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by Eden Foster.
This summer, Lorrien Dames from Pembroke Pines, Florida, quietly walked
through the sun and music-filled gallery at The Arts Center in Hendersonville,
North Carolina, murmuring to herself when she was particularly struck
by a piece on display. She stopped when she found her daughter, Cibonay’s,
perfectly formed sky-blue coffee mug, and a proud smile filled her face.
“Cibonay has gotten so much more hands-on experience at summer
camp than she ever could have in the school system,” said Dames.
“I am seeing a lot of her gifts being developed through her camp
experience, including things like poetry and photography that I didn’t
even know she knew how to do.”
Chances are Cibonay, eleven, didn’t know she could create beautiful
things before she went to Blue Star Camps in Hendersonville, North Carolina,
for the first time, either.
But it should be no surprise that Blue Star Camps, in addition to the
dozens of other camps in Western North Carolina, put a great deal of emphasis
on encouraging campers to explore and develop their creativity. After
all, art is a fundamental and traditional camp activity, and the visual
arts are experiential learning at its very best.
In an unprecedented collaboration, more than two-dozen summer camps,
business leaders, and a local community arts council came together this
summer to celebrate the visual and performing arts created by campers.
“Art Matters: The Creative Side of the Summer Camp Experience”
was on display from July 25 through August 2, 2003, and drew record-breaking
crowds on its opening night event. The Arts Center, a small, grass-roots
organization whose mission is to “bring art experiences to a diverse
community in Western North Carolina,” hosted the display of children’s
art, which appeared in virtually every media imaginable, including works
in ceramics, weaving, papermaking, wood burning, photography, blacksmithing,
poetry, and many others.
Worlds Apart
Brainchild of Starr Teel, a member of the board of directors for The
Arts Center, a summer camp advocate, and a business owner in the area,
planning began for the show a year before it opened. Teel attended summer
camp as a boy and considers it to be one of the highlights of his youth.
He is an active member of the Western
North Carolina Camps Association, and maintains contacts and friendships
with many of the camps’ directors and counselors.
Everyone in this small, rural but cosmopolitan Southern Appalachian
town did not share Teel’s enthusiasm for summer camps, however.
Long known as a retirement mecca, most residents of Hendersonville, (population
10,420 within a county of about 90,000 people, according to the 2000 census),
gave little thought to the impact that local summer camps have on their
economy and community.
But a 1999 study done by the Appa-lachian Regional Development Institute
at Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina, brought to the
fore some remarkable statistics. The report indicates (Appalachian State
University 1999):
- Western North Carolina has one of the highest concentrations of organized
camps in the United States, with fifty-two camps concentrated around
Asheville, North Carolina, in Buncombe, Henderson, Jackson, and Transylvania
Counties.
- In 1998, these camps served more than 41,000 summer campers representing
approximately 34,000 families.
- Most of the camper families live outside of North Carolina, and 26
percent of the children attending camp traveled at least one way by
plane.
- More than 3,500 staff worked in the camp, and 90 percent of them
were seasonal.
- Twenty-two camps responding to the survey reported owning or leasing
an average of 524 acres per camp, and 58 percent of them have undertaken
special efforts to protect the native flora and fauna.
- Camp budgets pump considerable dollars into the local economy. Direct
spending by the camps was projected to be $44.6 million in 1997, and
parents provided an additional estimated $19.5 million direct-spending
impact. When calculated with indirect spending induced by a conservative
multiplier effect, “The total estimated economic impact of organized
camping in the study area was $96.2 million for 1998 (Appalachian Regional
Development Institute 1999).”
Teel and others believed that it was high time to educate the community
about the economic and educational value of summer camps. He formed an
informal committee consisting of representatives from camps, businesses,
and The Arts Center, and planning began in earnest for the “Art
Matters” show.
The committee began by visiting the local Chamber of Commerce and Travel
and Tourism center to inform business leaders about the value of camps
as an environmentally friendly and lucrative industry that has the added
benefit of playing an invaluable role in the education of our nation’s
children. They came away with promises of major financial support from
two businesses with a large financial investment in the economic success
of local summer camps.
Why Art?
“Art is such a bridge and The Arts Center uses it to bring diverse
groups together,” said Nancy Hayes Neill, executive director of
the nonprofit Arts Center. “Art is the perfect medium to come together
and find respect for each other’s cultures and to learn about one
another. We thought that the “Art Matters” show would be a
conduit to highlight the benefits of summer camps to the community, including
their economic, educational, cultural, artistic, and environmental contributions,”
she said.
While much attention has been given to adventure camping in recent years,
many camps have quietly continued the tradition of encouraging children
to explore their creative sides. And according to the National Center
of Education Statistics, art in summer camps may be the only exposure
many children have to art.
