Upstate New York Winter Gathering

Registration now open! Register by November 11, 2026 to get the early bird rate!

Not an ACA Member? Join today for FREE and get the best rates for this event!

Consultants may not self-promote at the conference and must register under the consultant rate unless they are a confirmed speaker at the conference.

Need a hard copy of registration? Email [email protected]

Every Kid Needs a Champion: Building the Systems That Make It Happen

Dr. Rita Pierson told us every kid deserves a champion. Most of us heard that and decided to care more and try harder. This keynote takes her message somewhere more useful: championship can be taught, practiced, and built into how a program runs.

Drawing on 15 years as a teacher, school administrator, afterschool leader, and camp director, Jarod Wunneburger walks through the Thrive Point Model. It has three elements: strong individual skills and habits, intentionally designed culture, and intentionally designed systems. Stories from a Bronx classroom and a Vermont summer camp bring each element to life. Leaders get two tools they can use right away. The Behavior Board catches kids who struggle loudly. The Connection Audit finds the quiet kids no one on staff has connected with. The talk closes by turning the same lens on staff, because the young people who run our programs need champions too.

Attendees leave with:

• A way to define what "champion" means at their organization, including the boundaries that keep it healthy
• Daily culture habits and shared staff language that make seeing every kid the default
• Two ready-to-use systems: the Behavior Board and the Connection Audit
• A plan for championing seasonal and first-year staff

• One place to start: the weakest element in their own program

   

Jarod "W" Wunneburger is a visionary education leader and consultant with over 15 years of experience driving transformative change in schools, after-school programs, and camps. As Owner and Education Consultant at Thrive Point Studio, he specializes in leadership development, organizational design, and training programs that improve retention, performance, and culture in summer camp settings. Previously, Jarod served as Director of Programs at Farm and Wilderness and ran Camp Timberlake, an overnight wilderness camp for boys ages 9-14, where he developed hands-on expertise in camp operations and youth development. He has presented at numerous American Camp Association conferences across the country, delivering sessions on classroom management, coaching systems, leadership development, and behavior management strategies. His camp consulting work includes transforming staff observation frameworks, redesigning disciplinary approaches from punitive to restorative models, and developing leadership training programs that have resulted in measurable improvements in staff retention and confidence metrics. He holds a Master's in School Leadership from Harvard University and a Master's in Special Education from St. John's University, and his approach focuses on aligning strong individual habits, intentional community culture, and robust organizational systems to create lasting impact in camp environments.

NPR went looking for a camp because of what the research keeps saying about boys: that they are lonelier than they used to be, with fewer close friendships and less practice being honest with each other. They wanted to film a place where that was already being addressed, and where the work looked like summer.

Boys of Summer is the NPR Studios original documentary that came out of it. It follows a cabin of teenagers at a remote summer camp in the Vermont woods across one summer. Free from screens, they learn to open up and support one another. It is a tender vérité portrait of vulnerability and friendship, and of the quiet rebellion of feeling deeply.

The film premiered this year and is not yet streaming, so can only be seen at a camp conference. 

Jarod Wunneburger spent five years directing the camp where it was filmed and now leads educational and community engagement strategy for the documentary. He has spent fifteen years building programs for kids, at camps and in schools, and now works as a school administrator in Vermont. He will screen the film in full, take you behind the scenes on how NPR made it, and discuss the mix of staff skills, intentional culture, and robust systems that made it happen. 

It is a love letter to the work of all camps, and a reminder of what that work is for.

Schedule at a Glance

• 9:00-9:30 — Coffee & Check-In
• 9:30-9:45 — Welcome 
• 9:45-11:00 — Session 1
• 11:15-12:15- Session 2
• 12:30-1:15- Lunch & Announcements
• 1:30-2:30-Boys of Summer Screening with Q&A
• 2:30-3:30- Closing