Running header: CIT Program
HOW A SUMMER CAMP COUNSELOR-IN-TRAINING PROGRAM MAY FOSTER
RESILIENCE AND SELF-EFFICACY IN ADOLESCENT BOYS
AN ABSTRACT
SUBMITTED ON THE EIGHTEENTH DAY OF MARCH 2013
TO THE INTERDISCIPLINARY PROGRAM IN THE DEPARTMENTS OF
ANTHROPOLOGY AND PSYCHOLOGY AND THE SCHOOL OF SOCIAL WORK
IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS
OF THE SCHOOL OF LIBERAL ARTS OF TULANE UNIVERSITY
FOR THE DEGREE OF
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
BY
______BRADLEY S. PHILIPSON
APPROVED:
______PROF. J. MAXWELL (DIRECTOR)
______PROF. S. DU
______PROF. A. TRUITT
______PROF. M. CUNNINGHAM
______DEAN R. MARKS
ABSTRACT
Over the years, a number of quantitative studies have attempted and failed to capture the positive psychological growth that comes from participation in outdoor adventure education, as well as the precise source of that growth. The logical conclusion from this is either that such growth is an illusion, such growth can’t be measured, or that the studies were in some way methodologically flawed. The present study takes an intensive ethnographic/autoethnographic approach to study the progress of six teenage boys in a bifurcated eight-week summer camp program evenly divided between adventure travel and apprenticeship as staff to younger children. The study set out to find out what antecedent factors predicated the development of resilience and self-efficacy, with a particular focus on the culture of the camp as a whole and the expectations placed on staff conduct; the developmental trajectory of the individual; the individual’s past experience with adversity; the individual’s self-concept both at a given point of observation and over time; the group dynamic of the CIT cohort; the mentorship of older staff; the formal training as a counselor; and the expectations of a caregiver role. In addition to clear measures of self-efficacy, and, in some cases, resilience, the study also revealed generalized positive psychological growth as a result of a healthy, value-setting group dynamic. Of particular interest was the development of the study itself, with its reflective interviews and focus groups focused on positive adaptation to challenges, as an additional antecedent factor.
Running header: CIT Program
HOW A SUMMER CAMP COUNSELOR-IN-TRAINING PROGRAM MAY FOSTER
RESILIENCE AND SELF-EFFICACY IN ADOLESCENT BOYS
A DISSERTATION
SUBMITTED ON THE EIGHTEENTH DAY OF MARCH 2013
TO THE INTERDISCIPLINARY PROGRAM IN THE DEPARTMENTS OF
ANTHROPOLOGY AND PSYCHOLOGY AND THE SCHOOL OF SOCIAL WORK
IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS
OF THE SCHOOL OF LIBERAL ARTS OF TULANE UNIVERSITY
FOR THE DEGREE OF
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
BY
______BRADLEY S. PHILIPSON
APPROVED:
______PROF. J. MAXWELL (DIRECTOR)
______PROF. S. DU
______PROF. A. TRUITT
______PROF. M. CUNNINGHAM
______DEAN R. MARKS
Blank page/copyright
Acknowledgements
A huge debt of gratitude goes out to the boys who participated in this study.
The time spent getting to know them and watching them grow has been far more meaningful to me than this document can possibly reflect. Thank you, as well, to
“Dodger,” “Curly’s daughter,” and “Furry,” for making room for me to do the study and supporting me throughout. I consider myself lucky to have such good friends.
Renée Michelet Casbergue, now at LSU, deserves credit for first steering me towards doctoral studies, and April Whatley Bedford at UNO helped keep me on that path.
The first day I walked into the temporary Anthropology offices at Tulane, I could not have conceived of the lengths Judith Maxwell would go to help me design my interdisciplinary program, recruit a committee, get the program approved (and funded), and then walk me through every step of the way, especially as things got rough at the end. She has been incredibly patient. Thank you, as well, to the rest of my committee for your counsel in and outside of the dissertation process, Michael
Cunningham, Ron Marks, Shanshan Du, and Allison Truitt. Outside of the direct world of this study, thank you to Carolyn Chandler, Howard Barton, Corbett Simons, and Chris Bright for helping me make room in my professional life to continue to grow as a student (at an increasingly advanced age). Thank you to all of my family and friends for everything you’ve done to support me in this process, and, above all, thank you to my parents; the more I work with kids, the more grateful I am for the support and guidance you have given me for the last thirty-seven years.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS………………………………………………………………………..…………….ii
INTRODUCTION, LITERATURE REVIEW, AND METHODOLOGY………………………..1 I. Introduction: Study Aim, Background, and Design…………..……………………..1 II. Literature Review………………………………………………………………...………………………...7 III. Methodology……………………………………………………………………………………………..…41
PROGRAM NARRATIVE………………………………………………………………………………….…49 I. Prologue: A Researcher’s Bias…………………………………………………………..…49 II. Maine, June 16-22…………………………….………………………………………………...62 III. Bar Harbor, ME to Glen, NH, June 23-27………..…………………………………..…85 IV. The White Mountains (NH) to Vermont, June 28-July 3………..……………....92 V. Vermont to Upstate New York to Ontario to Michigan to Camp, July 4- 13..…………………………………………………………………………………………………..102 VI. Discussion of travel portion of program…………………………………………….122 VII. The Apprenticeship, July 14-21……….……………………………………………..…128 VIII. The Apprenticeship: July 22-July 28……….…………………………………………145 IX. The Apprenticeship: July 29-August 4………. ……………………………………...155 X. The Apprenticeship: August 4-11, Post-Program Conversations…………165 XI. Discussion of Apprenticeship…………………………………………………………....192
DISCUSSION……………………………………………………………………………………………………198 I. Revisiting the Research Question……………………………………………………...198 II. Areas of Applicability……………………………………………………………………….204 III. Conclusion………………………………………………………………………….……………215
REFERENCES…………………………………………………………………………………………………..217
APPENDIX A: Consent Form……….……………………………………………………………………227 APPENDIX B: Assent Form………………………………………………………………………………233 APPENDIX C: Self-Efficacy Questionnaire…………………………………………………………236 Appendix D: Focus Group and Interview Prompts……………………………………………238
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CIT Program 1
INTRODUCTION, LITERATURE REVIEW, AND METHODOLOGY
I. Introduction: Study Aim, Background, and Design
In September of 2011, journalist Paul Tough published an article in the New
York Times entitled “What if the Secret to Success is Failure?” His thesis, based on work done in urban KIPP schools, catering to mostly socioeconomically disadvantaged children who are members of ethnic minorities, and at the tony private Riverdale School in the Bronx, is that the key to raising kids to be successful, to not only get good grades but to possess the positive psychological traits to be successful, resilient adults who can handle whatever comes there way, is character education. More specifically, not merely values, but performance character, values relating to actions and decision-making. Citing the Angela Lee Duckworth’s work on resilience (2006) and Peterson and Seligman’s (2004) Character Strengths and
Virtues, Tough seeks to identify specific traits students need to develop and examines how they can develop. He later expanded this article into a book, How
Children Succeed (2012), in which he synthesized empirical research and qualitative study to examine how noncognitive intelligence, made up of the skills and abilities relating to performance character, is not only the best predictor of success, but that it is also malleable, teachable, at the very least, well into adolescence.
Tough’s original article drew a lot of attention in education circles, not in the least part because he takes the time to address the needs of both inner city kids and
CIT Program 2 children of privilege, and this text was an eagerly awaited follow-up to that article.
For many of us in education, though, Tough was merely calling attention to what we already knew; the information amassed by students is far less important than what they learn about how to be a person. Certainly, much of this takes place at home, but how parents raise a child is heavily mediated by what the child learns in a social environment. Peer groups and institutional culture, as well as the role models, both in the form of proximate peers and trusted adults, shape values and provide a basis for decision-making. At about the same time Tough was working on this article and this book, I had, at the age of thirty-five, returned to summer camp to examine how a small group of teenagers attempted to transition into positions of responsibility.
I was in a unique position in returning to this particular camp. For the first part of the program, I would be one of two staff members traveling with six teenage boys throughout New England on a series of outdoor adventures, serving dual roles as trip leaders and staff trainers. While we prepared them to take on the role of apprentice staff members, we would be, essentially, within twenty-five feet of these kids for twenty-four hours a day. We would drive them from place to place in a van, hike, kayak, and canoe with them, visit tourist spots, set up and break camp, shop for and prepare meals, all as a group. There’s a level of intimacy that grows out of this dynamic, one with which I am very familiar after having led a half-dozen or so such trips spanning from the time I was not much older than these boys to just the previous summer. Nevertheless, at this camp, it was particularly unusual to have a trip leader older than their mid-twenties, let alone one who would be recording the actions of the participants at every step. I was able to gain this access because,
CIT Program 3 despite encroaching middle age, I am one of them; I am a member of the fictive kinship network stemming from this particular camp. I had been a camper in this program, then staff, then trip leader, and, as recently as seven years prior, supervisory staff. I was trusted and allowed in by the camp directors, the boys’ parents, the staff, and the boys because, essentially, I was already in.
Writing about an organization that was a large part of my upbringing and which shaped my career in education is fraught with peril. A certain level of bias is unavoidable. I’ve attempted to mitigate this as best I can by thoroughly journaling my own history with the organization and keeping track of my role in the camp over the course of the summer to provide a clear picture of how my position may affect my observations.
My time with the boys consisted of only one summer, but it was a summer that reflected their years of experience as part of the camp program. Our interviews as well as our informal discussions revealed, to varying degrees, the developmental trajectory of each child as they progressed through the camp program. Their relative success in this particular summer did not necessarily reflect their relative growth; that is, the most competent camper and staffer may have brought more assets to the experience than one who still struggled a bit, but that participant who still struggled may have come a longer way to get where they are. It’s easy to run home when you start on third base; it’s more impressive to make it to second when you started out not knowing how to swing a bat.
This program serves as a formal rite of passage as campers pass into adulthood. It is encouraged but not required for campers who want to become staff;
CIT Program 4 some choose to take the year off rather than occupy this interstitial space. The first half of the summer, the travel portion, functions much like the travel programs the boys would have participated in the previous two summers. A major difference, however, is that the boys fly directly to the travel site instead of camp. They don’t physically enter camp until it is time to take on the role of apprentice staff, so that when they do enter the property for the first time that summer, it is when they begin their roles as counselors.
The original purpose of this ethnographic study was to observe and record an environment in which adolescent boys may develop self-efficacy and resilience over the course of an immersive 54-day program. As I, as principal investigator, shadowed and observed the participants in the Counselor–in-Training (CIT) program of a Midwestern boys’ summer camp in hopes of observing ways in which the setting and program may foster displays of resilience and self-efficacy, what I discovered was both larger and, at the same time, more subtle than what I expected.
Though the data points for resilience were at times a bit unclear, this appeared primarily to be a result of the success of the program; because of the positive psychological traits fostered in the program, sources of adversity were relatively minor and easily handled. Nevertheless, the theoretical background of this study is based on studies of the constructs of resilience and self-efficacy, as well as previous studies of Outdoor Adventure Education (OAE), and the conventions of social psychology and peer group influence. The literature review will also address the appropriateness of an ethnographic approach, and in particular how this
CIT Program 5 ethnographic approach will seek validity, as well as the appropriateness of choosing affluent, white, male adolescents for participants.
Research Question
How may a residential summer camp counselor-in-training program foster displays of resilience and self-efficacy in adolescent boys? In particular, what are the roles of the following factors in the facilitation of these displays:
• The culture of the camp as a whole and the expectations placed on staff
conduct;
• The developmental trajectory of the individual;
• The individual’s past experience with adversity;
• The individual’s self-concept both at a given point of observation and over
time;
• The group dynamic of the CIT cohort;
• The mentorship of older staff;
• The formal training as a counselor;
• The expectations of a caregiver role.
This particular program, occupying a liminal place between child and adult, directly addresses the adolescents’ transforming needs and expectations, as they are both camper and staff in this role, both child and adult. The research will seek to identify the mechanisms that facilitate as well as those that hinder displays of self-efficacy and resilience. Given the difficulties of past quantitative studies in OAE, this study will ideally better identify some antecedent factors for positive psychological
CIT Program 6 growth in residential OAE programs for adolescent boys, providing fodder for future study. Though, as stated, clear instances of self-efficacy and resilience were not as frequent as expected, examination of the component factors listed above provides clear evidence of positive psychological growth as a result of the program, including the further development of the noncognitive intelligence that will serve these boys beyond the eight weeks of the study. The study size is small in order to achieve a great depth of results, but, ideally, the end result is the identification of clear antecedent factors for positive growth that may then be applied in future, larger scale studies. Essentially, this study posits that the eight factors listed above foster personal growth and maturation in the study participants, with a particular focus on efficacy beliefs and a capacity for resilience.
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II. Literature Review
A. Self-Efficacy
In 1977, Albert Bandura published two major works that laid out the tenets of self-efficacy theory. One, a book entitled Social Learning Theory, discusses the nature of efficacy beliefs without specifically coining the term self-efficacy. That final step occurs in an article published that year in the Psychological Review, “Self- efficacy: Toward a Unifying Theory of Behavioral Change.” Bandura’s use of the term
“unifying” refers to the historically divergent theories that positive behavioral change is effected either through cognitive processes or through actual performance-based procedures. Bandura posits that the same basic mechanism underlies both of these theories, and that behavioral change is essentially the result of both cognitive beliefs and the acting upon those beliefs.
In his 1977 article, Bandura lays out four basic sources of self-efficacy: performance accomplishments, vicarious experience, verbal persuasion, and physiological states. Performance accomplishments provide direct evidence of past success, the clearest and most easily accessed of sources for efficacy beliefs.
Vicarious experience, the witnessing of others modeling successful completion of a task both firsthand and symbolically, shows that the task is accomplishable. Verbal persuasion, particularly when coupled with vicarious experience or used as direct feedback, can convince the individual of their own efficacy at the level necessary to
CIT Program 8 complete the task. In terms of physiological states, emotional arousal and the stresses it triggers can debilitate performance beliefs. Active efforts to address negative emotional arousal, whether through attribution of the source of arousal, deliberate relaxation techniques, or exposure and/or desensitization to the task, clear the path to the utilization of efficacy beliefs (Bandura, 1977a). Though some time has passed since Bandura’s work, and his work has been refined, these core principles are directly applicable to the efficacy behaviors in the present study. All four come to play in the observation and explication of displays of efficacy outcomes in the context of the CIT program.
These sources of self-efficacy are worth putting in the context of reciprocal determinism, as explained in Bandura’s Social Learning Theory (1977): development through social learning is the function of an interaction between the person, their behavior, and the environment, with each of these three factors affecting the others
(p. 10). The operationalization of performance accomplishments, vicarious experience, verbal persuasion and physiological states all take place through some form of reciprocal determinism. Given the inherently social nature of the program design, individual growth of the participants of this study must be placed within the context of the group and the environment.
Bandura continued to develop his work on self-efficacy, both on his own and with others, often restating previous conclusions with increasing clarity. In a 1991 article, he describes the three components of motivation that he posits to be at the core of self-regulation: “selection, activation, and sustained direction of behavior toward certain goals” (Bandura, 1991; cited in Bandura, 1997, p. 228). The
CIT Program 9 individual must view the goal as desirable, they must choose to seek that goal, and they must pursue a course of action designed to achieve that goal. All of that is predicated, however, on an expectation that their actions will bring about a desired result. Returning to Social Learning Theory: “an efficacy expectation is the conviction that one can successfully execute the behavior required to produce the outcomes”
(p.79). Strong self-efficacy on its own is not a guarantor of success, but the coupling of efficacy beliefs with the requisite skill set will potentially result in achievement
(Bandura, 1977a).
In another article from the 1990s, Bandura (1993) posits that there are four major processes through which self-efficacy functions: cognitive, motivational, affective, and selective. Cognitive processing is a necessary step in utilizing existing skills to accomplish a task. That is, having the skill set required to complete a task is insufficient without the cognitive process that tells the individual that completion of the task is possible and of value. The more challenging process is to retain this belief in the face of uncertainty. “People who are plagued by self-doubts anticipate the futility of efforts to modify their life situation” (Bandura, 1993, p. 125). Before a task can be completed, before motivation can begin, cognitive processes must recognize the goal as achievable.
Once cognitive processes recognize a task as achievable, it is then up to motivational processes to choose to pursue completion of the task. This selection is predicated on the expected result—to what extent will the result be achieved and at what cost, and what is the expected value of that result (Schunk, 1991, Bandura,
1993)? This comes down to a sort of cost-benefit analysis termed “expectancy-value
CIT Program 10 theory” (Bandura, 1993, p.128). If the individual believes the expected outcome to be worthy of the effort contributed, they will proceed. If, however, they expect failure, or, at the very least, a result not worthy of their efforts, they will not expend what they perceive to be a futile effort. To elicit effort, a goal must provide a significant challenge (it can’t be too easy, either, or the payoff will be presumed minimal) and corresponding payoff, and motivation can be sustained by self- monitoring of progress toward that goal and periodic readjustment of actions, proximate goals, and effort to maintain that process (Bandura, 1993).
Motivational processes at this level are inextricable from cognitive processes, as it is the cognitive process that must frame the narrative in terms of the drive to accomplish the goal. The individual needs to believe that they will get up once they fall down, that difficulty is not a negation of their ability to succeed, a belief that can be effectively reinforced through verbal persuasion, both internally and externally, even when efforts have not been successful in the past (Bandura, 1977, Zimmerman,
1995).
Verbal persuasion may be of great use in addressing affective processes, as well. Poor self-efficacy is not the result of a rational process by which the individual considers a task, considers their ability, and dispassionately decides the task beyond their capacity. Rather, an insufficient sense of self-efficacy can trigger anxiety, depression, and stress, triggering a weakening of emotional and physical resolve
(Bandura, 1993). As a remedy, affective processes need to be addressed through efficacy coping mechanisms, a rational process of acknowledging the stress triggers and neutralizing the threat they create. Such calm analysis in times of apparent
CIT Program 11 crisis, however, can be difficult and can often require trusted counsel, at least until the individual becomes experienced enough at this process to gird their efficacy against threats.