According to the center, only 55 percent of the nation’s elementary
schools had full-time, visual arts teachers, and their mean teaching load
was 555 students per week. Seventy-three percent of the nation’s
elementary-aged children received one or two sessions of art instruction
each week with an average time of just forty-three minutes. Only one quarter
of all elementary schools that offered visual arts had a dedicated room
with special equipment for that purpose (National Center of Education
Statistics 2002).
A National Art Education Association report states that only 19 percent
of high schools conducted district-wide assessments in art. In their “Where’s
the Art” campaign materials, the organization states: “Without
art study, large and important legacies of art and culture go unseen,
unheard, unread, unstudied, and unlearned. Many of our children are being
left behind. The surest way to create semiliterate graduates from American
schools is to insure that many of the important artistic forms in which
meaning is represented will be enigmas to our students – codes they
cannot crack.”
Hundreds of summer camps help children and youth “crack the code”
by offering opportunities for campers to experiment with a variety of
creative expressions under the tutelage of dedicated professional art
educators, far from the pressures of schools, family, and long-established
peers. Summer camps have become incubators for a lifetime of creative
discovery, self-confidence, and community building.
Creativity, Collaboration, and Community
Staging an innovative multimedia art show in a small community is heavily
dependent upon local volunteers and business support. “We could
never have done this without Starr and other Arts Center volunteers,”
said Neill. “We brought the same attention to detail to this show
as we did to the show on Picasso that followed it. Art Matters was very
professionally presented, but that happened only because we spent a great
deal of time making attractive labels for each piece, playing with the
display until we felt it looked right, and then getting the word out to
the community. I heard comments from parents, campers, and camp directors
that the show looked very professional. That’s important, because
we want kids to know that art is just as important as sports or academics,”
she said.
Two major businesses provided a significant portion of the project’s
funding, but approximately a dozen smaller businesses and camp vendors
also lent their support by joining The Arts Center as Corporate members
and providing other services. In return, all sponsors received recognition
in all printed and Web-based materials and on a prominent display during
the show. “We never missed an opportunity to give them credit —
it’s important to recognize the contribution these organizations
made to the success of Art Matters,” said Teel.
The twenty-four camps that participated also joined The Arts Center
as members. Each camp was required to safely deliver and pick up their
art work and to provide sufficient information for a label for each piece
on display. The camps then ensured that the campers’ works were
returned in tact.
Publicity for the show began six months before the opening with an op-ed
feature in a local paper, the Hendersonville Times-News, written by the
president of the Chamber of Commerce, Bob Williford, which further added
credence to the idea of an art show.
Funds raised from the show were used to hire a freelance writer and
to purchase half-page “advertorial” space in the paper. Each
of these illustrated feature stories gave prominent mention to the show’s
major sponsors, and each focused on a different aspect of the summer camp
industry, including the local economic impact, educational value, and
artistic expressions.
More than one thousand postcards describing the show were mailed to
Arts Center patrons and volunteers. Several weekly and daily newspapers
and radio and television stations also picked up the story. The Arts Center
and the WNC Camps Association both featured the show on their Web sites.
Camp Arrowhead for Boys in Tuxedo dismantled an old car and rebuilt it
into a competitive racecar with the help of well-known custom and performance
car builder, Dale Morgan. The car was painted fire engine red, and decorated
with promotional “Art Matters” information along with the
various sponsors of their race team. In advance of the show’s opening,
the car was parked in front of The Arts Center on Main Street, generating
a great deal of excitement and curiosity.
The happy result of all the publicity and planning was that opening
night was a smashing success. “It was shoulder to shoulder, you
couldn’t move in here. It far exceeded our expectations,”
said Neill.
The Last Words
“The Arts Center now has an established relationship with both
professional and young artists in camps, and many more people are aware
of what we do because of this program,” said Neill.
“This is a program that we are so very proud of and that we want
to continue. We strongly encourage other geographic concentrations of
camps and their communities to create their own artistic collaborations,”
said Tom Rosenberg, director of Blue Star Camps and president of the American
Camping Association Southeastern Section.
“Western North Carolina (WNC) camp directors have for generations
been known for excellence in creative programming. In their role as child
educators, it is no accident that beyond the assumed physical experience
of climbing, hiking, canoeing, and other activities everyone associates
with WNC camping, they are keenly focused on the arts and the importance
it plays in balancing a child’s complete development,” said
Teel.
Will Hamby enthusiastically summarized his Eagle’s Nest Camp experience:
“It’s so artsy here that it just gets stuck into your life
and becomes a habit. Now, if I don’t have art in my life it feels
weird, somehow.”
References
Appalachian Regional Development Institute. (1999). The Economic Impact
of Organized Camping in The Western North Carolina Counties of Buncombe,
Jackson, Henderson, and Transylvania. Boone: Appalachian State University.
National Center for Education Statistics. (2002).
National Center for Education Statistics report, 131.
The National Art Education Association, “Where’s
the Art” campaign, www.naea-reston.org.
Originally published in the 2003 November/December
issue of Camping Magazine.
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