my name's marie thomas and i'm here with some friends to tell you about our community cares camp and our plans for the upcoming camp season in july to two thousand and fourteen with me are jennifer hand and jessica hill we'll be hearing from them in a couple of minutes our communicators camp was incorporated as a five a one c three nonprofit corporation in two thousand and nine at that time we just hoped to be able to feed some local kids give them some good summer food and some fun activities then we were fortunate enough to find liz russell a very talented person who is a guidance counselor as well as a teacher she's not with us today unfortunately due to a bout of lemon giantess but she will be at camp this summer for her sixth year this created a wonderful summer camp world for our children there are stories and games and crafts and music and cooking and all sorts of activities that just keep the children very very engaged and she created this camp culture where people come and we're just part of a community we're part of the o c c community the kids come from year after year they have the same counselors because our counselors do come back because they have such a good time working with us and she's produced this high quality camp program that's been recognised and praised by groups like hunger fever montt in the agency of education as a model for summer programming but food still remains the core of our program and we provide two excellent meals a day to our children made with fresh local foods many children participate in cooking classes so they learn how to make good choices in food as well as in behavior our community cares camp has grown since two thousand and nine that first year we had about thirty kids a day and eleven employees and last year in two thousand and thirteen we had sixty children a day onsite and twenty five employees and fourteen intern interns or students who are aged fourteen to sixteen and they're coming in volunteer in their time and learning what it is to have a job and many of our interns have gone on to other jobs and some of them have become counselors but we saw that there was a need for more good summer programming so last year we added another program called the leadership adventure camp or the l a see this campus for upper middle school students and we hired jennifer hand to direct that camp jennifer can you tell us a little bit about the leadership adventure camp and your camp is a four week camp for middle school students who are going into seventh and eighth grade we like to focus on art two biggest events that the kids really enjoyed we had something called the amazing race where the two kids had to split up into three different teams and then each team here had to create a vehicle for their team out of cardboard and each team took a very different approach to doing what they thought is a vehicle one team built a battleship out of cardboard for their team another one bill a rocket ship and the third one built a fire engine and then they had to use clues in travel from country to country and at each stop they had to do an activity based on the culture from that country in order to move and get to the next country another thing that we did last year we did our competition in which the kids again split into teams and then each team got a mystery basket ingredient and then they had to create a different dish is using this ingredient and they were very creative i think the one that was the most unique was the team that got the sun butter because none of us had really tasted it before we didn't really sure how it would go but they did some interesting things with that they made muffins and created this cream to go into the muffins they also created it into a smoothie and were rather successful at being able to take this unusual ingredient and make it into something that they were proud of and that was the team that ended up actually winning our competition and then the other things that we did last year we took a tour on the solar boss so the kids can learn about solar energy and diesel power and solar powered vehicles and they were really interested in that they had a lot of great questions and stuff concerning the environment and how to take care of the environment and then we also had a field trip last year in which we went up to m m u and we did the low ropes course as part of our team building that we'd like to do with the kids how do you think these activities help the students i think it really brought the students together as a team they really enjoyed being with each other even when we were supposed to go have lunch in the cafeteria instead of wanting to be there and be with the other camp in with other students that were there they really just came together as a group and wanted to eat in their classroom it was a space that they felt was really there and they really took ownership of that and i think we also were working on creating skills that they could use later a lot of our kids are about that age where they're going to be going out and babysitting or staying home by themselves so we really want to give them some skills that they could use at home and in a practical sense well that sounds like a lot of fun i know i when i saw the kids they always were happy and engaged and just having a wonderful time do you have any extra special things for the summer about your plans this summer we plan to focus more doing more cooking activities we didn't get to do as much as we wanted last year so we're definitely going to build that up this year the kids really enjoyed the cookie portion we're also going to go back to m m u and work with julie smolin up there but instead of doing the low ropes course we're going to try the high ropes course to continue on with our team building we're also going to do some new new our projects and do some more science stuff because the kids really enjoyed that last year and we've got a few new things to pull out from you know other than the things that we did last year we've got some new activities planned well that sounds really fabulous and finally in two thousand and thirteen o c c see which is how we refer to ourselves partnered with camel's hump middle school art teacher marion horton to enable her to offer again her very popular summer art camp and this is a tuition base camp where people pay to come to do art but unfortunately marianne is not available to direct the camp this summer due to other commitments she has for the school so we've hired jessica hill to direct the summer camp in this camp will be open to anyone aged eight to thirteen and will run for four weeks in july beginning july seventh from nine to twelve each day and campers can sign up for one or more weeks there's also an option for meals before and after camp at o c c c so jessica welcome to the o c c c family and can you tell us a little bit about yourself and what you hope to bring to the  am very excited to join our community carers camps and i can speak for how important it is to have a local community can't because when i was a middle school student i attended marion's art camp and those experiences in my formative years really led me to mike chosen career path was which was to be an art teacher so i feel very excited but also like it's my turn to contribute back to what helped mentor me into my chosen career path marion was a really great art teacher and i'm excited to sort of build on her past successes and starts new projects and work with students and an open studio model which i think is really a good indicator of any summer arts campus it's kind of like giving those kids who really enjoy art during the school year but they don't have the time or maybe the one  to tension from their teacher to really develop an idea or a project so i love the idea of having the flexibility to work with individual students you know if you have a kid who is really into painting really get into that or are student who really enjoy one project that they want to push that idea further you know also i'm really excited about doing some recycled are some really fun ideas to do some mixed media monsters which i think will be a lot of fun in utilizing a lot of materials we have sort of our repurpose thing a lot of materials like it donated from the community in sort of bringing a second life into them so i think we'll have a lot of fun this summer what are your favorite kind of yourself i really enjoy painting i like colorful i tend to be drawn to doing landscapes and things because for mine is just such it's hard to deny the inspiration of our surroundings here but i absolutely love to get my hands dirty in clay and i know that's something kids really enjoy because sometimes in the school year they get an a couple opportunities but in the summer it's really fun sort of like tom to go all out with a project and you know push the boundaries so i think that's what i'm most excited about the summer well i think we're all very excited about all of this and thank you both for telling us about your camps and i know you're both anxious to meet your campers for the summer regular o c c see which is kindergarten through sixth grade will be back this summer with many exciting activities many of our counselors are coming back and the children will get to see their favorite counselors  applications for both to see in the l a c will be in the schools in early march so you can ask for one their applications for the summer art camp we were so proud to be able to offer this art camp to the community because i know my son went for many years and it's always just been so popular and i'm glad that we're able to bring it back to you but the applications will be ready in the next week or two in early march look for them at school or at your local library or town clerk's office you can e mail us c c c at g m a t net and asked for one there also be an application on our website and you can download one there or you can also call us at four three four six zero zero six and ask one to be sent to you a moment for the camp will be limited to twenty children per week so enrollment will be on a first come first serve basis so don't wait and there will be some discounts for multi we can roll minutes or for multiple children from one family a last reminder our community cares camp the leadership adventure camp operate through the generosity of donors like you more than sixty percent of our funding comes from the local community so please consider a donation today you can donate online or through our website or facebook page where you can mail your check to the address that will be shown on the screen we so appreciate all the support that you've given us for these past five years the children are so grateful and every time i see their smiles it just makes me want to go on forever you've provided the means through your generosity for giving them a great summer camp and helps them to keep their skills sharp so that when they go back to school they're ready for school and we've been learning that these summer opportunities are so so important for children in their development so thank you and please get in touch with us if you have any questions or if you want to donate materials or time to the camp and thank you for listening to us today