Funded by the Templeton Foundation, 12 medical specialty camps have been participating in a three-year project led by the American Camp Association, SeriousFun Children’s Network, and Abt Global, aimed at promoting character through leadership or counselor-in-training programs.

We used Character Lab’s definition of character: “intentions and actions that benefit other people, as well as ourselves.” And, from the outset, the project formed a community of practice as a strategy to help create, implement, and disseminate new ideas to advance character development at camp.

In the first year of the project, six camps participated in the community of practice. The community members identified what they thought were the most important character strengths to elevate in counselor-in-training programs, grounded in the current research about character and specific to the context of youth with illnesses and disabilities. The strengths that the community collaboratively identified were communication skills, teamwork, role modeling, empathy, possibility and perseverance, authenticity, and advocacy. We then created playbooks to bring to life what these strengths look like at camp and how other camp professionals could promote these character strengths in their own programs. In year two, our team recruited an additional six camps, and several camps tested the playbooks over the summer of 2024. Now, in our final year of the project, we have finalized the playbooks based on community of practice member feedback, created accompanying videos to illustrate how to promote specific character strengths through camp activities with learning guides, and are ready to share these materials with the broader ACA camp community. We are also exploring and documenting camp professionals’ experience as part of the community of practice.

In a recent interview, Ana Baggiano, adolescent and young adult director of The Hole in the Wall Gang Camp in Ashford, Connecticut, and John (Mitch) Mitchell, head of partnerships at Barretstown Camp in Barretstown, Ireland, shared their thoughts about being part of this community of practice, which was designed to elevate character in counselor-in-training programs at medical specialty camps. While camps outside the SeriousFun Network are also included in the community of practice, both interviewees come from camps that are part of SeriousFun Children’s Network. Founded by actor and philanthropist Paul Newman, SeriousFun Children’s Network is a community of 30 camps and programs that deliver life-changing camp and recreational experiences free of charge to children living with serious illnesses and their families all around the world.

Can you tell me about your experience in the Character Development Counselor-in-Training Community of Practice for Medical Specialty Camps? What do you think made it successful (or not successful)?

Mitch: I was immediately interested in being part of this community of practice because of the opportunity to become more deeply involved with SeriousFun Children’s Network camps. I think what made it really successful is the passion that everyone has for working with children and adolescents with serious illnesses.

Ana: I began this project right when I began my current role at the Hole in the Wall Gang Camp in May 2023. For me it has been really great in terms of being able to connect with all of these people across the network. I am of the belief that the more minds in the room, the better. Everyone’s perspectives and diverse backgrounds make the project so rich, and we hope the content that we put out there is rich. A key success for this is getting camp professionals together in a room. Sometimes in camp, it’s easy to get stuck in a way of doing things, but the passion and innovation that this group brings pushes us forward to embrace new ideas.

What, if anything, did you get out of being part of the community of practice? What do you recommend to other camps who might be joining a community of practice?

Mitch: If it’s only on us to continue to come up with new and innovative ways, we will run out of creativity. As a SeriousFun Children’s Network camp and as a camp who is part of the wider ACA network, you can get so many ideas of how to develop high-quality programming all the way from the recruitment process to how campers experience their camp. For international camps, especially for us here in Ireland where we are the only medical specialty camp in the country, our only exposure to other camps is through a network like a community of practice. This community has provided so much food for thought in terms of how we develop our programming as well as the structure of that programming.

Ana: Having all of the voices of community of practice members in the [virtual] room is just so powerful. Being able to represent those identities and voices and the identity and voices of our campers has been incredibly valuable. The group keeps that energy and momentum moving forward. There is also a piece around accountability; everyone in the community of practice doesn’t just want high-quality programs; they also want to meet the desires and wishes of campers — and we feel accountable to each other.

The opportunities that have come through this project have helped me become connected within the network and to other camps. We have been able to have conversations outside of virtual meetings with individual camps and have built relationships.

The camp professionals in this community of practice identified seven character strengths (listed in the table) as the most important strengths to elevate in counselor-in-training programs. Why these character strengths? What makes them so important from your perspective?

Mitch: It’s always very difficult to explain camp and the impact of camp to future funders, camp ambassadors, and others. I am able to use these character strengths — strong communication skills, good teamwork, having empathy — to explain that this is the impact of one of the programs in Barretstown. These words mean a lot of things to a lot of people, and it’s been helpful to define each of them.