Selection processes are the fourth and final category Bandura (1993) discusses. Selection of a given path is the result of motivation to pursue that path and the cognitive process that selects that path as appropriate. Ultimately, efficacy without selection is merely self-description; it is a belief about one’s self that is neither tested nor put to use. It is the selection and pursuit of a given path that gives a sense of self-efficacy its power. In the present study, that pursuit comes in the form of a successful group experience in the travel portion of the trip, including physical challenges and the daily tasks of self-sufficient outdoor living, as well as, and more significantly, a successful term as an apprentice staff member.
If the development of efficacy beliefs is the result of reciprocal determinism, then proliferation of interaction with the outside world that grows exponentially as a child attends school, spends more time with peers, and increases experience independent of the family unit provides myriad opportunities to increase self- efficacy (Bandura, 1997). If, as Vygotsky (1978) posits, children learn in a zone of proximal development by working with a learned other, experience with peers slightly more and slightly less competent than the individual provides the child with opportunities place themselves within a spectrum of competency. Bandura points out that it is a moderate level of social self-efficacy which is integral to acceptance.
The inefficacious child becomes withdrawn, whereas the over efficacious child may engage in coercive behaviors, resulting in an alternate form of alienation (p. 173).
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When the adolescent enters into a residential program with peers, as in the CIT program studied here, this influence intensifies and provides increased potential for growth. What’s more, as they apprentice with older staff in the latter half of the summer, they are surrounded by and outnumbered by learned others, creating more opportunities to venture successfully into their zones of proximal development. What’s more, all of this is taking place while the adolescent is amidst
Erikson’s (1950) Identity versus Role Confusion stage. This experience, including the defining of the self, helps to shape how the adolescent sees himself interacting with the world.
Self-efficacy becomes especially important during the crucible of adolescence, as it is during this time of identity development that the individual must simultaneously act as both a child and an adult, often taking on the physical appearance of the latter while still growing out of the worldview of the former.
Typically, adolescents are changing biologically while navigating social and educational environments that are new to them after the elementary educational
(and social) setting where they have spent most of their young lives. They are establishing their own identity in both outward and inward senses while met with a flurry of choices (including choices about substance abuse and sexual behavior) that may very well determine their long-term path. One advantage of an OAE program like CIT is that it pulls them away from peer expectations about substance abuse and sexual behavior like they may have at home because there are simply not the opportunities to act on them. They are often expected to act like adults, caring for
CIT Program 13 themselves and others, but they are kept from many of the pitfalls of the adult world.
Bandura (1997) posits that it is an agentic perspective, a sense of control over one’s self, one’s choices, and one’s outcomes, that best serves the adolescent in persevering through the adult risks presented to the growing child. He argues that whereas protective/sheltering factors fail to teach the child how to resist or survive the harsher elements of the world, the enabling of an agentic perspective allows them a sense of control over their own fate and provides the strength to overcome the challenges of adolescence. Such success, he posits, is the result of “the strength of personal efficacy built up through prior mastery experiences” (p. 178). It is during this time that contemporary schools, at least those concerned with the psychosocial development of the child, attempt to use verbal persuasion and vicarious experience, two of the major components of efficacy beliefs first laid out by Bandura (1977b), as well as recognition of performance accomplishments, to build efficacy beliefs that will enable adolescents to make prosocial decisions.
Self-efficacy beliefs are domain-specific as well as context-specific and task- specific (Zimmerman & Cleary, 2006). During the “sturm und drang” [sic] of adolescence, seemingly competent youth may find themselves nevertheless struggling with doubt in any number of areas. Adolescents must not only prove themselves academically at a time when drastically varying developmental paces create great disparities in the classroom, they must also prove themselves socially, as well as, often, athletically and/or artistically. Often, self-efficacy beliefs predict success better than ability in the classroom as well as in athletics, for example
CIT Program 14
(Zimmerman & Cleary, 2006). Returning again to reciprocal determinism, this efficacy can develop through mastery experiences which can develop as the result of emulation of modeling by close others (vicarious experience) and a positive, encouraging social environment (verbal persuasion). It is the setting in which the adolescent finds him or herself which can facilitate efficacy beliefs. If they see nothing but negative modeling and receive discouraging feedback, it is unlikely that they will develop the efficacy beliefs requisite to achievement.
Ultimately, the child’s sense of self-efficacy is directly influenced by everyone with whom they interact on a regular basis: peers, teachers, summer program staff and other adults in positions of authority and/or mentorship, and parents. It is with the effective guidance of and belief in the child that the child will develop positive efficacy beliefs and achieve resultant successes, both in the immediate context of an
OAE program, as well as in the world beyond it. While self-efficacy may provide an integral building block for success, though, it can also play an important role in overcoming the challenges that a child may meet along the way.
B. Resilience
Luthar (2006) defines resilience as “phenomenon or process reflecting relatively positive adaptation despite experiences of significant adversity or trauma” (p. 742).
There are two constructs whose co-occurrence provides the basis for identifying resilience: significant adversity and positive adaptation. According to Luthar (2006), the concept of resilience grew out of studies of the children of mentally ill parents in the 1960s and 1970s and a longitudinal study of a Hawaiian population from birth to adulthood over the course of the latter half of the twentieth century, and was
CIT Program 15 crystallized by two papers published in the 1980s (Garmezy, Masten & Tellegen,
1984; Rutter, 1987; both cited in Luthar, 2006). According to Cunningham (2010), the concept of resilience has grown over the years to encompass the overcoming of
“parental mental illness; maltreatment; urban poverty and community violence; chronic illness; and catastrophic life events” (Masten & Coatsworth, 1995; Cicchetti et al., 2004; Luthar, 1999, Richters & Martinez, 1993; Wells & Scwebel, 1987;
O’Dougherty et al., 1997; all cited in Cunningham, 2010). Spencer et al. (2006) have also applied the study of resilience (and its converse, vulnerability), in a normative developmental context. That is to say, resilience will look different in different contexts; it is specific to the milieu in which the subject is observed, the needs of that subject, the demands placed on them, their maturational stage, and their interaction with peers and elders. Spencer et al. consider such factors as cultural influences, race and ethnicity, and a phenomenological perspective on identity and self related to Spencer’s Phenomenological Variant of Ecological Systems Theory
(PVEST). Essentially, a study of resilience must keep in mind the individual, their experience, and the context in which this experience takes place. In the present study, the bar for adversity may be set slightly lower from an objective standpoint, but, given the emotional state and limited experience of teenagers, the degree of stress in a given situation may reach the same levels as when faced with what society may deem more significant adversity. That is, what is determinative of the level of resilience required to overcome stress relates to how significant the adversity is within the context of the individual and the environment. Masten
(2001), below, explores this further.
CIT Program 16
Resilience is a state rather than a trait (Allen et al., 2008), and without adversity, there is no activation of resilience. Resilience differs from resiliency in that while the former refers to a process, the latter refers to a personality trait
(Block & Block, 1980; cited in Cunningham, 2010). Resilience develops when needed, when adversity necessitates positive adaptation. It may be context specific, as an individual who displays resilience in one situation might not do so in another
(Hauser et al., 2006). This is a limitation to the concept, as the study thereof is necessarily post facto; subjects must have proven they are resilient before resilience can manifest, and because it may not manifest in all domains, this makes antecedent study of resilient individuals by definition impossible except in retrospect. That is, one may study a group of individuals at risk of developmental challenges such as substance abuse or educational difficulties longitudinally and track who demonstrates resilience and who does not, but at the time of study, one does not know who will demonstrate resilience and who will demonstrate vulnerability to adversity. One of the ideas behind this study is to see if a watched pot will, in fact, boil; from an academic standpoint (though not a sympathetic one), the hope was to see adversity rise to a level that required demonstrations of resilience.
Masten’s (2001) definition of resilience is similar to Luthar’s, considering resilience to be “the class of phenomena characterized by good outcomes in spite of serious threats to adaptation or development” (p. 228). She argues that resilience is not extraordinary, but rather common and a function of the bringing to bear of protective factors on the situation in question. These protective factors include positive attachment bonds with caregivers; positive relationships with other
CIT Program 17 nurturing, competent adults; intellectual skills; self-regulation skills; positive self- perceptions; self-efficacy; faith, hope, and a sense of meaning in life; friends or romantic partners who are supportive and prosocial; bonds to effective schools and other prosocial organizations; communities with positive services and supports for families and children; and cultures that provide positive standards, rituals, relationships, and supports (Masten, 2009, p. 29). The development of positive self- definition is an antecedent factor of the resilience we seek to foster, something that is less a trait or characteristic than it is a process. In fact, though Masten refers to
“protective factors,” the term factor fails to recognize the dynamic nature of what are actually protective processes, processes which the individual must execute on an ongoing or repeated basis to achieve resilience (Luthar, Cicchetti & Becker,
2000).
It is, in fact, this positive self-definition which is at the center of Outdoor
Adventure Education in all of its forms. By testing abilities and fostering a growth in the ability to take on responsibility and try out new activities and environments, participants have an opportunity to strengthen their self-concept. Failing all else, signs of a growth in positive self-definition will provide evidence in improved protective factors, increasing the capacity for resilience even when no opportunity to display resilience arises.
Resilience may look different across different cultures as the subordinate components, adversity and positive adaptation, may be culturally specific (Ungar,
2006). In fact, according to Ungar, even the protective factors which facilitate resilience may be specific to a given culture, much in the same way that risks,
CIT Program 18 adversity, and means of adaptation may all be context-specific. What is universal is the fact that resilience occurs when individuals rely on protective factors to make positive adaptations in the face of adversity, whatever that adversity and that adaptation may be.
Ultimately, anyone seeking to work with children and adolescents (at least with anything other than capitalistic aims) seeks to promote positive development.
They want the youth with whom they work to have the best lives possible, to succeed and to have the opportunity to pursue whatever life may wait in their future. No matter what they teach a child, what skills or facts or competencies they instill, however, none of it will reach its potential utility if the child is overly vulnerable in the face of adversity. To a certain extent, such vulnerability is unavoidable. The pain and suffering life may heap on an individual is limitless.
Nevertheless, if work with youth can instill the protective factors delineated by
Masten, if we can gird youth with assets requisite to positive adaptation, we can prepare them for almost any obstacle that may arise. We can’t prevent bad things from happening to kids, but we can work to prevent vulnerability in the face of these bad things. We can affect how they react to the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, a term that arises incidentally but alludes to a story of great vulnerability.
In Hamlet (Shakespeare, 2003), the prince never recovers from his father’s death, ultimately meeting his demise in a failed attempt at vengeance, along the way spurning his girlfriend who, unable to face this adversity, commits suicide. It is a cautionary tale of the failure of resilience. Though resilience is often examined in the context of children of color in low-income settings (e.g., Taylor, 2010), it is
CIT Program 19 applicable to children of privilege, as well, and every child in between. The level of stress triggered by adversity is context specific, and can be perceived not only during times of objective crisis, but subjective crisis as well, dependent on the context (Spenser et al., 2005). In many cases, children of apparent socioeconomic privilege are exposed to as many or greater risks than students who encounter more traditionally and more commonly examined risks (Luthar and Ansary, 2005). I use the term “children of privilege” here to refer to the group Luthar and Ansary identify as being “affluent” or of “high income” (p. 234). While the sample they refer to comes from suburban communities with very high post-secondary education rates and median incomes of approximately $80-100,000. The exact income of the parents in this study is not identified. Rather, the children all come from areas similarly situated to the subjects in that study, and, more importantly, are part of a group that has access to expensive programs like the one being studied. Luthar and
Ansary’s selection of children from a given community rather than based on polling specific income and parental education data from each participant before entering into the study implies that being a child a privilege often has less to do with a ledger balance and more to do with access to educational and economic opportunity.
Youth programs that recognize a capacity for resilience as integral to the success of the children and adolescents in their charge can work to promote the eventual success of the entire constituent population. In the case of the CIT program examined, in particular, studying the mechanisms of personal growth may provide fodder for future hypotheses in different settings or on a larger scale, including integration into programs that offer broader levels of access. Absent displays of
CIT Program 20 resilience, evidence of protective factors and the growth thereof shows an increased capacity for resilience. Ideally, a successful study will break the mechanisms that provide such growth into component parts that are replicable, looking at if and how the program develops positive outcomes for its participants.
C. Performance Character
In his report on the application of the work of Angela Lee Duckworth (2006) and
Peterson and Seligman (2004), Paul Tough (2012) refers to performance character as those character traits, like self-control and self-efficacy, that are a reflection of an individual’s beliefs about his or her own actions. More specifically, Tough examined the focus in both KIPP charter schools and Riverdale Country School, an elite private school, on “grit, self-control, zest, social intelligence, gratitude, optimism” and
“curiosity.” That is, rather than an examination of traditional values, these fall under what Peterson and Seligman term “character strengths and virtues.” Displays of such behaviors, they argue, are indicative of a life well lived. In addition to the primary focus on the development of self-efficacy and the capacity for resilience, displays of such behavior in the present study will be indicative of positive outcomes for program participants, outcomes that will serve them well beyond the period of the study.
D. Application of Social Psychology and Age-Set Cohorts
Rubin, Bukowski and Parker (2006) define a group as “a collection of interacting individuals who have some degree of reciprocal influence over one another” (p.
578). Essential to the understanding of the participants’ actions in the present study is placing them with the context of their social identity as members of this CIT
CIT Program 21 group. Their group is representative of a larger cohort with whom they have moved through the camp ranks, and it is especially salient during the CIT summer, when they are members of a very visible in-group that falls in between the role of camper and staff. Typically, such a group can be identified by “patterns of behaviors and attitudes that characterize group members and differentiate them from members of other groups” (Rubin et al., p. 579). Especially when a camp cohort is winnowed down to small numbers like this, the group can take on a clear identity within the context of the camp culture, whether positive or negative. The boundaries between the individual’s self-concept and social identity in this context can become quite porous. Social identity in the context of in-group membership can be determinative of self-concept (Tajfel, 1981), and, under self-expansion theory, when the group members of the group meet with some success, all members of the groups can feel like they have succeeded (Gardner, Gabriel & Hochschild, 2002). This group membership becomes a motivational factor (Batson, Ahmad & Stocks, 2011).
Essentially, once out of the home, the primary influence over their behavior is their peer group (Harris, 1995). Social cues direct individuals to act like members of their peer group, and they set expectations for behavior in a way that differs once children and adolescents are away from their family. The intensity of the period of separation in the present case means the participants have more of a chance than is common at this age to become who they are around their peers rather than who they are at home, making peer influence and group identity crucial in determining the presence or absence of pro-social behavior. The salience of social identity, the degree to which self-concept and group identity merge, is context specific (Aron et
CIT Program 22 al., 2005), so, while the travel portion of this program may be important in terms of peer influence, placing the in-group in a setting surrounded by out-group members will make social identity that much more a part of self-concept.
Related to the social identity aspect of this program is the part role models play within the camp setting. Same-age cohorts move through the camp hierarchy together as kids, and then, as they move into staff roles, groupings of typically three cohorts become age sets who ascend in prominence as they get older. Older age sets consistently prove proximate role models as they are far enough along in life in and out of camp to come across as worldly and experienced to the younger age sets, but close enough to be highly relatable. Often, the older campers and younger staff are learning how to conduct themselves by watching and emulating these proximate age sets. As they see the demonstration of values by these role models, such as the way they react to camper behavior, they can create emotional expectancies of how a staff member is supposed to conduct oneself. Such emotional expectancies, then, can motivate an adolescent (Krettenauer, Jia & Mosleh, 2011). That is, if the role model demonstrates the value that the success of a camper in his care will make him or her genuinely happy, that can motivate the adolescents efforts to aid in a camper’s success when that adolescent is a new staff member. Similarly, avoiding negative emotional expectancies can also be a motivating factor.
Such role modeling is far from limited to the expectations of the job. Another large part of becoming a camp staff member is social conduct, both in and out of camp. CITs are exposed to unguarded, slightly older adolescents who are accustomed to college life and a near-total lack of adult supervision. Choosing the
CIT Program 23 right role models within this proximate age set is crucial, as such selection can be determinative of health-related behaviors, including choices about substance use and other decisions that may endanger the adolescent (Yancey, Grant, Kravitz-Wirtz,
Kurosky, & Mistry, 2011). It’s scary, as adults, to think of how little influence we have in this context, but it is truly the peers and proximate age set who will have the greatest influence over an adolescent in this setting.
E. How Understanding the Way Adolescents Learn Outside the Classroom
May Provide Insight Into Helping Them Inside the Classroom
According to Dewey (1916), the blurring of lines between school and the outside world enables student interest and agency. What helps them understand this is the link between their already existent outside efficacy with in-school efficacy. Already, students engage in a variety of out-of-school competencies as a means of engaging the world, a way to make meaning out of their everyday existence and understand how they exist in relation to the outside world (Mahiri, 2004). If students are already using these out-of-school experiences to explore issues of identity, then the bridging of such experiences to the school experience should enable engagement in traditional school competencies and critical thinking (Lenters, 2006). In order to achieve Dewey’s goals, we need to make explicit the connection between efficacy in other fields and efficacy in the classroom.
