https://www.acacamps.org/article/camping-magazine/camp-counselor-self-care-guide-emotional-physical-well-being

As a camp counselor, you have many responsibilities to juggle, including home life, camp life, and life after camp. It’s important to prioritize your physical and emotional health, as they are...

https://www.acacamps.org/article/camping-magazine/five-essentials-supporting-staff-mental-health-well-being

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) define mental health as “your emotional, psychological, and social well-being. It can therefore affect every stage of life and impact how you...

https://www.acacamps.org/article/camping-magazine/continuous-improvement-program-quality-lessons-learned-part-two

As established in the first “Lessons Learned” article (...

https://www.acacamps.org/article/camping-magazine/continuous-improvement-program-quality-lessons-learned

Program quality (PQ) is essential to youth programs, and research shows that high-quality programs are directly linked to more positive outcomes. PQ refers to the environment that is created at...

https://www.acacamps.org/article/camping-magazine/top-25-staffing-solutions-gathered-through-collaboration

Highlighted here is a curated collection of great ideas about how to recruit and retain staff — a direct result of the last two years of conferences and various collaborative brainstorming sessions...

https://www.acacamps.org/research/special-projects/campwell

Currently in 15 pilot camps, CampWell is a six-hour skills-based, in-person, multitiered, training course that guides participants to identify, understand, cultivate, and create a community of...

https://www.acacamps.org/article/camping-magazine/healthy-inside-out-role-mental-health-counseling-summer-camp

I spent my childhood summers at a sleepaway camp in Pennsylvania, and I loved it. When I turned 18 in 2021, I couldn’t wait to work as a counselor myself. I was following in my mother’s footsteps;...

https://www.acacamps.org/research/special-projects/camp-program-quality-initiative

Funded by the Lilly Endowment, Inc., ACA began a special project to explore and develop systems that support camp professionals in promoting positive youth development through camp experiences.

https://www.acacamps.org/research/continuous-improvement

At ACA, we believe in continuous improvement. We believe that our work for young people is not conceptualized in boxes or checklists; instead, we think about our work in a cyclical way—a way that...

https://www.acacamps.org/research/continuous-improvement/camp-program-quality

Program quality refers to the ways camp staff practices, activities, and program climate foster youth development consistently over time.