
Grinspoon is not the only professional who believes our survival as a people is contingent on Jewish children attending Jewish summer camps. Jerry Silverman, former president of the Foundation for Jewish Camping, said, “I personally think that Jewish camp is the best insurance policy we have within the Jewish menu of experiences that we can give Jewish children today in terms of Jewish identity and continuity over the long haul.”
So now I’m wondering: Should I have forced my son to return to the same Jewish overnight camp or at least have made him try a different Jewish camp? Did I fail the Jewish camp system or did the Jewish camp system fail me?
It seems that most of my friends who have boys my son’s age have also chosen not to send their kids to Jewish summer camps. Some, like me, sent their boys to Jewish camp only to receive “pick-me-up” letters similar to mine. Other families compared the list of activities offered at the Jewish overnight camps to the more extensive lists at secular camps and chose the latter. Still others feel that biweekly attendance at Hebrew school is “enough” Jewish exposure. There is a feeling among many parents that Jewish camps are based on an outdated model that hasn’t kept up with the numerous specialty camps — golf, tennis, filmmaking, gymnastics, computer — they naturally compete with.
Some Jewish camps are starting to recognize that if they want to continue to attract large numbers of Jewish kids, they are going to have to adapt to the modern camp world.
Foundation for Jewish Camp COO Maggie Bar-Tura, in a recent interview with New York’s Jewish Week, said it is important for Jewish camps to understand that in today’s market a certain ”volume of size” is necessary, “the same way … grocery stores are being knocked out by Wal-Mart, mom-and-pop camps are not able to survive today.
“If a camp agrees with us that what they do is incredibly important to the future of children and the community, then they can’t be satisfied until we’re serving every single kid — until every Jewish kid has the opportunity to attend camp in a way that is appropriate for him or her.”
Sam Bloom, the director of a Jewish camp in Pennsylvania, hit the nail on the head when he said, “Parents used to just send their kids [to Jewish camps] because that’s what you did. There’s got to be more flavor to camp now.”
This leaves Jewish camps in the classic Catch-22 of the Jewish world. On the one hand, camps need to keep their costs down so they stay affordable. On the other hand, they need to stay competitive with camps that offer “more flavor,” or risk appealing only to the small segment of the Jewish world that will continue to send their kid to a Jewish camp “no matter what.”
In my kid’s case, that “flavor” is better food and paintball. In another kid’s case, it is golf or Olympic-style horseback riding. Appealing to the vast diversity of Jewish kids’ interests and staying affordable will be quite a challenge.
So if the evidence linking Jewish camp attendance to a Jewish adulthood is so compelling, why don’t I force my future Jewish adult to go to a Jewish camp whether he wants to go or not? After all, I’m not swayed by:
“I don’t want to go to boring Hebrew school,” or “Let’s eat doughnuts instead of matzah at the seder,” or, “I really want Christmas lights.” So why should “I don’t want to go to a Jewish camp” be any different? (And there is no question I’d be disappointed if my grandchildren spent Yom Kippur shooting each other with paintball guns.)
For me, the decision to let Jake pick his own camp probably has something to do with my own lukewarm Jewish camp experiences. When I was a kid, I attended every Jewish overnight camp in Los Angeles and spent two summers at Camp Swig in Saratoga. The truth is I just wasn’t one of those “camper kids” who develops a cultlike relationship with their camp, and my son (so far) doesn’t appear to be one either.
Fortunately, not every Jewish kid who chooses a Jewish adulthood follows the same Jewish brick road. While the JDC + JSC = OJA formula works a lot of the time, it doesn’t work all of the time. Camp turned out to be a minor brick in my Jewish road; other Jewish experiences turned out to be more significant: weekly Shabbat dinners, staying connected to my synagogue through confirmation, massive Passover seders, a father who blew the shofar, a mother who made kugels, candles lit during every night of Chanukah, a visit to Dachau, rabbis who made me think, and a grandfather who read a Yiddish newspaper and bought rye bread on Fairfax.
So, just like my Jewish road didn’t fit the classic model, my son’s Jewish road will just have to be paved differently. Without Jewish camp, I will just have to substitute a few extra bricks.
Wendy Jaffe welcomes comments at {encode=”wjaffewrite@aol.com” title=”wjaffewrite@aol.com”}.
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