Very important in the outdoor education setting, based on my experience and that of my peers in the field, is the relationship that develops between the adults in charge and the participants, even when the adult in charge is only a few years older than the participants. The amount of time spent together, the way in which the staff
CIT Program 24 member seeks unconditionally to mentor and care for each participant, and the degree of trust the staff member places in the participant can all serve to change the way an adolescent sees him or herself. Similarly, in the classroom, a great deal of student engagement is predicated upon letting the students see how much teachers care (Noddings, 1992; Santa, 2006). Through a trusting relationship, they first believe in the teacher. A large part of this is a willingness to engage in their out-of- school life and knowledge. If the adult buys into what they have to say, they are a lot more likely to reciprocally believe in what the adult says to them. Just as an outdoor education staff member spends a great deal of time around a campfire or on the trail, listening to the reflections of the youth in their charge, teachers must offer outlets for self-expression. Once adolescents they understand this shared purpose, education as a collaborative rather than passive endeavor, they can trust it. They pursue it. They achieve. This drive, however, must come from within. It is through purpose-driven student work facilitated by competent, dynamic, caring teachers that our educational system will improve. If we transfer some of the lessons of outdoor education to the traditional classroom, we may find new ways to facilitate positive growth in more adolescents, another example of how the clear delineation of the factors which facilitate the growth this study seeks to identify may be applied to broader settings.
F. The Problem with Boys
Across the board, scholars agree that there is a growing achievement gap between male and female adolescents (Bleach, 1998; Byrne & Shavelson, 1987;
Noble & Bradford, 2000; Skelton, 2001; Smith & Wilhelm, 2002). The fact that this is
CIT Program 25 a dynamic trend, a gap that is widening, implies that historical achievement discrepancies wherein males find success more evenly than females will not only be erased, but reversed if the trend is not arrested. Even if this is not the case, capable males are nevertheless slipping through the cracks. That is not to say that work should not run concurrently to address the needs of female adolescents, but that male adolescents are, quite literally, a different animal, and focused research is needed to address their needs. Male students are failing to engage in the curriculum.
A lack of engagement leads to a lack of effort, which then leads to poor achievement, reinforcing negative efficacy beliefs. Male students, whether by genetic disposition, societal conditions, or simply due to poor curriculum planning, are falling behind in achievement; they require a metaphoric and literal voice in their development, which has heretofore been ignored (Noble & Bradford, 2000). In order to help adolescent boys find that voice, we need to foster in them a sense of agency, some feeling of control and ownership over their curriculum, which is linked to directly to their sense of self-efficacy, the feeling that they are actually accomplishing something (Brozo, 2006; Lipstein & Rennger, 2007; Smith & Wilhelm, 2002). When all of this comes together, the aggregate of these characteristics of the undertaking should create what Csikszentmihalyi and Larson (1984) call a flow experience, the total engagement in an activity to the point where nothing else matters, something that can often occur in an outdoor, nontraditional setting. Ideally, this flow experience promotes a sense of self-efficacy which can then be accessed when facing challenges in multiple settings.
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Beneath some of the challenges boys face is that while the rigid structure of school may suppress some of their predispositions, the social setting within and outside of school dictates a sort of normalized masculine behavior (Martino &
Pallotta-Chiarolli, 2003). In order to be accepted, they feel a need to fulfill what they believe to be the public notion of manhood, allowing little room for vulnerability or frivolity. Boys find it difficult to be themselves for fear of being judged or shunned.
One of the particularly fascinating things about this study is that the environment appears to remove a lot of that traditional judgment. The environment studied is not without societal expectations, but they are of a different sort, one that values such traditionally feminine virtues as nurturing others. To a certain extent, this is an important function of studying boys in a culture away from girls. While there are some women who work in the camp, for the most part, the dynamic of the group is one that does not include interaction with girls. Much in the way we traditionally worry about males judging and evaluating females on a very superficial level, the converse is also true in adolescence (Martino & Meyenn, 2001). My experience, from working in both coeducational and boys-only outdoor educations setting, has been that this removes an additional need for approval, and the abdication of the need to appear “cool” in front of girls frees the boys that much more to be themselves and feel emotionally safe.
What’s more, in terms of development, this programmatic rite of passage coincides with a very real developmental transition for adolescents. Already, boys lag behind girls in development of a capacity for empathy in adolescence (Jolliffe &
Farrington, 2006). What’s more, egocentrism abounds in adolescent conceptions of
CIT Program 27 the world around them (Berzonsky, 2000). Because of the programmatic expectations of the caregiver role within this study, both of those adolescent tendencies will be challenged by circumstance, forcing the boys to either adapt and grow beyond societal norms for their age and gender or flounder in the expectations of their role within the camp. This important shift in focus away from the self and towards the well-being of others will prove transformative as this study shifts from the isolated travel program of the first half of the summer to the staff apprenticeship of the second half of the summer.
G. Affluent Youth
The children who participate in the camp’s tuition-based programs are typically children of affluence. The cost of participation in the CIT program is the lowest of the 54-day tuition options ($7,800-$8,375), as the latter half of the summer is spent essentially interning as staff, but the cost is still $4,975 plus airfare. According to
Luthar and Ansary (2005), youth from high income and low-income families have
“more similarities than differences,” meaning that both groups are more likely to engage in risky behaviors (p. 243). Unique to children of privilege is that, though their packed schedules of activities don’t seem to affect their emotional state, the pressure, internal and external, to be perfect and successful can (e.g., achievement pressures); another risk factor for children of affluence is isolation from adults
(Luthar & Latendresse, 2005). A unique aspect of Outdoor Adventure Education is that for every four to eight youths, at least one adult is dedicated full-time to their care, directly addressing the latter factor, while the singularity and intensity of purpose, all time dedicated to one program, addresses the former. Compared to
CIT Program 28 their lower-income counterparts, affluent youth show similar patterns in regards to academic difficulties, substance abuse and delinquency (Luthar & Latendresse,
2005). At the same time, much as children in poverty were largely ignored by researchers until the 1970s, as studies that identify subjects socioeconomic status typically focus on children who are socioeconomically disadvantaged, children of privilege have received little attention as of yet, and further studies to understand their unique needs would address this deficit (Luthar & Latendresse, 2005).
From a skeptical point of view, a program that perpetuates the success of a group already positioned to succeed seems a bit redundant. Nevertheless, the risks, identified above, are very real. What’s more, such a program that fosters personal growth in a way that shifts the focus away from one’s self and more towards other shifts the entire paradigm; to revisit an adage used earlier, “it’s easy to steal home when you’re born on third base”—but that adage doesn’t say anything about putting the success as the team as a whole above your own personal statistics. By improving the way the participants interact with others, the benefit spreads beyond the immediate constituent population to anyone they may help in the future.
H. The Difficulties of Previous Outdoor Adventure Education Studies
Research into the effects of Outdoor Adventure Education (OAE), particularly those studies relying on quantitative measures, have struggled to encapsulate its effects on personal growth, a term used here to describe an increase or improvement in positive psychological traits. Typically, researchers know, in principle, how OAE should work and what it should do, but they struggle to design a quantitative study capable of recording this effect. Adolescents involved in OAE
CIT Program 29 learn that they are capable of self-sustaining. They learn that they are valued individuals on whom others rely, and they are valued for no more than being themselves and sharing the responsibility of perpetuating group well-being. Most of all, as already addressed, they develop a sense of self-efficacy. Previous research has been divided into quantitative studies, qualitative studies, and mixed-methods studies.
1. OAE: Quantitative research
Typically, the quantitative studies chalk their shortcomings up to methodological difficulties. Though they typically sought to link some form of personal growth (self-efficacy, self-concept, etc.) to OAE, they failed to achieve statistically significant results. Here, with one exception, these studies are reviewed and critiqued chronologically.
The first of the significant quantitative OAE studies reviewed is Sibthorp
(2003). The literature review often cites meta-analyses, a research phenomena in this field noted above. Essentially, Sibthorp attempts to test the dominant process model in the field, based on an oft-cited but out-of-print Outward Bound publication, by comparing participants’ antecedent characteristics with the presence of socially desirable psychological growth as a result of participation in
OAE. Looking at two residential Outward Bound programs, Sibthorp begins with a sample size of 301, eventually retaining 191. They are given pre- and post-tests to test for the desired characteristics. He finds some of the desired results, a growth in desirable personal characteristics, but not at statistically significant levels. This study is not successful, according to the researcher, because the sample size is not
CIT Program 30 large enough and consists of a homogenous group—primarily economically privileged Caucasians, although the aim of the study was not to examine this particular group. This concern about sample size persists throughout the quantitative research. Further, the recognition of personal growth via surveys requires an objectivity and self-knowledge beyond the typical adolescent participant in OAE. If the target population were altered to limit itself to this type of
OAE participant, this sample could be useful. The difficulty comes in the design of an instrument which would account for the myopic self-review of adolescents. Perhaps, though, therein lies a message for directors of OAE: the programs themselves should take care to ensure that participants recognize and appreciate their own personal growth.
Sheard and Golby (2006) might be the most often cited study in contemporary OAE research. The study begins by addressing the eight-hundred- pound gorilla of OAE research: a lack of empirical evidence supporting the widely accepted conclusion that OAE develops positive psychological characteristics in its participants. Based on this problem, the study sets out to examine personal growth in six areas as a result of participation in a college OAE program. They begin with a sample of seventy college students, winnowed down to fifty-one by completion. The sample is evenly split between an experimental group and a control. The selected instruments are well-vetted, but, once again, a quantitative study fails to prove its hypothesis. The researchers blame sample size, as well as the inferiority of a non- residential OAE program. In truth, most of the studies on OAE, quantitative, qualitative and mixed, examine residential programs. Residential is the industry
CIT Program 31 standard, the intensity of experience considered by those in the field essential to the stripping away of self-inflicted emotional distance and the requisite forcing of an interpersonal immediacy upon the participants. Residential programs leave participants nowhere to hide, no time away to rebuild barriers to commitment.
Though carefully designed, this study essentially studies wax apples in an effort to draw conclusions about real ones. They may look similar prima facie, but their innards are as different as stale air and juicy pulp.
More recently, Larson (2007) looks for advancement of self-concept in youth who present with behavior problems participating in an OAE. Larsen is somewhat unclear regarding the population he wishes to study. The subjects are 61 adolescents, ages 9-17, male and female, from separate but similar populations. He uses the widely accepted Piers-Harris Children’s Self-Concept Scale in his study, consisting of a pre-test on day one of this residential program and a post-test on day five, utilizing a “quasi-experimental non-equivalent control group” design (p. 321).
The failure to prove the hypothesis here is accredited to the ubiquitous sample size issue, but also, more importantly, the length of the program. The typical residential
OAE runs somewhere between three and seven weeks. Outward Bound (the dominant OAE) is typically five weeks, Wilderness Ventures is seven, and the
National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) programs can last an entire semester. A five-day program, even for troubled youth, undermines the intensity of an OAE just as non-residential design does. Particularly with troubled kids, the ones who, in my experience, demonstrate far greater personal growth than already psychologically healthy participants, the program requires a prolonged penetration period, time for
CIT Program 32 acclimation where the participant loses the need hide behind a mask of stoic world- weariness. Regardless of the validity of research design, if the study examines a sub- par program design, results will be underwhelming.
Interestingly enough, Cross (2002) manages to prove his hypothesis despite a study design that contained many of the same shortcomings as the above studies; he examines a small group for a quantitative study (17, plus 17 in a control group) in a short setting. The program he uses is an intensive five-day rock-climbing adventure for at-risk adolescents. He is careful to set aside unreliable subtests within his instruments while retaining the indicators that meet reliability standards.
He based results, like most similar studies, off brief pre-tests and subtests.
Somehow, his results differ from Larson’s. From my point of view, Cross succeeds because he has a strong understanding of OAE program structure. He gets that the novel environment enables participants to break down barriers. He gets that a nurturing staff makes a difference. He gets that small group size is essential to personal growth. He even participates in the running of the program. He essentially performs a quantitative study while positioned as a qualitative researcher. Cross has not designed a mixed methods study, but it is his perspective as a participant researcher, his qualitative accounting of the environment of the program, which provides insight into why his study succeeds where others failed.
2. OAE: Mixed methods studies
The mixed methods studies on OAE and positive personal growth tends to succeed in all the places where the quantitative studies do not. They seek to establish the same link, but they do so far more conclusively than the quantitative
CIT Program 33 studies. McKenzie (2003), alone, does not name as the sole purpose of her study the establishment of this link. As Sibthorp (2003) attempts in the same year, McKenzie examines the dominant Walsh and Golins model for understanding the Outward
Bound OAE process. She hopes to set aside this personal-growth-driven model in favor of one that values social awareness and sensitivity, as well as environmental awareness. She does not succeed in this attempt. She does not discount her results, she does not blame sample size (n = 92), and she does not cry foul on program administration. As her quantitative data is supported by a wealth of carefully collected qualitative data, she settles for the conclusion that the Western Canada
Outward Bound program was best at fostering personal growth. Though she hoped to find more to be true, her results are sufficient to support the aim of the present study. Further, McKenzie differentiates between the aspects of a program that foster personal growth (course activities, physical environment, instructors, the group, and students’ characteristics) and those that hinder it (failure to achieve success, a lack of physical challenge, the course-end run, working and interacting with the group, instructors’ expectations and personalities, the weather, and a lack of adequate food).
Brannan, Arick, Fullerton and Harris (2000) find similar success in matching
OAE, in this case an inclusive program mixing disabled and non-disabled youth, with positive personal growth. The report on this study, which appears in a journal,
Camping, with both academic and non-academic distribution, is very brief. Given the dearth of information, we can assume that, like Cross, this evidence is supported by a well-designed OAE program. Though the subjects are not described in detail, this
CIT Program 34 study is worthy of attention due to the rarity of its sample size (n = 743, evenly split between disabled and non-disabled youth) used in the quantitative element. The researchers also manage to use 72 discrete subjects in the qualitative portion of the study. The researchers would be well-served to provide a more expansive review or their methodology, data and results.
Fischer and Attah (2001) provide the most thorough literature review of any of the OAE research studies examined. Unfortunately, alone among the mixed researchers, they fail to find the desired results, positive personal growth for OAE participants, in this case Atlanta group home youth. Again, they blame study size (n
= 23) and length of program (five days). Additionally, Cross and McKenzie have established that OAE design and administration are essential independent variables worthy of consideration. Worthwhile here is also Fischer and Attah’s intent. What if these 23 group home youth were to be placed in a four-to-seven week program?
Their target population, they explain, has not yet been studied as OAE participants.
The first step in such a research study is the placement of youth in the correct program. Were this prerequisite fulfilled, what could these participants accomplish?
Martin and Lieberman‘s (2005) mixed methods study sets out to compare quantitative and qualitative data collection as effective means of examining personal growth in OAE. Their premise is that the typical quantitative study sets as its goal the affirmation of the widely accepted link between OAE and personal growth.
Nonetheless, they posit, quantitative measures time and again prove insufficient to measure the nuances of the dependent variables at stake. In their medium-sized study (n = 157), they fail to establish any link between personal growth and OAE
CIT Program 35 with their quantitative data, while their qualitative data provides no shortage of such evidence. Of course, while so logically explaining the bias of most quantitative researchers, they fail to address the same bias in qualitative researchers. In fact, their conclusion is illogical. If researcher bias is a problem, wouldn’t that suggest a need for good quantitative work, free of the taint qualitative researchers may leave on subjective data? This is not a reason for discounting this study, but it is a failing that should be addressed in qualitative studies through a thorough examination of bias.
Daniel’s (2007) mixed methods study differs from the others in this section in that it focuses on OAE with a spiritual element. By spiritual, however, Daniel is really talking about a religious element. Most OAE involves an implicit spiritual element—what is the quest for personal insight if it is not spiritual? Daniel, however, looks at a program that incorporates elements of organized religion, in this case Christianity. Such an inclusion does not conflict with traditional OAE pedagogy, though it does narrow the target population to practicing Christians.
Especially useful in this research design is the inclusion of OAE participants from a thirty-year span. Quantitative results are summarized but not included here, lending the appearance that qualitative data provided the basis of the conclusions, namely that the OAE provided significant, life-altering personal growth. Data from the thirty-year sample (n = 210) is reliant on the returning of questionnaires by mail. As such, those who place less value on the experience may have chosen not to return the questionnaire, as 27.8% so selected. Nonetheless, 72.2% is an impressive response rate, something which supports the conclusions. Daniel encourages
CIT Program 36 broader research, including different types of studies, and some differentiation between short-term and long-term results.
3. OAE: Qualitative studies
Wholly qualitative studies of OAE are more rare than quantitative studies, and only two such studies are worth remarking upon here. Though originating from opposite sides of the globe, both offers rich, thick descriptions. One study focuses on an Outward Bound program for Boston, MA girls; the other focuses on an outdoor education program for New Zealand Catholic school boys.
Porter (1996) examines Connecting with Courage (CWC), an Outward Bound program for twelve and thirteen year-old girls. CWC takes as its founding principle the divergence between the inner self and outer self in adolescent girls. The program seeks to strengthen the resolve of the inner self at the outset of this turbulent time in order to steel these girls against the difficulties of adolescence.
Porter seamlessly blends a review of selected research with rich, thick description of the program. The shortcoming, however, is that most of this research is theoretical rather than field-based, and Porter only cites eight sources. Porter also offers little description of methodology.
Davidson (2001), by contrast, offers the best-executed qualitative study of any of the research I have come across over the course of this project. Davidson’s stated agenda is to establish the supremacy of qualitative research in this field, and her scrupulous description of methodology and data should satisfy the most meticulous of quantitative researchers. She observes and participates in a six-week
OAE program, conducting in-depth interviews and careful journaling. She
CIT Program 37 participates alongside the ten boys in many activities, and she builds the trust requisite to candor. Davidson’s conclusion is that conventional quantitative studies of personal growth are self-limiting. The scope of personal growth and life transformation exceeds quantitative measures. This is a lofty claim, but Davidson offers evidence to back it up. The present study seeks to replicate her success with a more directed focus on outcomes.
Most commonly, the fault in OAE studies lies not in sample size or other methodological shortcoming, but rather in the results-driven focus. These studies fail to step back and examine the antecedent factors requisite to growth. In mathematical terms, rather than consider how one side of an equation leads to the value on the other side, they merely check that second value against an answer in the back of the textbook. Essentially, through a small, ethnographic examination, this study attempts to identify clear antecedent factors to positive psychological growth in the study participants. With those factors clearly identified, future research may construct a larger study that would test the generalizability of these conclusions.