Ana: We are working to create programs to help these counselors-in-training become better people, not just better at leading camp activities. I’m not a traditional classroom teacher, so I’m not teaching campers’ academic subjects, but I am teaching campers these types of character strengths. These specific character strengths help campers learn to be better humans, and these strengths drive that idea home.

Why should camps elevate these character strengths?

Mitch: If we want these programs to have long-lasting impacts, we need to be focusing on things like empathy, which campers can carry into the future, regardless of whether they are working at camp or elsewhere. As camp professionals we believe that campers will use those strengths throughout the rest of their lives in whatever route they go down.

Ana: Like Mitch said, we want these skills to translate to anything you do in life. That’s especially important because we serve such a diverse group of campers. Some campers might live independent lives, but other campers might never live independently. The character strengths drive home what I want campers to take home from camp and this experience: we want to help them be better human beings.

From your perspective, why are these strengths important for young people living with a serious illness?

Ana: We tried to ensure that the playbooks we developed to help camps promote these character strengths uses inclusive language that was applicable to those with a serious illness. For example, the strength of self-advocacy is particularly important for these young people. Writing from that lens has been important, because it helped us to approach things with a more trauma-informed lens that applies to all young people. The language we included in our playbooks can translate to any child or adolescent.

Mitch: Any child will benefit from a camp experience and from programs that help to build confidence and self-esteem, if done with quality and intentionality. However, all of my experience has been in working in medical specialty camps, so I’m very interested to hear how the playbooks and the character strengths might need to be adapted for camps that are not medical specialty camps.

What does elevating those strengths look like at your camp?

Mitch: In our counselor-in-training program, we created intentional opportunities for counselors to be empathetic and to learn to advocate for themselves. Young people who are 15 or 16 years old are sponges for information. Each day of our weeklong training for counselors-in-training is now focused on a specific character strength. So, if today’s focus is on teaching communication skills, the counselors-in-training are actively looking for ways to lean into that. I think counselors-in-training need to see this in action and practice doing it, so we provide opportunities for them to do both.

Ana: A major reason why these seven character strengths rose to the top is because they are super important for people to have in order to be successful at life. All seven character strengths were already incorporated into our counselor-in-training program in various ways, but we had to do this more intentionally.

To be concrete, we started by creating agreements with counselors-in-training that said, “These are the seven things we expect from you. For example, we expect you to communicate effectively.” Then we took it a step further and used these seven character strengths to evaluate the counselor-in-training staff experience. Every other day the cabin mentor talks about these traits after the cabin chat talks and provides feedback to the counselor-in-training about what they observed, where the counselor-in-training was doing a great job, and where there were areas for improvement. We also reinforce these character strengths with visuals such as a ring of laminated index cards that give examples of how character strengths are tied to behaviors related to different activities in our schedule.

What do you recommend to other camps who are starting to focus on character or are deepening their focus on character?

Ana: Taking a strengths-based approach is key: what are you already doing well, and how does it relate to these character strengths? In so many moments there are opportunities to hit the pause button, put on that facilitator hat, and label the character strength and behavior. “Let’s talk about that awesome moment of empathy that we just saw. I saw how you embraced possibility and perseverance when you were attempting that.”

Mitch: There are going to be different levels of experience in running these types of programs; some are just starting out with their counselor-in-training programs, and other camps have been doing counselor-in-training programs for years. Camps don’t need to do all seven character strengths at once. Pick two to three character traits that you want to focus on and get those right. For those camps that have established counselor-in-training programs, this could be an opportunity for trying something new with a character strength you are already addressing.

Ana: Lean on your community and the other camps that have done this work for years. This mindset embraces who we are as camp professionals; we want to lift each other up and advance the field.

Additional Program Information

For more information, refer to the 2022–2025 Promoting Character Through Counselors-in-Training Programs at Medical Specialty Camps project at: ACAcamps.org/research/special-projects/promoting-character-counselors-training-programs-medical-specialty-camps

Allison Dymnicki, PhD, is a principal associate at Abt Global who supports ACA on several projects including this project designed to promote character in counselor-in-training programs and ACA’s Character at Camp Initiative. Allison has been a strong champion for ACA and out-of-school organizations and has partnered with the SeriousFun Children’s Network, the YMCA, Girls Inc, and Playworks over her 19-year career. Allison is a former camp counselor at two camps in New England.