I. The Application of an Ethnographic Approach
In making the case for diverse levels of inquiry into resilience, Luthar and Brown
(2007) make a case for qualitative inquiry to seek out more open-ended exploration, ideally resulting in new hypotheses to be explored on a grander scale. Qualitative studies in general, and ethnography in particular, create some difficulties in research validity. Most notable is that the immersion into the studied culture creates myriad opportunities for subjective bias, particularly considering the total
CIT Program 38 immersion and isolation of the proposed study. When anthropologist Marcel Mauss
(1924) attempts to synthesize customs of various cultures to draw conclusions about the universality of human behavior, he sets an expectation that such activity is truly possible that is predicated on more complete capacity for knowledge and clarity than is really possible. Such a wealth of knowledge and clarity is, according to
Geertz (1973) predicated on an abundance of hubris. That is, the interpretation of observed culture is limited to the evidence gathered by the social scientist. It is not generalizable beyond the specific context(s) being observed, and so any conclusions must be limited to observations of that context. Anthropological observation cannot be predictive, as Mauss might assert, but is rather reflective, a means of providing a record of some segment of humankind’s existence.
Roy Wagner (1975) notes that ethnography is a construction based on the observations of an outsider, and that outside cultural upbringing brings with it alternate foreknowledge which distorts the observation in way that would not occur if it is viewed through the eyes of someone brought up within that culture. This does not invalidate the observation of the outside observer, but rather asserts that the resultant observation is not purely the objective application of a scientific framework, but rather the marriage of the observer’s native cultural preconceptions and the acts that are being observed. In the proposed study, there is a bit of an autoethnography in play. I, the researcher, will have been a product of the observed culture, and as a result subjectively biased in support of it, but I have also has spent time in formal organizational settings and in studying ethnographic methods, psychology, and social work theory, bringing the biases of these studies to bear, as
CIT Program 39 well. I know how the culture views itself and what the academic world in which I’ve become enmeshed would make of this culture. As my own identity and my career in education were first molded in this setting, I bring any number of biases to this study. All of that is said because the journaling of my own biases and predispositions will be essential to the ethnographic validity of the study.
Hammersley (1992) argues that the dominant poles of ethnography, realism and relativism, offer two unacceptable extremes. A pure realism is untenable because it presupposes an absence of all biases and cultural preconceptions.
Conversely, a total abdication of realism in favor of relativism produces an utterly unreliable text. Instead, Hammersley argues for a “subtle realism” (p. 54) which strikes a balance between the two poles, acknowledging the static and mild distortion of recording culture while still setting realism as an ideal. Similarly,
Whitaker (1996) embraces a Wittgensteinian approach. He argues that ethnography should be viewed not as a representation but a form of learning. That is, what is important is not the final product, but the process entailed in creating that product.
He likens it to Wittgenstein’s philosophic investigation; every increasing complex effort at a truth draws one closer to a truth. In mathematical terms, the degree of realism in ethnography is a variable. Rather than settle on x=relativism or x=absolute truth, The appropriate mathematical statement is in the form of limits; as the ethnographer strives to acknowledge biases and gather the most accurate data possible, x should approach realism, and though a pure realism is not possible, the more we strive towards it, ever mindful of our own distortion, the closer we will get to effective, accurate ethnography.
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Much like those who take the Hippocratic oath, the ethnographer must attempt to do no harm. By cataloging every bias, every observation, every phenomenon, by over-journaling, perhaps we can hope to find all of the details, all of the evidence that the previous OAE studies have missed.
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III. Methodology
A. Subject Population
The participants are the six Caucasian adolescent boys between the ages of 15.5 to 16.5 years participating in a counselor-in-training program at a Midwestern summer camp in late June through early August of year in which the study was conducted, the year being redacted here to aid anonymity. The fact that the boys are all Caucasian is not intentional, but rather a product of using a group whose membership is volitional and, in this case, predetermined. This particular camp has relatively few attendees who are members of ethnic minorities, and of those members of ethnic minorities, none in this age group chose to participate in the CIT program. The fact that there are six participants is the product of availability as this is the size of this particular camp’s CIT program this year, but it also provides a manageable number upon which to base case studies while providing some differentiated experiences. This particular camp was chosen for the study because the principal investigator has a long history there; the PI attended the camp as a child and worked there for nine summers, most recently in 2004. The PI has been acquainted with the camp directors for approximately twenty years and is well versed in the culture and operating procedures of the camp. This history, coupled with a career working with a population similar to that from which the participants
CIT Program 42 will be drawn, increased credibility with the participants and the participants’ parents alike.
This particular set of participants serves several purposes. First, adolescent boys are a frequent subject of inquiry due to their underperformance in school as compared to adolescent girls (Bleach, 1998; Byrne & Shavelson, 1987; Noble &
Bradford, 2000; Skelton, 2001; Smith & Wilhelm, 2002). Second, as these were primarily children of privilege, as defined above, this status served to examine an understudied population within which we are only beginning to understand the phenomenon of resilience. The concept of resilience may be adapted here, using
PVEST, to identify any time during which a participant meets a subjective threat to safety and/or well-being with positive adaptation. Finally, the intensity of access and the ethnographic methodology allowed for a more thorough level of analysis than previous studies of outdoor education, often more quantitative in nature and with less direct interaction with participants.
Participants were recruited using two letters sent to the families from the camp offices. The first was from the camp director, briefly introducing the study and offering a brief biography of the PI. This letter also assured the participants and the participants’ parents that neither participation nor non-participation in the study would adversely affect their status at the camp. The second letter, from the PI but channeled through the camp offices, explained the study and methodology and requested informed consent. Upon arrival, all participants reviewed and signed assent forms to reaffirm their rights.
B. Procedure
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Participants participated in the camp’s counselor-in-training (CIT) program. This is a 7.5 week program, though one participant had to leave midway through the summer due to other obligations. The program began when the staff (the CIT
Director and the PI) picked up the participants at a New England airport. The group then traveled the New England region for approximately three weeks, participating in outdoor activities and various staff training sessions. Travel was in a rented fifteen-passenger van, and the group stayed at campgrounds each night, necessitating the set-up and taking down of tents, shopping for, preparing, and cleaning up after meals, and other basic tasks. At the close of the travel section of the program, the group returned to the Midwestern site of the camp via van, where the
CITs spent a couple of days together in their own cabin, helping with various duties around the camp before being assigned to individual cabin groups around the camp for the second 27-day session of the summer. The tuition parents of CITs paid is approximately the equivalent of one session’s tuition; at the session changeover, the
CITs literally began earning their keep as mentored staff members. For liability purposes, they retained the legal status of campers, but for practical purposes, they functioned as staff.
The PI signed a nominal staff contract with the camp for liability purposes and aided the CIT Director as needed with trip administration and operation, but attempted (with varying success) to limit any supervisory capacity over the participants. The challenges of that unique position are chronicled in the study.
Given the immersive nature of the experience, the PI, as expected, developed personal relationships with each participant, and was called upon to offer advice to
CIT Program 44 both the participants and the CIT Director, a staff member in his early twenties who was a camper when the PI was on staff with the camp, but the PI did not deliver evaluations of individual performance to the camp. The camp did not have access to the PI’s observations. When they are made available, they will be coded for anonymity to the extent that is possible, as the differentiation of developmental trajectories requisite to drawing conclusions about the anonymized individual may reveal some identity clues to those who are already intimately familiar with the study site and the participants of the study.
Because of the PI’s work experience and relationship with the camp directors, he served as an informal consultant to the camp throughout the summer, providing occasional administrative support as needed. At no time, however, was this work permitted to overlap with supervision and/or evaluation of individual participants.
The researcher was conducted thusly:
Within forty-eight hours of arriving, the participants completed a self- efficacy questionnaire and subsequently participated in an individual ten-minute interview with the PI to discuss the participant’s background and goals for the summer. Individual interviews were recorded using a digital voice recorder. Audio files were transferred to a laptop computer, password protected and titled using coded names, and then deleted from the recording device. The key to the coded names used throughout the study was kept in a password-protected file. Each electronic file used in the study had a unique password following a pattern known only to the PI. The laptop on which data was stored was backed up to an external
CIT Program 45 hard drive after each addition of data. No one other than the PI was allowed to use the laptop during the course of the study.
Participants were offered the opportunity to keep journals of the challenges they faced over the course of the summer and how they faced these challenges. The participants were given the option of what portion of this journal they chose to share with the PI at the end of the summer or during interview. Participants were not required to journal in this fashion, nor were they held to any kind of schedule for writing in the journal. Only one of the participants elected to keep a thorough journal and turn it in. When turned in to the PI, the PI photocopied the journal, returned the journal to the participant, and then deleted identifying information in the photocopy using a black marker. The photocopy was coded so that the PI would know from whom he had gathered the information.
The PI maintained a field journal chronicling the progress of each of the participants and the PI’s own thoughts and observations. Coded names were used, and this journal remained with the PI at all times.
At the close of each week, the PI conducted a focus group of the participants followed by individual interviews. These weekly interviews and focus groups began on the travel portion of the program and continued throughout the summer, including on-site at the camp. The content of these focus groups and interviews was largely dictated by follow-up questions necessitated by the answers to the basic questions found in the attached interview and focus group scripts. All focus groups were video recorded (for clarity as to who is peaking when), and all interviews and focus groups were audio recorded. Neither the CIT Director nor anyone else
CIT Program 46 employed by the camp had access to the interviews, focus groups, or transcripts or recordings thereof. The content of the interviews and focus groups was to remain confidential to the extent allowable by law; on one occasion, the PI passed along a concern brought up in an interview to the camp director, but this was at the participants’ request.
Interviews (10-15 minutes each) took place at various times throughout the day, based on the availability of the participant. The timing of focus groups (30-45 minutes each) varied during the travel portion of the summer, but, upon return to the camp, took place during the after-lunch “rest period” (approximately 1:30 p.m.), or, on one occasion, during counselor free time prior to dinner.
C. Risks
The risks of participating in this study were minimal, but not nonexistent. The primary risk was the emotional one. The interviews and focus groups required a great deal of self-reflection, and at times may have even provided a setting where a participant shared more about themselves than intended. This was a particular danger in the focus group. Focus group participants were instructed that they were entering a circle of trust, and that what was discussed within the focus group should stay in the focus group. Though several reports made it back that other counselors had asked about what they had discussed, there were no reports of any CITs betraying each others’ confidences in this regard.
To address any other risks to privacy, all study records were locked in a secure location (a locked filing cabinet in the PI’s cabin) and labeled with unique codes. The key that identified pseudonyms and the like was secured in a separate
CIT Program 47 location from the data. Electronic files were password protected, and the computer and hard drives storing such files was also password protected. Only the PI had the passwords. Any data that was shared with others was coded to protect identities. If findings are published, data will similarly be presented in a manner that protects the identities of participants. Any audio recordings, video recordings, transcripts, and other data described have been maintained in accordance with these strictures.
D. Benefits
The introspective processing of the interviews and focus groups allowed participants to better understand their own processes of resilience and self-efficacy, strengthening efficacy beliefs and providing a template for self-affirmation in the future. Though this was the explanation laid out in the planning documents, the extent to which this would become the case unforeseeable. While the interviews and focus groups started out, on the travel program, to be very formal and somewhat stilted. By the third focus group and fourth round of interviews, the participants had become to make use of them as a tool to frame their work and their personal as well as professional conduct. They were actively thinking about how they were responding to challenges, recognizing as their week progressed what challenges they had overcome or failed to overcome and structuring their answers to the recurring questions in their heads in advance of the interviews and focus groups.
They had internalized the values set up by the questions (such as positive adaptation to adversity) and this had a very real, very positive effect on their conduct.
E. Remuneration
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There was no payment for participation in this research study.
F. Costs
There were no costs to the participant for participating in this research study.
G. Alternatives
The alternative for the participant would have been that they take part in the CIT program but did not take part in the proposed study. No CIT participants chose this alternative.
H. Consent process and documentation
Consent documents were mailed to the participating families in advance of the program. These were channeled through the camp’s offices, but included contact information for the PI. Consent documents were signed by both the participants and their parents. Additionally, the participants signed an assent document at the outset of the program to remind them of their rights.
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PROGRAM NARRATIVE
I. Prologue: A Researcher’s Bias
A. The Researcher’s History with the Study Site
I am not an unbiased observer. To pretend otherwise would obfuscate the observations I have made in this study. I first attended the camp which serves as the research site in 1987, the summer of my twelfth birthday. The winter after my third summer, my parents explained that they couldn’t afford to send me back for my
Junior Leader (JL) year, the culmination of the camper experience that included a six-week tour of the Dakotas, Montana, and Calgary. We were not going through especially difficult times; it was merely a matter of financial prudence. Though we were comfortable, we didn’t have the kind of wealth many of these camp families had. I skipped the next year, the Counselor-in-Training year, the program which is the subject of this study, before returning the summer before my senior year of high school, full of myself and expecting fully to be every bit as “cool” as my own counselors had been. I arrived early, in time for the optional set-up week. I was the only junior counselor (JC) there, and I signed up for the lifeguard class offered that week and set about trying to fit in, quite poorly as it turned out. My insecurity at being a kid in this world of adults manifested in sarcasm and outward arrogance.
Eventually, an older counselor, one who had known me very little previously but, as a fellow camper-turned-staff, felt enough kinship to want to help, took me aside.
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“Look,” he said, “I’m telling you this because someone did the same for me when I was a JC. You need to stop trying so hard.” He wasn’t talking about labor. “This is camp. You don’t need to ‘act cool.’ Just be yourself and you’ll do just fine.”
At first, I was good for very little. Having trained as a lifeguard, though, the program director tried me out at teaching swimming. The waterfront director spoke well of me as a swim instructor, and though the village head counselor usually appeared to resent my presence, he passed along this feedback. I felt good about myself as I headed down to the lake each day.
My friendship with my competent, respected, and a few years older co- counselor, Esau, along with my success as a swim instructor, changed both how I viewed myself as a counselor and how others viewed me. I still made some mistakes, but as Esau and I became a counselor team, I picked up good habits. I worked hard, tried to set a good example for the kids, and generally succeeded.
Perhaps the purpose of my cabin placement was not to park me where I couldn’t do any harm, but rather to set me up to learn how to improve. I wasn’t struggling to fit;
I was content.
As soon as I returned home that August, my parents noticed a clear difference in me. Amid a discussion (or argument) that autumn, my dad pointed out that I had grown up a lot that summer. It was perhaps this kernel of data that inspired the present study; some of the participants would have similar conversations with their parents upon their return home. As the school year drew to a close, there was very little question that I would return to camp. Within a week of
CIT Program 51 high school graduation, I was on my way back north, alongside David, a friend from home who had been a cabin-mate when we were kids.
Esau was promoted to head counselor that summer, and I, along with, David, moved up with our campers to the next age group, and the next the following year.
We did well. At nineteen, we had the responsibility, bearing, and track record normally found only in older guys. Unfortunately, though, I fell prey to some of that same need to fit in I had had as a first-year JC. I was always careful of my conduct around my campers, but I was too willing to either suggest or go along with irresponsible behavior when around staff, and I was caught violating camp alcohol policy just before I was to leave on a nine-day Canadian canoe trip. I was sent home with two weeks left in the summer.
I spent that August before returning to school working in an un-air- conditioned furniture warehouse in New Orleans, slowly crawling from self-pity to remorse. I sent a heartfelt letter of apology to the camp director, Curly, who was now more to me than merely the brother-in-law of my dad’s friend, and, as the winter crept on, I learned that it had had some effect. I was forgiven to the extent that, along with David, I would be entrusted to take out the PNW trip the next summer. We discovered soon after our arrival back at camp, though, that we were once again the low men on the totem pole. The more experienced “big trip” staff saw a dividing line; they were training us to do what they did, and our experience counted little to them. A divide grew between us. The next year, with Curly knowing he couldn’t send us out together, those older guys got to take out the JL trip. David and I were assigned as lead counselors in older cabins back in camp, with Stan as
CIT Program 52 our head counselor. Two years later, I would return one last summer to run the camp’s canoe program before heading off to law school.
I headed off to law school that August, but I never settled in there. I enjoyed working at a park nearby, clearing trails, renting out boats, and picking up trash. I quit after three semesters, then worked as a financial advisor for a year and a half before quitting that to apply to creative writing graduate programs and teach. Along the way, I remained close to camp friends. I took a road trip through Mexico with
Esau. I stood as best man in David’s wedding. Others faded in and out of touch, but this particular camp forms a fictive kinship network, and, much in the way you might with a relative, it was customary to look one another up when in the same town, to touch base occasionally even before social networking made this all much easier.
Working with kids again, I finally felt like myself again. I returned to camp the following summer before starting grad school. Curly was still there, of course, but the assistant director was now Dodger, an Englishman who had been a counselor concurrent with me but whom I had never gotten to know very well. He made me a head counselor, and after a little adaptation, I learned to love being on supervisory staff, helping younger staff learn their jobs and participating in the running of the camp. Supervisory staff taught me teamwork and problem solving.
The next summer, after finishing my one-year MA but before moving back to New
Orleans for a fellowship in an MFA program, I worked as Special Programs Director.
Were someone to play a highlight reel of my time at camp, this was where most of the shots would come from. I was better at this job than I had been at any previous
CIT Program 53 position, running the all-camp activities, essentially serving as the master of ceremonies for the summer. Dodger was leaving his year-round post at the end of that summer, and at one point, Curly queried whether I would be willing to forego my fellowship to come work in the camp’s winter offices. I declined, but I was flattered. Dodger and I became close friends that summer, and when I returned to
New Orleans and began teaching at an private school alongside my graduate work, it was on the condition that I get time off to attend the weddings of my younger brother in Virginia and Dodger and his fiancée, whom he had met at camp a few years earlier, in Oregon.
I worked one more summer as Special Programs Director before realizing that the demanding schedule of camp drained me too much before the start of the teaching year. I loved my position at the school, and as I finished my MFA, I settled into my teaching career. A little over a year later, Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, and I became a member of a group of New Orleanians at a Houston private school that had taken on displaced students and staff. We were paid by our home schools, and the students were permitted to attend for free. When we returned to a school that was still being repaired that December, I found myself drawing on my camp skills once again, whether it was being willing to pitch in on manual labor tasks and light maintenance, organizing activities to boost student or faculty morale, or just general problem solving.
That summer, I joined Dodger out in the Pacific Northwest to help him with a month-long non-profit outdoor education program for inner city kids he was running with another former camp staffer. In recruiting me and thinking he had to
CIT Program 54 sell me on the different populace and how foreign this experience typically was to them, he used a line that has stuck with me since: “The kids are great, you know.
There’s no such thing as a bad kid.” What he meant by this, and what he and I both believe, is that kids aren’t fully formed yet; they may do bad things, but there’s still an opportunity for them to learn from their actions, especially when they’re in a closed environment, away from outside influences. It may be a bit naïve, but we both hold this belief about the kids we’ve worked with regardless of the individual’s socioeconomic background (and prejudices typically abound about both ends of the spectrum) or even their disciplinary history. This had been our experience at camp and my experience in schools, especially when working in a public school with kids who drifted back and forth from alternative disciplinary schools. I had always found that once a relationship had been built with a child, I could find ways to build on their assets to make up for their challenges. That relationship did not always come easily, but, with relatively few exceptions, it did develop.
I fell in love with this program. After a tumultuous year where I felt like I controlled nothing, this program controlled everything. That is, the kids interacted only with other kids in the program and only participated in the activities we scheduled or they created on the spot. At all times, for almost a month, everything was part of the program. Unlike the kids I worked with in school, we knew what they were doing in their downtime and we were able to keep it directed in a positive
(if at times chaotic) manner. Formal group discussions, photography assignments, meal prep, sitting and talking on the beach or along the trail, even a game of basketball when passing through a town, everything contributed to the experience.
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The kids, ages fifteen to seventeen, had total buy-in and grew tremendously over the course of the summer. They were diligent and self-confident and learned that they were capable of more than they had imagined. This program was the basis of an independent study I did for graduate education credit, and that led to the pursuit of my doctoral studies.
The next summer, Dodger started working with our old camp again, and I began increasing my responsibility for the program out west. At the same time, those camp skills applied to the school environment had earned me an administrative post at my school. Dodger was called back to camp full-time to relieve an ailing Curly, and when Curly passed away, Dodger and Curly’s daughter took over the running of the camp. For the next four years, my winters were spent as a dean and my summers running the non-profit outdoor education program.
Eventually, the donors behind this program either lost interest or suffered from the lagging economy. This coincided with the need for me to take time to perform my doctoral research. My initial research into the benefits of summer programs unearthed both a wealth of positive psychological and social benefits for participants as well as a dearth of successful research into such programs. I saw a niche for participatory ethnographic research in this field, but I needed to find a target population. I was discussing this need with Dodger on the phone one day when we arrived at the first rough plan for the present study, to select a group within the camp, the CITs in particular, and, by enmeshing myself in the program amidst interviews and focus groups, carefully examine the processes through which the participants pass, the influences that affect their behavior, and the precise
CIT Program 56 outcomes of the program. As this brief (and mildly self-indulgent) autobiographical recounting shows, my time at camp shaped my career and who I am as a person.
While I recorded my observations with as much objectivity as possible, my interpretations must be understood as being viewed through the eyes of someone inextricably tied to this institution. The same thing that gives me such intense and immediate access lends a significant potential bias to this study, one that will be mitigated with thorough chronicling of my internal thought processes as well as the testimony of the study participants.
B. June 15: Getting to Know My Co-leader
As the tin snips snapped through the chicken wire, pulverized rust made its way around the edges of my sunglasses and into my eyes. I blinked, trying to generate the requisite tears to flush it away. It was getting dark, but I kept the sunglasses on in lieu of safety goggles to at least abate the rate at which I was blinding myself.
“That doesn’t work,” Furry said from where he was perched atop the other ladder. Furry is a pseudonym of a nickname; camp tradition dictates that staff use nicknames instead of their first names. We were removing the old, ripped, rusted chicken wire from a backstop on the camp’s upper ball field. These particular backstops, about fifteen feet high, were framed out by wooden posts, with black stained boards about 30” high paneling the lower portion and old, rusted sheets of chicken wire stretched between the posts covering the rest. I had spent a good portion of the week replacing broken boards on the lower portion of this and other backstops in the camp, measuring out and attempting to drag the infield, and doing
CIT Program 57 other minor repairs. My idea that day had been that if I took down the chicken wire, that would eliminate the hemming and hawing over how replace it. The start of camp was looming, and it would have to be replaced expeditiously, using whatever method was most practical.
Furry continued. “You can’t just declare you have no power or authority.”
“But I don’t,” I said. “Even on this trip. You’re in charge. I’ll help out however, but my primary goal is to observe, to see how the kids grow.”
“That’s all fine and good, but in camp, whether you want it or not, you have authority and power,” Furry said.
“I don’t, though,” I replied. “I’m not on supervisory anymore. I’m not in charge of anybody.” I climbed down and moved my ladder over, then climbed back up.
“It doesn’t matter. You decide you want to do this study, right? And Dodger gives you that sweet cabin in the staff village. You walk around camp during work week and choose what projects you want to take on. You have the run of Will’s shed, using whatever tools you want, and you come and go in the kitchen as you please. If you were just someone off the street wanting to do a study, none of that would happen.” Furry took off his work gloves and wiped his brow.
I smiled. “Whatevs. I can’t help it if people like me and want to do nice things for me.” I snipped again and let a section of chicken wire fall to the ground beneath me.
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“No, hell, I’m not judging you for it. I think it’s awesome. I’d love to get that kind of treatment. I’m just saying you can’t pretend you don’t have any power or authority here.”
I climbed down the ladder again. “I’ll sure as hell try for as long as I can.”
The ethnographic challenge was clear. I was going to have to get these kids to open up and act naturally around me without the excessive deference that might normally be afforded someone with my camp experience. One distinct advantage would be that we would open with the traveling portion of the program. We would meet the kids out east, so some time would pass before they saw me around Dodger,
Will, the cooks, and the supervisory staff, let alone all of the counselors who remembered me from when they were campers. Seeing my interactions with them had the potential to inhibit the openness requisite to the study. I would have to establish our relationship and the way we communicated before we returned to camp.
It was no accident that Furry was the person helping me with the chicken wire that day. I was purposefully avoiding the pre-camp training sessions to prevent being drawn in to a leadership role. Though I had known Dodger and his assistant director, Streisand, a long time, and I had helped them with some things behind the scenes, it was important to me that the staff not see me as an authority figure, regardless of the relative dearth of thirty-something staff. I spent those days either prepping the study or performing various maintenance tasks around camp. If a training session wasn’t absolutely mandatory, I found something else that needed doing. One training session from which I had to depart early for a CPR
CIT Program 59 recertification, though, was the one I found interesting, at least based on what I heard and the materials distributed. It was for the staff taking out the extended trips, and it was centered on the principle that the purpose of these trips, above all else, was the personal growth of the participants. Far from the jock-like attitude experienced during my younger days at the camp, where many extended trip leaders were far more interested in the adventure itself than the kids in their charge, the camp wanted to make clear that decisions were to be made on what the kids get out of the experience, not what would be cool to brag about accomplishing.
In other words, what the kids learned from what they had done on trip was more important than what it is they had done. This session is an essential part of understanding the culture of camp and the expectations of staff conduct. In a world where outdoor educators are too often focused more on their own love of the outdoors than their duty to educate, this philosophy was comforting to discover.
On that particular evening, I had persuaded Dodger to let me pull Furry from the training session to work with me on the baseball backstop. A veteran staff member at twenty-two, Furry had been an older camper during my last run on supervisory staff, and though we certainly knew of each other, we didn’t know each other well. Streisand had warned me that Furry was a little nervous about working with me, even a little intimidated, so I thought it would be a good idea for us to work on a shared task together for a while. As the lead staff member on this trip, he would be providing the most direct example of the mentorship of older staff, so it was important that he feel natural around me. Plus, he was way more comfortable shinnying up a backstop post to get to some hard to reach spots than I would be.
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As is often the case at camp, a challenging, tedious task becomes enjoyable when you have someone with whom to work on it. What I hadn’t realized during my first summer of work week was how helpful these shared challenges were in getting to know people. Collaborative labor was exponentially more effective for this than drinking a beer together down the road. It’s why, as a camp staff member, I and others had always found the backcountry experiences are always so important to building bonds between kids—by undertaking a collective, arduous task, you come to rely on each other, you’re forced to cooperate, and you get to know each other better. This is true whether canoeing across a windy lake, scrambling up a mountain, or standing in a three feet of water, pounding dock posts into the lake on a cold, overcast day. In the case of kids, in particular, it contributes to group identity and the group dynamic of, in this particular study, the CIT cohort, a shared in- group history of adversity that becomes a source of pride, a positive connotation to group membership.
Eventually, we backed up the old grey pick-up and loaded the chicken wire to take to the dumpster. There was enough fine grit in my eyes to take days to clear, and the bleeding scratches around the portions of our forearms not covered by work gloves reinforced the importance of getting the required tetanus booster before coming to camp. We climbed into the truck.
“So, basically, we took all of this down tonight because you wanted to give them no choice about replacing it after we get on the road tomorrow afternoon?”
“Yep.” I started the engine.
“You’re a dick.”
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We both laughed.
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II. To Maine, June 16-22
A. June 19
On June 19th, in the Concord, New Hampshire airport, they emerged from the
Jetway in a pack. Six awkward, unruly boys in their mid-teens, facial hair thin but mostly growing unchecked, clothes a mix of suburban trends and high-end outdoor gear. They were clearly enjoying each others’ company, as they had, no doubt, since the hub airport upon which they had converged and from which they had flown to
Concord together. The exuberance that carried them from the plane to embraces with Furry, their counselor from previous summers, left me feeling a little bit left out. Though Furry and I had gotten to know each other well, spending most of the previous week together, I was suddenly odd man out, at least where the kids were concerned. They all knew I would be on the trip and that I would be performing a study—they had heard as much from Dodger even before the consent letters arrived—so a formal introduction was unnecessary.
One especially confident boy turned and hugged me after hugging Furry. You didn’t have to be especially close to people to hug them when you saw them again at the start of a camp summer—it was a customary greeting. Nevertheless, I was a bit surprised. This would turn out to be Quint—his dad had been a camp doctor, and he spent a couple of weeks at camp each summer while I had been on supervisory.
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Though I had remembered neither him nor his father well, the names were familiar, as was my name to them.
A tall boy in glasses sheepishly offered “I bet you don’t remember me.” I thought back to a phone conversation with one of the mothers the previous week. I had been working on the backstop by myself, attaching newly stained planks to the bottom section, when she returned the call I had placed to ensure they understood the consent forms. “Max remembers you well from his first summer,” she had said. “I know the staff stick out a little more to the kids than they may to you.”
“I remember the name,” I conceded, an answer grown from the number of team rosters and the like I had gone through during the summer of 2004, “but I have to admit I can’t connect to a face. I’m sure it will come back to me when I see him again.” We went on to talk about how Max had just returned from an out-of-town academic program and how he would be leaving early this summer for another academic obligation.
The six-foot man-child who stood before me, child-like features stretched out on an adult-sized frame, bore no resemblance to any specific memory, but the way he asked the question gave away the answer. “Max, right?”
“Wow. I’m impressed.”
“I think you knew my brother,” one boy who looked younger than the rest said.
“You’re Jason, right?” I asked. “I remember you guys a little.” Again, I remembered the names and two especially young campers, near identical, running around the youngest village, though the second part may have come more from
CIT Program 64 prompting by Dodger than actual recollection. Each of the remaining boys, the quiet, curly-haired Josh, skate-shoe-wearing Graham, and smiling, heavy-set Evan, introduced themselves and shook my hand.
With the non-profit program out west, I had spent the last five summers on airport pick-up in entertainer mode, chattering non-stop to nervous kids, many of whom had just flown for the first time and were about to sleep in tents for the first time. We did not take on returning kids, wanting to reach as many as possible, and most were nervous in the face of this wholly new experience. Now, on this trip, every one of these kids had spent at least four previous summers in camp. They were eminently at ease, full of almost antic energy. I decided to give Furry a chance to catch up with them in baggage claim while I went to pull the van around.
We were at least two songs in before someone noticed the Katy Perry album playing on my iPhone, wired through the van’s stereo. I had downloaded it the previous night, when Furry and I had been stuck on a train after an afternoon off in
Boston. We were travelling back to the hotel where we had left the van and were surrounded by pre-teen and teen girls leaving the Katy Perry concert in TD Garden.
“Wait a second. “Firework?” Really?” Graham asked.
Evan, Quint, and then the others started singing along, smiling and laughing as they did.
Furry looked at me from the shotgun seat, smirking. “I hate you so much right now,” he said quietly.
The enthusiasm to which they took to singing along to the notably feminine pop star is not insignificant. Katy Perry is popular, but she is not cool or masculine.
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Enthusiasm in singing along carried with it a thin veneer of irony, the joke being that the sight of a bunch of teenage boys headed into the woods would appear ridiculous to anyone watching. It was also, though, an abdication of the aloofness so commonly found among teenage boys. In many other contexts, this kind of behavior would be ripe for mockery. Though they had been reunited for less than a day, however, these boys felt perfectly safe acting in such a silly manner in front of one another—in fact, the group dynamic of the CIT cohort in this context pushed them towards such silliness. The expectation had become not one of macho aloofness, but of a goofiness un-self-consciousness, lampooning oneself for fun.
That night, with the group sitting around the campfire at a state park, I pulled a large, waterproof, locking orange case (called a Pelican, for the company that manufactures it) from the van. The Pelican had belonged to the non-profit, and
Dodger had been kind enough to bring it to camp from the store of old gear in
Portland. I unlocked the small padlock and brought out the study materials. I showed them the digital audio recorder and set it to start recording the session.
After handing each of them two copies of the assent form, I explained the purpose of the study. Though they had already, along with their parents, signed consent forms, the assent forms served to remind them of the purpose of the study, and, more importantly, their rights, and it required only their signatures, not their parents’. I explained the basic research question of how a residential summer camp counselor-in-training program may foster displays of resilience and self-efficacy in adolescent boys. I defined resilience and self-efficacy for them in lay terms, and explained that, essentially, I was looking to see how they responded to adversity. We
CIT Program 66 went through the assent form carefully, and then I handed out notebooks they could use as journals. I explained that journaling would be optional, though appreciated, and turning in all or any portion of their journal would be completely optional. I told them that anything they told me as part of the study would be kept confidential, even from Furry and Dodger, unless it represented a safety threat. I would be journaling each day myself to record how the trip progressed and how they were growing. I also made sure to stress that they were free to withdraw from the study at any time and explained the venues through which they could express concerns.
They were all very good-natured and playful about it, and signed the assent forms cheerfully. Once I had collected everything and put it away, we transitioned into talking about the trip and about what life would be like upon their return to camp. They were thoughtful, both nervous and excited about this transition year where they would begin to assume the mantle of staff and take on the expectations of the caregiver role.
B. June 20
Essential to understanding the significance of actions and words in relation to outcomes is understanding the unique identities and developmental trajectories of the individuals, as well as seeking to discern the individual’s self- concept. Though they have much in common, each brings a unique background and personality to the program, and understanding these identities and starting points is essential to understanding study outcomes. My notes upon first impression of the boys, recorded the next morning before anyone awoke, are below:
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Quint—Confident, a leader in the group. Not surprising given his gregarious, friendly, and supportive parents. His dad is a camp doctor, and they have already proposed us all spending time together at Jazz Fest next year. He can be a bit vulgar and picks on the other kids a little bit, but more out of age- appropriate insensitivity, going for the laugh, than any kind of mean- spiritedness.
Jason—Smaller, physically, than the other boys, and he knows it. They occasionally pick on him for this, and I’ve seen Evan in particular start to pick on him for this and then back off. I was impressed when Jason brought up, during the end-of-night-discussion with Furry, that he’s a little anxious in regards to knowing how to be a CIT when we get back to camp—knowing what to do as a counselor. This shows that he’s thinking about the role and wants to do a good job. We talked to him about some of the basic roles of a leader, about taking initiative, and about imitating the good examples and learning to identify the bad ones.
Josh—Quiet so far. He didn’t go on the JL trip with the others, so he’s the only kid Furry doesn’t know. I don’t have any impression of him yet.
Max—Nerdy awesomeness. He’s classically awkward. Based on his vocabulary and the things he’s said about school, I’m guessing he’s pretty smart. He’s clever, too, in way that the other kids don’t always get. He’s trying to fit in, but, God bless him, he’s awkward. They pick on him some, but in a
“he’s OUR nerd” kind of way—he bugs the other kids with his otherness, and they won’t let that slide, but he’s still clearly part of the group. He’s missing
CIT Program 68 second session for an academic program, so I have to figure out how that affects the study. He’s made a joke of “feeling adversity” in a very Ratso Rizzo way (“I’m walking here, I’m walking here!”) after the intro session (Hellman
& Schlesinger, 1969). Pretty much he and I are the only ones who find this funny.
Graham—has been mostly quiet. He appears physically older than the other boys, but he doesn’t dominate the group. I think this is only his second year with a lot of them, and he seems to align himself with Josh. Again, not much to remark upon yet.
Evan—Probably the most material so far. Divorced parents, overweight, gregarious personality. He talks a lot, often the center of attention in the group. He projects the sort of confidence that comes from being physically different and having to make the choice to either control the room or be swallowed by it—he can get picked on, or he can beat others to the punch, then cast about his own shots. Again, this isn’t mean-spirited on his part, and he is as quick with compliments as he is with mockery. He has had physical challenges in these wilderness programs, he acknowledges, but the fact that he’s still with it says something. The kids pick on him some, really for his bombastic personality more than his size (though a little for his size, too, though they clearly see this as dangerous, unfair ground, as when Jason made that clearly fell flat), but they pick on him in the course of his being one of the group. He certainly has their attention, and though they pick on him, he gives more than he gets, and he is clearly one of the leaders of the group. He’s
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pretty sharp, too. When collecting a few left behind assent forms, he made a
joke about being sure to read it so that he knows his rights—meaning he gets
the purpose of the document, a subtle thing that shows he’s paying attention.
Looking back after the completion of the study, my initial observations were not entirely accurate. I would come to discover that while Evan was perhaps covering some nervousness with over-exuberance, Graham and Josh would become much more engaging once they became comfortable with the group dynamic. In examining these notes, though, I can see that the initial affection I felt for this affable group is similar to how I would feel about them at its conclusion or when I go back through their interview and focus group transcripts. I will do my best to portray each of the participants as I discovered them. That is, I will attempt to accurately depict my impressions at a given time, rather than let my final assessments and the totality of the experience color the observations.
The role of a participant-observer is a difficult one. Though I may be past the point in my career where I would take this sort of position, this is still my field, and my experience in both outdoor and traditional education has been that finding a way to connect and build a relationship with kids is the surest path to helping them grow. I care about any group of kids with whom I work, and this would be no exception. In this sense, my interest in the outcome of the study, I realized, is not merely academic; I (along with Furry) had been entrusted with these kids for the summer, and I wanted to see them grow as people and be successful as apprentice staff. I cared about what they got out of this program, and I cared about what they contributed to the camp. In this sense, my actions make me, to a certain extent, a
CIT Program 70 study participant, as well. Brad “Bruno” Philipson, long-time camp staffer with experience in varied educational platforms, was a variable that would affect the outcome of this study. I would be part of the mentorship of older staff, as well as, to a lesser extent, the formal training as a counselor. I resolved, at the time, to not take the trip over from Furry; this was his show. Making sure it was clear that Furry was in charge was to help them view me as just another trip leader instead of a friend of the current camp director who had himself played a big role in running camp when they were younger. I didn’t want to negate a role as an authority figure to the extent that I wasn’t providing Furry with whatever support he needed from a co-leader, but I wanted to make sure they were telling me how they felt without fear of consequences in order to gather data for the study. To what degree I succeeded in downplaying my authority is another matter.
Our first full day together had focused primarily on driving. We broke camp before driving into Maine, working our way up the coast. We listened, once again, to the four catchiest songs on the Katy Perry album Teenage Dream: the title track,
“Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.),” “California Girls,” and “Firework.” We found we had to cut the album off before the thinly veiled double entendre of “Peacock” made us all uncomfortable. It became a ritual, however, that all four of these songs would get played once per day in the van.
We stopped for lunch at a park on the coast, with an abandoned fort on a cliff just above, and the ruins of a manor home (later part of the fort) behind the cliff, and an open field between the ruins and the road. After we ate, the boys set off in two groups to explore; Graham, Josh, and Max in one, Quint, Jason and Evan in the other.
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This latter group appeared to have in common their closeness to Furry. They were the three who kept in touch with him during the winter. Quint and Evan had been with Furry on the 21-day Canadian canoe trip two summers previous. We all eventually met up atop the fort, looking out from what used to be gun turrets at the waves crashing on the rocks below. From there, we moved below to the ruins below and the field. Quint had brought along the Nerf football from the van.
Quint was throwing the ball back and forth with whomever would join in, then he suggested a game of “500.” This game is roughly the equivalent of what I had always called “Three-flies-in,” only with five catches to win instead of three. One person lofts the ball from a distance to where the group is standing. Everyone leaps for it, and the person who catches it gets a hundred points. When someone amasses five hundred points, they get to become the person throwing the ball. The game was fairly even across the board, and everyone participated. It was a good distraction before getting back in the van, and it gives an occasion to discuss Quint a little further in depth.
Closer look at self-concept and developmental trajectory: Quint
Quint expects adults to like him. He is a rule follower, and he makes frequent attempts to be a vocal leader. Having spent at least a portion of every summer at camp since he was a toddler, many of the veteran staff still see him as the cute little doctor’s kid. What’s more, prior to this summer, he apparently looked young for his age; only a recent growth spurt has carried him forward into those slightly gawky mid-teen years. Though his outward appearance is neither athletic nor un-athletic, he is clearly among the most physically able in games calling for coordination or
CIT Program 72 hikes requiring stamina, sustained effort, and endurance. His “hard skills” are very strong. He is eminently capable at working with stoves and campfires, with the tents, and with cooking.
Quint expressed to me in interviews a clear vision for developing his leadership abilities. Although he is clearly a natural leader, he perhaps over- intellectualizes this a bit, talking about it, thinking about it, and often telling others what to do with the best of intentions but with a poor sense of timing. Perhaps because of his camping and athletic skills, he feels he is in a position where he should bring others up to his level. At times this is very helpful, though at others it serves to create some distance between him and other kids.
Returning to this first full day, after we piled back in the van and continued up the coast, we were just turning inland when we came across a giant hunting boot on the side of the road—the famous L.L. Bean company store, one of the top tourist destinations in Maine. Furry and I needed to pick up a couple of items of group gear we had discovered we needed during the first few days of the trip, and this was a chance for the kids to spend some their parents’ money burning holes in their pockets. These boys were not trying to make a purposeful show of affluence. My experience with my other program was that working class kids were eager to spend their parents money, too. The difference is where the money was being spent.
Whereas the kids in the other program tended to spend on junk food and presents for people at home, these kids tended to spend on junk food, technical clothing, and camping gear. Having the best gear is a persistently recurring marker of “coolness” in this setting, one that often but does not always correlate with wealth—
CIT Program 73 oftentimes, it is the staff who migrate from one outdoor program to the next in winter have the gear that all of the kids will attempt to replicate the next summer.
The words “pro deal,” referring to a contractual discount given by an outdoor gear company to either individuals or organizations in outdoor education is a marker of status among the staff. For many of the kids, though, their affluence allows them to adopt these outer markers of status without the experience many of the staff had undergone to gain these same markers. Having the right gear becomes very much a marker of self-concept and status where wealth can be substituted for experience.
Getting back to the shopping trip, one of the things I discovered during my years with the nonprofit sector is that there is not a direct correlation between parental wealth and the amount of money given a child to spend on a trip. I have seen impoverished families who set aside money every week to make sure their child had enough to spend, kids from modest homes stepping off planes with rolls of bills. I have also seen wealthy kids with frugal parents who had trouble imagining what their child could need much money for when their basic needs for sustenance and shelter were already provided.
Closer look at self-concept and developmental trajectory: Max
This affords the opportunity to speak a little more of Max. Max is tall and bespectacled, and he walks around with his head hung just a little as if apologizing for being taller than his peers. He uses many big words when he speaks, usually correctly, and though he is not thin (the term “overweight” would evoke greater thickness than is actually the case) and his gait suggests the demeanor of a bookish
CIT Program 74 dodge-ball target, he is a “hoss” (in camp terms) when it comes to our physical challenges. He is perhaps the group’s strongest paddler, and he scurries up mountains with boundless energy. He makes jokes about his own lack of coordination, but the appearance as what my grandfather would call a “nebbish” is a matter of temperament more than ability. I’m just not sure Max knows this.
Max lives in an upscale suburb of a Midwestern city, though he says this is only the case because his parents wanted him to attend that suburb’s prestigious public high school. He insists that his family is out of place there, and he points out that his father drives an inexpensive make of car. His pleas of (very) relative poverty overlook the fact that his parents were able to afford both this prestigious suburb and to send him and his sibling to camp, as well as to send him to a residential academic program for the second portion of the summer. Outward indicators are that his parents earn a very respectable living, but also that they prioritize where they spend their money—on providing the best start in life for their kids instead of on the trappings of status. His perceptions of wealth are tainted by the excess too often shown by his peers, both at camp and at home. Having come from a similarly situated family, I, of course, feel a certain kinship to Max.
Max has inherited some of this. His parents gave him prepaid Visa gift cards instead of a debit or credit card like most of the others carry. At L.L. Bean, we learned that he is very cautious about how he wants to spend his money. It would be nearly the end of the trip before I discovered that the appearance of not having enough walking-around money is mostly the product of his own frugal nature. He
CIT Program 75 had enough money to enjoy almost everything his peers spend money on—he was just more cautious with it.
Max is brilliant. He was set to take mostly senior-level AP classes as a high school junior, and he could speak at length about any number of issues. He’s defensive, though, as well, and when we had to correct him on something, his first reaction was typically to explain why he wasn’t wrong or why it wasn’t a big deal. A stern follow-up look would get him back on track, but this defensive nature, grown, clearly, from a long history of appearing as an “other,” was a major hurdle for him.
In his initial interview, he intellectualized about friendship in a way that I still can’t quite decipher:
What would you say is your biggest challenge in everyday life?
The fact that I am technically anti-social. My parents wanted to send me to
anti-social therapy or self-esteem therapy when I was in sixth grade because
I was just admitting to myself constantly that I had low self-esteem, and then
I developed a massive ego which centered on doing well in school and
mentally overcoming people and other challenges, and that…
And that’s balanced out now, right?
More or less, hopefully. I’m sure if I took this, like, establishment of social
cognizance and capabilities, I would rank very, very low, like, if I had to
answer truly, but, still, I find it interesting.
Now, how is that the same or different at camp?
Camp is much more open. Like, in regular society, I stick to the formality, like,
introduce myself, try to make small talk, interesting conversation, slowly
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develop friendship. At camp, it’s, first impressions mean everything, and
beyond that, it becomes, well, did that work out, can I say “hi” to them again.
Camp is much more hit or miss, and I like it better than that because it
improves the odds, I think.
Because there are so many social interactions? So, whereas at home you have
to make that …
You have to slowly build stuff up. At camp, it’s brief, so everything either
works very, very well, very, very quickly, or it works bad, and then it can
improve very quickly, as well.
My best guess is that he’s referring to the intensity of camp relationships, the fact the volume of interaction with peers is so high. Regardless, whatever awkwardness to which Max professes outside of camp, he is clearly one of the group here. He is not any one person’s best friend, but he gets along well with everyone except Evan, and usually even that relationship is at a very manageable level of mild reciprocal hostility.
C. June 21
We made it to Bar Harbor in time for lunch in a park, taking a quick look around before heading into Acadia National Park and driving to the top of Cadillac
Mountain. The small peak offered great views of all of Mt. Desert Island, as well as the ocean in the distance. As vegetation was minimal, it was easy enough hopping from rock to rock, exploring, talking, and generally enjoying the sun and breeze. I was with Graham, Josh, and Max. I had caught up with them where they had gotten a little farther out on the rocks. After a few minutes, Evan caught up to us.
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“Bruno,” he said, “Furry told me to find you and tell you I’m in trouble.”
“What happened?” I asked.
“I was trying to spit and the wind blew it back and it hit him.”
Clearly, Evan was not familiar with the Jim Croce song “You Don’t Mess
Around with Jim,” which specifically implores listeners not to “spit into the wind”
(2006). I would later play this song in the van to little acclaim.
Closer look at self-concept and developmental trajectory: Evan
Evan had been the kind of camper that separated out those who should be working with kids and those who shouldn’t. He had had significant difficulties with
Furry’s co-counselors the last two summers. While he and Furry got along well, for each of the last two years, Evan had fallen into conflict with a staff member. The previous year, especially, was trying for Evan. The guy would verbally abuse Evan, then claim he was just kidding. This staff member was not invited to return to camp.
Granted, Evan did plenty of things that could challenge the patience of a staff member. He didn’t always get along well with his peers, he could come across as spoiled, he could get pouty, and he had not been exposed to as much of the adult world as the other boys. At the same time, he was gregarious and outgoing and appeared to genuinely enjoy the friendship offered by his peers. He was fun to be around. The reason he could serve as a good litmus test for potential staffers is the way in which his immaturity needed to be treated as a matter of choices, not a damning character flaw. The Evan inside those choices is a worthwhile person who can rise above these behaviors. According to Social Learning Theory (Bandura,
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1977b), it is the learned other who helps the child move past these choices and towards efficacy beliefs.
Essentially, Evan, like most kids, could smell whether an adult liked him or not, and his subsequent actions were heavily influenced by that. He kept his emotions out in the open, good and bad, offering little in the way of defenses. Tears started to well in his eyes less than a minute into our first interview as he discussed how difficult his parents’ divorce has been on him.
Being overweight, he has had some physical struggles with hiking and other camp activities, but he concedes this is as much a mental challenge as a physical one, and Furry has traditionally talked him through the tough times. He also professes to some social challenges at camp, feeling, at times, like he’s not part of the in-group or not the counselor favorite, though there was no evidence of this being the case on this trip. If anything, the exact opposite appeared to be true.
For the most part, though, Evan claims, half-playfully, “everybody picks on me,” they most commonly only do so when he’s joking around and making himself the center of attention, and do so in a good-natured way. The only person who really picks on his size in Jason, and this is somewhat symbiotic; Evan picks on Jason for being small, and Jason picks on Evan for being big. At the same time, for all the bickering, when one of these two needs help with a task, the other one is the first to respond.
D. June 22
The next day in Bar Harbor, after checking in with the kayak outfitter taking out our three-day trip, we took a short hike on an island reachable by sand bar, then
CIT Program 79 came back and set the boys loose. We set up the guidelines for “town time”—stay in groups, check-ins, etc.—and set them loose on the tourist town.
Furry and I bought lobster rolls at a shop where the young guy behind the counter was overly friendly—several clues implied he was trying to cultivate us as potential cannabis customers. When we emerged, we saw the boys walking down the street—all in one group. Having given town time to a number of groups of kids in a number of situations, I assure you that it is very rare that they don’t separate out into pairs or cliques. This show of solidarity was impressive, and it would be echoed at later points in the trip. Very quickly into this travel program, isolated from the rest of their age set who had chosen not to participate in CIT, they had formed a cohesive unit. Their sense of belonging to this group drew them together, and then the shared experiences encountered while spending this time together further reinforced this group identity.
We all returned to the park to relax before heading to the campground, and it was here that we settled into a game of “Pelt.” The way it works is that after the sack has been touched three times by at least two people, someone in the circle can catch it and throw it at anyone else in the circle. You get a letter for each time you’re hit.
When the letters spell “pelt,” you’re out. It’s mostly a way the kids fill the time, but it, along with the other games they played on the trip, is illustrative the group dynamic of the CIT cohort and their tendency to construct activities together when no formal task is required of them. Much in the way staff would have coordinated some activity for them when they were younger, they now do it for themselves, on their own initiative, in a way that is inclusive of the entire group.
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I demurred to lie on the grass and read, and, after the first game, Furry joined me. We eyed the group carefully as a couple of older teens dressed like skateboarders asked to join them. They allowed, and soon the boys had a few new
“friends.”
“Why is everyone in this town trying to sell weed?” Furry joked. As the kids each got knocked out of the game, they joined us at our observation point.
“Man, those guys could not stop cursing,” Jason said as he sat down. “And I can’t believe they were smoking. That’s so gross. Those guys were sketch.”
Considering that we were struggling to curb the foul language among the
CITs just a day earlier, it was impressive that Jason had already internalized this value. Then again, Jason was in many ways “teachable.”
Closer look at self-concept and developmental trajectory: Jason
Jason is part of a large camp family. His older brother and he had attended camp together for eight summers already, since they were very young. His younger brother was now in the oldest age group to not take an extended trip. I was warned to be a little cautious when approaching the study with his parents, though the warning proved unnecessary. His parents struck me as similar to many of the parents with whom I regularly interact as an private school administrator— protective of their child and quick to speak up if they think something is wrong, but also very supportive of the institution and a zealous advocate of it to others. They had a few brief questions about the study but were excited about the trip and appreciative of what camp had done for their sons. Of course, I had the advantage of
CIT Program 81 being someone with a long reputation at camp and the endorsement of the camp director, whom they liked and respected a great deal.
Because Jason started camp a little young, he moved up with the group a year ahead of him. When this is combined with slightly delayed physical maturation, the end result is that he looks at least two years younger than the other boys. He is accustomed to being a staff pet, so to speak, and keeps in touch with a lot of camp adults during the year. Like Evan but for the exact opposite reason, his size had proven problematic during some of the more physical challenges of hiking and paddling, but he had pushed through, completing the challenging hiking rigors of the
Pacific Northwest (PNW) trip one year and the JL trip the next. This all started when, during the “progressions” year in which they complete a series of three to nine day trips to qualify for the extended trips, Jason suffered intestinal illness on his first major hiking trip:
We only did like one major hiking trip and I was sick the whole time. But,
like, I just kept on hiking. When we would go up a hill, I would be just a little
behind, but I still caught up. I wouldn’t just stop and refuse to go up.
And then you went on PNW.
My PNW, it was still just as challenging, but I knew how to deal with it, and I
didn’t cry, and I didn’t complain about it, I just fought through it and sucked it
up.
So, like, doing progressions, and getting through that, and the E. Coli, let you
know on PNW that even though it was hard, you knew you could do it.
Right. And then JL was horrible, but I just dealt with it without complaining.
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Being younger had also led to some insecurity about whether he was mature enough for the group, and, more than anyone, he was constantly asking us questions to prepare him for what he would face as a counselor. He was eager to do a good job, and he approached the idea with a great deal of humility for someone so used to being well-liked at camp.
The first backcountry excursion of our trip was to be the three days spent with an outfitter exploring the coastal islands of Maine by sea kayak. Whereas we typically guided ourselves on canoe or hiking trips, the dangers of navigating the ocean waters in sea kayaks necessitated an outside guide service. The night before, we picked up dry bags from the outfitter and set about packing them after dinner.
Josh was nervous and having some difficulty, so we sat down to pack side by side.
Making things easier, Josh and I had a lot of the same gear. Josh did not display much interest in his gear, but his parents had clearly made sure that he brought with him to camp the same equipment and clothes as his peers. Again, in ethnographic terms, one thing that helps an outsider gain credibility as an insider is the outer status markings of gear. Furry and I had an ongoing, comical debate over my insistence on buying water shoes, which look like outdoor sneakers but have drain holes in the bottom and are made of quick-dry materials, rather than the ubiquitous Chaco-brand sport sandals everyone else wore.
Of course, my gear on the whole was a little more beat up than that of the kids, accumulated over the course of time, but the similarities made it easy to speak a common language, like “your Nano Puff will be good because it’s warm but it packs down a lot more than a fleece” when referring to his nylon-shelled, synthetic down-
CIT Program 83 filled pullover jacket. Josh was nervous about his backcountry skills, having skipped
JL the previous summer. His hands shook as he packed, and a couple of times I had to cram things into his dry bag a bit for him.
In my time as a counselor more so than when I was a kid and we mostly bought camping gear from army surplus stores, having the right gear often served as a shibboleth amongst these kids. Some of it was quite expensive, while other gear was merely a matter of knowing which brand to buy. This had been a non-issue with our kids out west. In fact, part of the reason I had stocked up on gear with a portion of my stipend each summer was to make sure I had enough to loan out when necessary.
Closer look at self-concept and developmental trajectory: Josh
The shaking hands are the result of a tremor that he’s had as long as he can remember. It is affected by caffeine or fatigue. I didn’t know the details of it at the time, so it merely fit into the general appearance of skittishness I perceived in Josh.
For example, in Pelt, when someone caught the hacky-sack to throw it, and everyone scattered to avoid getting hit and getting a letter, he ran at a full sprint away from the circle. Whereas other scrambled away ten or fifteen feet, he’d end up fifty feet away before coming back.
Josh had been at camp for four previous summers, though he had taken the last summer off for driver’s ed. He had a little brother coming into his third summer, and he would be at camp for second session. Josh professed to be goofier and a little more outgoing at home with his friends, and he seemed a bit shy, as he hadn’t really spent time with this particular combination of kids before. He was a drummer back
CIT Program 84 home, participating in marching band and occasionally “jamming” with other kids.
He was probably the hardest kid to get to know at first, which would make talking to him that much more worthwhile as he opened up.
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III. Bar Harbor, ME to Glen, NH, June 23-27
A. June 23
Before we left on the kayak trip the next day, we were introduced to what the kids termed the first major “adversity” of the trip: The groover.
The guide, Mark, explained that soldiers used to use ammo tins as portable toilets, and the sides would leave “grooves” in their backsides. This particular toilet was very small, maybe the size of two shoeboxes side-by-side. It had a small, traditionally shaped toilet seat atop it, and the blue chemicals inside were to contain any odor accumulated by three days of collecting nine people’s bowel movements.
Because of the level of use in the area the delicate ecosystems on all of the coastal islands, we were to practice true “Leave No Trace” principles. Outside of urine, which would be washed away quickly and naturally, we were to leave absolutely nothing behind.
B. June 24
The next morning, on a coastal island to which we had paddled, we woke to learn that Jason had been the first to make use of the groover. This would be the first of many comical stories he would tell about bowel movements on the trip. Since his intestinal trouble three years earlier had been the result of poor hand washing, he was very cautious about the process. He didn’t understand how the seat worked, missed the target, and subsequently had to clean up urine and fecal matter from the
CIT Program 86 outside of the device. What is significant about this is that as we laughed, his explanation got more detailed and animated, something illustrative of both his self- concept as well as his developmental trajectory. We were half laughing with him, half at him, but he was clearly hamming it up for the attention.
Jason often appeared comfortable receiving negative attention for being the
“baby” of the group—or at least he appeared to be while in those situations. When speaking about becoming a counselor, he was very much concerned with appearing mature and doing the right thing. This discrepancy implies that playing the baby may be a coping mechanism from which he was trying to move away.
That night, the previous division between the more outgoing half of Quint,
Jason, and Evan and the initially more reserved Graham, Josh, and Max was pretty much gone. Graham, who has warranted little mention up until now, proved himself a strong paddler, a skilled camper, and socially engaging. He had started camp a little later and did neither the 21-Day or the PNW with the other boys. He was on JL, but he had never been in Furry’s camper group on the large trip, so he was a bit the odd-man-out.
Closer look at self-concept and developmental trajectory: Graham
Graham, in general, was a little bit odd, but in a very conventional way. His mother travels a great deal for work, leaving his father as primary caregiver.
Graham confided that he typically underachieved in the private school he attended, not to the point that he was in any academic peril, just to the point that disappointed his dad, which made him feel bad enough to put in just a short effort at the start of each new marking period. He claimed to have the usual physical challenges, but he
CIT Program 87 was also the most physically mature of the group, appearing a year or two older than he actually was, so the hiking and paddling did not prove problematic for him.
He was a bit more iconoclastic in his appearance, as well, favoring skateboarding sneakers and a carefully curated T-shirt selection. He still had the same nice gear as the other boys, he just only resorted to wearing or using it when the environment required as much.
Graham, though a little different than the others, fit in well. He was smart and funny and “cool” from the point of view of the more conventional background of the other boys. Regardless of this, though, he appeared to feel left out by how close most of the other boys were to Furry, and he frequently sought my approval, making jokes for my benefit, and seeking my attention. Thankfully, this dissipated over the course of the first week.
There is something of a hero worship when you get kids around people just a little bit older than they are. The older kids (or young adults) get to do what the younger ones don’t, and they’ve accomplished more, and when this is compounded by interaction with adults who actually pay attention to the younger kids and like them, the result is adulation. This is what makes the mentorship of older staff so powerful in this setting. These guys worshipped Furry after as many as three seasons with them, and with the exception of when I couldn’t help but slip into authoritative adult mode, I can’t complain about the tributes offered to me, as well.
This is part of what made listening to Katy Perry cool, what made them repeat
Furry’s gentle put-down of “rookie move” for lapses in good judgment incessantly
(among myriad other camp catchphrases), and part of what made them want to be
CIT Program 88 the kind of counselors, the kind of adults, we wanted them to be. Some of my field journal notes in consideration of this phenomenon follow:
The most remarkable thing about this endeavor so far really has to be the
hero worship. It’s directed mostly at Furry, but I receive it, too. I’d really
forgotten this aspect of camp. Adolescent boys latch on to young men,
whether a few years or twenty years their senior, and want to be just like
them. I can fit into this primarily because I’ve been doing this for so long and
enjoy behaving, at 35, much the way I did at 22 (though hopefully with better
judgment and self-awareness). That is to say, we, as adults, don’t worry about
looking silly in front of them. We open ourselves up to being made fun of a
little, we make fun of them a little, and in Furry’s case, he even wrestles with
them, something I would have done when I was his age but which I don’t
think appropriate for someone my age. The intimacy combined with this
natural progression through the camp hierarchy gives the staff accessibility
that parents don’t have. The closest I can equate it to is if someone’s cool
older brother was actually interested in and wanted to spend time with their
younger siblings. This works out well when there is a positive role model
like Furry, but what if someone was a jerk? This is something I’ll need to
watch.
Ultimately, what I was seeing was a positive peer culture, an opportunity to emulate a positive role model in a very genuine way, much in the manner discussed in Grant et al. (2011). These boys had chosen to return after many years at camp, and this experience was clearly very important to them. They wanted to do
CIT Program 89 everything right. It was, in fact, an important element of the group dynamic of the
CIT cohort to take as near-gospel the mentorship of older staff in this context. It is truly remarkable to see such a reciprocal caring relationship in a blissfully un-self- aware way.
C. June 25
The thunderstorm hit as we were getting very close to the end of the final day’s paddle. Furry was bringing up the back, and I had Quint in my kayak just behind Mark. I was trying to walk the line between deferring to Mark’s judgment as guide and pushing that we err far on the side of safety in terms of pulling out. Quint would later admit, in the focus group, to thinking we should pull out sooner and having to defer to the staff’s judgment. He was going by camp policy in his mind, which is what I was going by in mine, which dictated cautious risk management. I had been attempting, at the time, to impress this upon Mark while preserving his authority for the sake of preventing the kids from panicking. We had left early to try and stay ahead of the weather, but Mark knew there would not be much shelter at the boat launch where we were pulling out, so as the lightning got closer, we headed for the first covered area we could find, the floating dock beneath a larger pier, then climbed onto the rocks behind the dock.
Most of the boys would remark on being a little scared when the storm got close. It was chilly, and at one point three people hugged Jason at once to keep him from shivering. None of them acted scared at the time, though; I don’t know whether this was because Furry, Mark, and I, in an effort to provide appropriate mentorship of older staff were successfully toeing the line between remaining calm and making
CIT Program 90 sure the kids knew to take the situation seriously, or merely a function of having spent enough time in the outdoors to know that, from time to time, weather hits, and it’s a big deal, but it’s something you have to be prepared to manage. They also might have just not wanted to appear scared in front of each other, their mature and calm reaction a function of the group dynamic of the CIT cohort. Quint would remark on being proud of his leadership skills in helping other people get out of their kayaks and secure the boats. Josh was surprised that he wasn’t the weak paddler he had been two years earlier. Jason had been especially nervous, but was glad it all went well. Evan was impressed that the group had handled the weather much better than they had on the 21-Day, which half of the group had been on together.
Placing this adversity in the context of PVEST, the subjective threat here, the need for resilience, though short-lived, was quite real. A thunderstorm while you are on open water presents an imminent threat of lightning strike. Even a strike to the water in close proximity can be dangerous, even deadly. The boys felt this fear, despite our attempts to mitigate it, but they adapted in a positive manner, doing what needed to be done to get to safety, and then turning the ordeal into a positive memory. With a little help from Katy Perry.
The singing commenced soon after we were settled into our safe waiting place. Brent, our sea kayak guide, smirked for a moment before joining in.
“California girls, we’re unforgettable, daisy dukes, bikini on top…” we all sang, shivering as we huddled together on the rocks between a steep embankment and a floating dock while the rain pounded the pier above us. We were smiling as we
CIT Program 91 sang, life vests for insulation and rain jackets buffeting the wind. Thunder cracked nearby. The exchange of mildly panicked looks did not interrupt the song.
“Sun-kissed skin so hot, we’ll melt your popsicle…”
Jason, in particular, shivered, despite my “Nano Puff” pullover adding another layer to not only his torso, but, given our size difference, even the tops of his legs.
Beneath the pounding storm, we raised our voices to the heavens, laughing as we sang:
“California, girls we’re undeniable, fine, fresh fierce, we got it on lock…”
(Perry, 2010).
We had nearly exhausted our repertoire when the storm abated, and soon we were warm and dry and sipping hot chocolate in the van heading back to Bar
Harbor.
Everyone got hot showers near the campground that night, followed by dinner out in town. They had survived the first segment of our trip; Maine had been conquered, with New Hampshire, Vermont, and Upstate New York left to go.
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IV. The White Mountains (NH) to Vermont, June 28-July 3
A. June 28-29
As we prepped for the New Hampshire leg of the trip, I conducted interviews outside a Laundromat near the town of Glen. These were perhaps the shortest, least informative interviews of the trip; outside of the thunderstorm on the sea kayak trip, the boys had little to offer in the way of adversity. They seemed unsure of how to answer the questions, something that was only slightly expanded upon when did our first focus group later that night. Nevertheless, they were good-natured about it, and they looked forwarded to our coming hiking trip with both excitement and trepidation.
At less than 5,400 feet in elevation, Mt. Madison is not the tallest mountain in
New Hampshire. That honor goes to Mt. Washington, nearby. Mt. Washington, however, is accessible by a steep toll road, and there is nothing more demoralizing at the end of a long climb that seeing throngs of tourists emerge from their cars at the peak. Our target, then, was Mt. Madison. A steep climb a third of the way up or so was set for the first day. We’d set up base camp, then don daypacks for the rest of the hike to the peak and back on the second day, then we’d hike out on the third. The mileage was not especially arduous, but the ascent was to be very steep, and the group had done little in the way of conditioning.
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We decided to warm up for the first day’s hike with a brief period of intense calisthenics. By intense calisthenics, I mean blasting Katy Perry out the van stereo at the trailhead parking lot and dancing frantically, awkwardly, and with great enthusiasm, another testament to the group dynamic of the CIT cohort and how safe these boys (and Furry and I) felt being silly in front of one another. I tried not to reveal that my own enthusiasm was tempered a few hours into the hike. As we neared the campsite, I discovered a major difference between the West Coast trails to which I had grown accustomed and the older East Coast trails. Out west, and this applies to much of the hiking the boys had done, as well, mountain trails utilize switchbacks, adding some distance to the trail to make the climb more gradual, winding slowly up the peak. Not in the east. These trails tend to cut straight up the mountain, like walking up a flight of stairs (or sometimes a ladder) for days at time.
I was grateful that Evan was setting the pace. Something tells me that if the rest of the boys were set loose, I wouldn’t have been able to keep up. We made it to the campsite at a reasonable hour and once again were faced with wooden platforms upon which to pitch our tents. Clearly, the East Coast trails saw a lot more traffic than I was used to out west. Other than Jason using an excessive amount of toilet paper, a limited commodity, the night went fairly well.
The next day kicked my behind. I was breathing heavily and felt at near capacity as we ascended several thousand feet. Meanwhile, at the front Evan was plodding along, only mildly complaining. After a few hours we came up over the tree line, and the trail went from steep and muddy to a scramble over rocks. There were a series of smaller, “false” peaks leading up to the true peak in the distance. At a trail
CIT Program 94 crossing, Evan told Furry he didn’t think he could go any further. Furry told him he could. Meanwhile, in the back, I was struggling to keep Graham and Max on the trail.
They were restless with the pace (with which, at this point, I could finally keep up without worry) and were hopping around on the rocks, going every which way. Max, in particular, was leaping from rock to rock with the confidence of someone who had never suffered a significant ankle or knee injury. He was ebullient, and for all his talk about a lack of athleticism, he was very at ease with both the tenacity the hike required and the balance and coordination it took to scramble about as he was doing.
Quint would later concede a great deal of frustration with the slow pace.
Jason had no trouble at all keeping up, and Josh’s only trouble was with slipping and falling a few times, not with the physical demands of the hike. They all maintained good spirits, though, and mostly stayed out of the way while Furry worked on Evan.
They were good about offering only encouragement, not complaints or scolding.
After a few hours on the exposed rocks, Furry and I started to worry about the weather. Both the blessing and the curse of altitude is that you can see weather coming for some ways off. We could see some storm clouds out in the distance, and that they were moving in our general direction. We had already started extra early that morning in anticipation of potential weather, and our pace was on the slow end of what we expected. It was possible that the weather would pass near us but not over us, though if it did come right at us, we would be in trouble. We likely had enough time to get to the peak, but then we would be faced with the challenge of
CIT Program 95 getting all of the way back down below the tree line before the weather hit. We decided to stop for lunch and see how it moved.
As we were stopped, Evan insisted he couldn’t go any further. Actually, he insisted that he could do it, but that he really didn’t want to, that it wasn’t worth it.
He thought we had a great view from where we were, and he didn’t see the point in all of that extra effort to get a marginally better view. This was not Evan at his best; he was displaying an absence of resilience that would provide a challenge to
Furry’s capacity for mentorship.
Furry and I both knew that we would be able to push Evan into continuing on, that he would complain and argue but would thank us for it later. In his subsequent interview, he conceded as much, though he still argued that stopping where we did was better. The clouds ultimately proved too ominous, and we turned the group around to head back to basecamp. We can’t know for sure, but it appeared we were wrong. The storm missed us. It’s still possible it hit the peak after we were below tree line and we didn’t see it, but we never got the severe weather we feared on this excursion.
It’s funny how weather is such a nonfactor in modern life. My workday during the school year is rarely altered because of poor weather. My weekend activities rarely hinge on a sunny day. Living in the outdoors, though, every day needs an alternate plan of action. We had had mostly great weather on this trip, but already bad weather or the fear thereof had curbed our activities on multiple occasions.
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The thing of it is, this has to happen. Things need to go wrong. When I reminisce with others about trips I took as a kid, as a counselor, with the non-profit, the things we talk about the most are the things that went wrong. Someone forgetting to pack a sleeping bag. Near-freezing temperatures. Miserably hot temperatures. Burnt meals. Animals getting into the food. Broken stoves. Swarming insects. Getting a little lost. All of these things are miserable at the time, but all represent challenges that are overcome. These provide relatively safe degrees of adversity that, in this context, provide some degree of threat to comfort and, in some cases, safety. Bringing to bear protective factors to display some low-level resilience in this context lends confidence when the threat increases. Successfully navigating these challenges provides a basis for self-efficacy, both as an individual and in the context of a group dynamic. You survive these things, you survive them together, and you’re that much stronger for knowing that you can survive such things. Things go wrong, you either fix the situation or merely endure it, and that is one more issue that you know you can either remedy or endure. You’re stronger for it. For this reason, I was disappointed we didn’t reach the summit, but also consoled in that the walk down was nonetheless high-spirited and memorable. We played, all of us, a word game dependent on spelling and vocabulary. It lasted for most of the hike down, and Max and I were satisfied to accept a shared title as winner. Max stepped off trail countless more times. Josh fell countless more times (though to be honest, the rest of slipped a time or two, as well).
B. June 29
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The next day, we made it off trail without incident, played Katy Perry immediately upon our return to the van, and drove back down into Glen. On the way, we did try to stop at the Mt. Washington toll road for a quick drive up, but they told us that the winds were too high for a van and that we had too many people any way. Evan and I both hammed up mock offense at the assertion that we were too heavy.
Back at the site, Furry and I conferred and decided it was a good time for the tradition of the lobster dinner on CIT. This tradition dated back at least to when my older brother went on the trip in 1989. Camp puts in ten dollars per kid and they pay the rest. It would have been more economical to do in Maine, when we were still on the coast, but we had wanted to wait until it was more of a mid-trip celebration than setting the tone of this as a luxury tour. Though we told them we were on our way to pick up groceries for dinner, they all sensed something was up and got very excited when we pulled into a lobster restaurant. They all spent freely on this meal, even the normally frugal Max, and Jason had no complaints about his fish sandwich and spaghetti. The only black mark on the meal was when Furry had to take away
Graham’s phone because he was texting under the table. On JL and PNW, the staff hold all the phones, and kids get them back only at certain times to check in with their parents. I had persuaded Furry to let them keep the phones on CIT because that’s the way we did it on the non-profit, and it really wasn’t a problem. It was mostly comical because it was so tough to keep phones charged when you’re camping. Anyway, Graham claimed to be texting his dad, something which a quick
CIT Program 98 glance at the phone proved to be a lie. Furry was livid. I was only slightly less so, as the lie had been told to Furry and not me.
Furry explained to Graham that he would be without his phone for a while, and I took Graham aside at the Dairy Queen stop on the way back and explained in no uncertain terms how dishonesty was just about the greatest sin someone on the trip could commit; there’s plenty of room for mistakes borne out of immaturity or carelessness, but not for willful dishonesty. Everything we did was based on an ability to trust one another.
It is interesting that this reversion to self-indulgent conduct that violated the trust of both the group and the staff occurred in the context of a dinner out at a restaurant. Placed in a setting more like life back home, Graham conducted himself as he might have at home instead of adhering to the culture of camp and the expectations of staff conduct.
C. July 2
After our drive to Vermont, we spent the first day on an eventless day, then drove into town for dinner at camp alumnus Merv’s house. Merv had last been at camp in 1996. He had been, to me, one of the “cool older kids.” By cool older kids, I mean that when I was in my late teens, he was in his mid-to-late twenties, he was good at what he did at camp, he was funny, and he was friendly to everybody, including the junior staff. He provided an earlier model of the mentorship of older staff, one predicated the dynamic between Furry and the boys now. I hadn’t seen him in a long time, but I had posted very general updates on Facebook via my phone
(as in “MA, ME, NH down, VT, NY to go, then back to MN”), and he had seen the post
CIT Program 99 and offered to host a barbecue for the CITs at his house. It was great. I hadn’t seen him in fifteen years, but he looked identical. By all appearances, his aging process had frozen in place while I passed him by. Merv provides an example of the fictive kinship network that grew out of the camp. He was the second former staffer with whom we had intentionally met up, after we shared a front-country campground in
New Hampshire with the former assistant director of the camp who led group initiative games with the boys.
The kids played lawn games while he and I caught up, then they gathered around to hear and tell stories. Merv was pretty good about what he could talk about with his wife, Furry, and me and what he could say in front of the kids. His wife, delighted to be cooking for someone other than her vegetarian husband, made possibly the best grilled chicken I have ever had, and I’ve found it impossible to replicate despite my own considerable talents with a spatula.
The stories Merv rehashed in private brought back a lot of the “good old days,” lots of counselors bingeing on alcohol (and sometimes worse) and staying up until all hours, but always making it to breakfast on time and delivering on the job at activities. As the old waterfront director had said, “if you’re going to hoot with the owls, you have to be ready to soar with the eagles.” It was a drink hard, work hard atmosphere. Even went they weren’t officially “off,” counselors frequently went out after the kids had gone to bed and took turns covering for each other. At any given point in time, if there had been a true emergency after ten o’clock at night, we would have been grossly understaffed, especially if those at the bar a half mile down the road were already soused.
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Dodger may have been a part of that when he was in his early twenties, but over the course of his time as assistant director and then director, he tightened the reins considerably. By the time I returned for the study, the bar scene was a fraction of what it once was and the rules for cabin coverage infinitely stricter. Speaking as an adult, this is a good thing.
As a teenager, though, I wanted nothing more than to be part of this. My friend David was the angel on my shoulder. When we got crazy, it was to meet up with girls from girls’ camp and run into town for late night breakfast when we were supposed to be in camp. He didn’t drink until college, and then very conservatively, so he had no problem giving it up for the summer, as camp rules dictate for anyone under 21. Even this was a much stricter rule than had been in place when a drunk junior counselor totaled a friend’s car in 1989.
Nevertheless, I had myriad devils on my other shoulder, which calls up an incident briefly referenced in the recounting of my personal camp history. I never drank with Merv when I was underage, but other underage staffers and even some of the of-age staff were eager to scout out the places where this could be done. I had heard countless drinking stories at camp from my old counselors, from the guys who had been counselors when I was a kid and were still around, and from older guys like Merv, and in the same way these CITs want to be one of the cool older guys, back then, so did I. I made a number of stupid decisions about alcohol until a few weeks after my nineteenth birthday, I was finally caught drinking beer in a cabin with a few friends one night when I was supposed to be on duty in the sleeping village. Within 48 hours, I was on a plane home.
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It was no one’s fault but my own that this happened. I was a good counselor. I loved being with my campers, genuinely liked each and every one of them, and had busted my butt to get them through their progressions year and qualified for PNW.
My co-counselor that year was a good guy, but he was new to camp and somewhat passive. I had pushed them through to this point, and I had, somewhere in my head, justified that because I had as much responsibility as older guys, I was entitled to the same privileges. Drinking in a bar led to drinking in camp when the kids were asleep, and that was a line that should never, ever have been crossed. Even drinking off property during time off would mean I was defying the law and camp rules at the very time I was supposed to be teaching kids that such laws and rules are there for their safety and protection. How could I expect them to respect authority if I didn’t?
This may have been a failure of the mentorship of older staff, as well as one of the prevalent camp culture at the time, but it wasn’t the fault of the older guys that I did this. I may have been following their example, but they had no way of knowing they had to be role models for not just the kids, but the younger staff, too.
At that time, neither did I. About five years later, though, some of my former campers would get fired for underage drinking, as well. Like me, they all returned to camp and redeemed themselves, but I wish I could have saved them from having to learn this lesson the way I did: sometimes, the “cool older kids” are the ones making the “rookie mistakes.”
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V. Vermont to Upstate New York to Ontario to Michigan to Camp, July 4-13
A. July 4
We spent the afternoon at a park on Lake Champlain. There was goofing around, Pelt, throwing the football, and, for me, a chance to knock out a good chunk of the Norman Mailer novel I had been carrying around. I would say heavy reading is another marker of my unusual age for participating in this sort of trip, but I had been carting around oversized books since my first backpacking trip as a kid. It’s not that unusual; later in the summer, I would catch a staff member reading Dante’s
Inferno on an outing to the Mississippi headwaters at Itasca State Park.
Engrossed as I was, though, I didn’t notice that Evan had been sulking. He never told us what was wrong that day, though I could extrapolate from later developments that he was starting to get nervous about our return to camp and becoming a counselor. In face of the coming challenge, his self-concept and efficacy beliefs were not strong enough to convince him that he could meet the coming challenge. Camp was important to him, and he didn’t want to fail. The anticipation of that possibility was getting to him. The important thing at the time was that Furry noticed it and decided to bring him out of his funk. By kicking his ass.
In his 1987 memoir, A Dream Season, written with John Hough, about the
New York Mets 1986 World Series-winning season, catcher Gary Carter talks about the closeness of his team and how often he and his teammates would touch each
CIT Program 103 other. In classic 1980s homophobia, he then challenges anyone to call him gay, but he explains that the constant physical contact, the high-fives, the pats on the back, the “good game” butt slap, were all part of the closeness of the team. Similarly, in
Sebastian Junger’s book War (2010) about his time embedded with U.S. troops in a forward operating base in Afghanistan, the author writes of how the constant wrestling and fighting not only relieved tension, but provided a means of human contact, a way of showing affection in a very socially acceptable way. In the summer of 1992, my friend David, though only 5’6”, was in shape for varsity football (though a bum knee would keep him off the field), and though no athlete, at about six feet tall and more than 200 pounds, I was not someone easily trifled with. Nevertheless,
Slim, the then assistant director of the camp who was no taller than David and pushing forty at the time, decided to beat the living hell out of us in front of the lodge one day. It was awesome. When I say he beat the hell out of us, it was some pretty simple wrestling, and basically he’d pin one of us, then the other, then the other. We were junior counselors, but to him, we were also a couple of kids he’d watched grow up, and, as his sons were not yet, at the time, old enough for this sort of thing, he decided to have a little fun with us. Incidentally, I know one of his kids, now 21 years old and working at camp. He’s a great guy and a good counselor. I also saw Slim recently, and I’m pretty sure he could still take me down. Even in the non- profit, where kids often came from backgrounds where fighting was nothing to joke about, I remember taking on all six boys at once in a parking lot the last night of a trip. They were determined to get me to the ground, but I kept them at bay, laughing and tossing them into one another until someone finally thought to take out my legs.
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It was hilarious, and it was a means of showing affection. In this setting, the adult would never wrestle with someone who could perceive this as actual aggression.
Even in pre-camp staff training session, rough play like this is not outright banned; it is merely to be treated with extreme caution and with close attention to physical and emotional safety.
In this case, this was exactly the attention Evan needed. In no time, Furry had pulled him out of his funk. He was chasing Furry all around the park, and we all, including Evan, were laughing. In this context, the mentorship of older staff wasn’t about providing sage advice, but rather the stimulus required to elicit a reaction that would change the tenor of the participant’s conduct.
B. July 5
Our campground after a day of driving through Upstate New York was part campground, part trailer park filled with decaying RVs, contributing to the run- down theme of the day. We did our second focus group, and the recording includes me telling kids to lift their heads up and getting frustrated with multiple insistences that eating the twenty-scoop Vermonster sundae was not among the most important challenges of the previous week. Their answers to the questions still felt more like they were trying to check a box than truly be reflective.
After dinner, we had a talk with them about the return to camp next week and how they can be positive leaders by setting examples, being energetic, and being helpful while not telling their co-counselors what to do. This was an intentional, planned discussion that was part-formal training as a counselor, part just an attempt to guide their conduct on trip. I used Dodger as an example of a good
CIT Program 105 leader—we all want to please him because he works so hard to do nice things for other people. Who knew how much would sink through?
C. July 6-7
A fog lifted as we set out on the river the next day, both literally and metaphorically. I had Evan in the bow of my canoe. He was a surprisingly strong paddler, his muscle memory returning after a two-year canoe hiatus since the 21-
Day. The reed-filled river was reminiscent of the waters of the upper Midwest, where all of us, kids and staff, had undertaken our first significant canoe experiences. We plugged along, enjoying ourselves and making good progress despite my questionable navigational skills. We had to pull out for a brief thunderstorm, but the weather cleared quickly.
Things were going well at the campsite, and I discussed with Furry about how at a certain point on the trip with the non-profit, we had a talk with the group about the staff pulling back and letting the kids really run the show, the packing, cooking, cleaning, and so on. Inevitably, they make mistakes and suffer natural consequences, but they gain the confidence of knowing they don’t need the staff to get by. We cringed and laughed at the comedy of errors that was the six boys hanging the food out of reach of bears that night, then played Mafia until rain forced everyone into their tents (and me under a tarp, which had become my customary alternative for rainy nights).
I awoke to beautiful weather and the sound of an animal batting at the hanging food. Luckily, the animal was just Furry. We had an easy day paddling to the next campsite, and this time I had Josh in my bow. He pulled out some social skills
CIT Program 106 he had appeared to be holding in reserve. The previously quiet Josh was downright chatty, talking about his marching band director back home who played favorites, how his friends weren’t as good on guitar as he was on drums, so he’d jam with them but not join a band, and how he was a little crazier at home, always the one friends could get to do something silly on a dare. We had a blast. Meanwhile, Evan was paddling with Jason, and they were chiding each other incessantly. Jason was not much of a paddler, a fact that would be emphasized in the ensuing focus group, and he wasn’t much for trying harder than he already was. He had never come across as lazy, so this presumably was due to the same lack of upper body strength about which I had complained on the kayak trip. Their bickering, comical to the rest of us, never reached a level requiring intervention. They were annoyed with each other, but not angry at each other.
Once we’d set up camp and the canoes were cleared of gear, we put our life vests back on and paddled out to play “Pirate Wars,” the goal of which is basically to tip each other out of the canoes. The following account comes from my journal:
Josh…leapt from our canoe to that of Jason and Evan and tipped it. Jason
subsequently managed to, from the water, tip my canoe enough to dump me
out, but, unlike theirs, ours didn’t swamp. Josh and I crawled back in, while
Jason went after Furry and Graham’s canoe. Evan and the swamped canoe
started drifting. He kept asking Max and Quint to help him empty the canoe,
but they wouldn’t—they would need a fourth person to do the canoe-over-
canoe procedure, they said. Evan then went to try to tip their canoe, which is
part of the game, but he was a little upset already. Max then proceeded to
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fight him off violently—neither was smiling. I yelled for Max to back off, but
he was too involved to hear me. Evan started cursing, yelling f-bombs at him,
clearly upset, and I had to shout the situation down. Josh swam over to bring
the canoe in with Evan. Quint, realizing he should have been better, jumped
in the water to help, and Max soloed the canoe in. We declared the game
over. I told Max that he was wrong, that he was getting too violent and that I
had warned him as much. Max is not good at admitting fault, but he was
getting better at not trying to defend every action. I told him that if I were
him, I’d apologize, but I wasn’t going to make him do so. Evan sulked for a
while off to the side of the campsite. Eventually I went and sat a few feet from
him to read and gently teased him enough to get a smile out of him (threw a
twig at his leg, lightly—that’s not funny—it’s a little funny—I’m not
laughing—you want to smile—he smiles). After a few minutes, he went back
to the group. Later, while the group was fishing, I read near Max and had
ordinary conversation with him. We would have put the two together to talk
it out, but I lacked the confidence that they could do so productively.
I would come to discover that the root of this argument went back several years. As
Max would later describe in an interview:
Um, what happened was we were playing “pirate wars” in which one person
attempts to flip or submerge another person’s canoe. Evan’s partner, Jason,
had abandoned him to try and go flip another canoe, and his canoe was now
sunk, or at least floating on top of the water as a canoe would.
Swamped.
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Swamped. And he was paddling over and he was yelling for us to do canoe- over-canoe. We didn’t trust him and we kept saying that he needed his partner back, he needed his partner back. However, he was able to latch on to our canoe and then try to flip us. I as the bowman, um, was, I would say, responsible for not letting people flip the canoe or at least trying not to, and, so, my first, my instinctive reaction was to try and prevent him from doing that. It eventually became more violent than it needed to be, whereas I was shoving his lifejacket forcefully. It was not a safe action to be doing. However, he got very angry and scratched me on the shoulder, to which I immediately,
I angered, but I didn’t hit him after that. I said “Evan, don’t do that.” And then he retorted back…do you want me to?...
Yeah.
“I’ll claw you if I want to, you little shit.” I could have made it worse after that.
I could have, but I restrained myself not to. And then I had a conversation with you, and…
And he said a few things in addition to that that were even worse.
Oh, I’m very sure of that. Uh, besides that, um, restraining myself from making the situation worse was probably the biggest challenge because it would have led to more problems. It would have, and I don’t take offense well. I never really have, but restraining myself was probably the most difficult thing to do in that situation.
And so when you say restraining yourself, not just, you know, when you got back on shore, but for the rest of the trip?
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Yes.
And how are things between you now?
He, I’m not sure. Ever since [seventh grade] year we’ve had this back and
forth thing. It was, I believe it was rectified during [eighth grade] year, but
he’s obviously held some animosity since then.
The altercation would stand out less to Evan, who met with some more adversity that week. Nevertheless, what came to pass between the two after this appeared to be more of a stalemate or cease-fire than any kind of lasting truce. In terms of resilience, this was a failure of positive adaptations, as well as a gap in what had, up until now, been a relatively healthy group dynamic of the CIT cohort.
D. July 8-9
Day three of canoeing was the probably the most pleasant, relaxing day of the summer for everyone. We left most of our gear behind and paddled to a hiking spot.
The sun was shining, and the temperature hovered in the upper seventies for most of the day. After pulling the canoes out, we changed our shoes and hiked uphill about an hour to a beautiful scenic outlook. The lake, formed by dams, was already at some elevation, so the extra 400 feet or so of elevation made for fantastic views from a bald, rocky hilltop. After we descended, we paddled to a sandy beachfront for lunch. Furry and I vetoed Pirate Wars, so the boys decided to all paddle a canoe together. Cramming six (mostly) adult-sized teenagers into a canoe meant to carry two people and maybe 150 pounds of gear is not a recipe for buoyancy. They’d paddle as far as they could before the balance got off just enough for water to rush over the gunwales and swamp the canoe, dumping them all into the water as they
CIT Program 110 laughed maniacally. They were having a blast, and most of them would later recall it as either all or part of their favorite memory of the week. Though there was little direct interaction between Max and Evan, it went a long way towards relieving tension and restoring the group dynamic of the CIT cohort.
The paddle back to the pick-up point the next day was a breeze. While we had been paddling against the river’s current the first day, we were with it now, and the distance we had paddled over the course of the first two days flew by. I had
Graham in the front of my canoe, and it felt like the boat was being pulled by a motor. He had been outstanding since we had left Vermont. He had not required any kind of correction, his attitude had been persistently positive, and he was showing the kind of quiet leadership we had been hoping the other boys would pick up on.
Graham knew he was emerging as a leader, too, though in a much more humble way.
He would tell me in his interview later that week:
What was your biggest challenge this week and why?
I think it was, um, it has to do with the transition to becoming a counselor
from a camper. I think I’m doing pretty well in that, but I think, it was like,
kind of controlling myself when my other, my co-campers were not acting,
like, mature. And then, when you’re like, hey, come on guys, and they’re kind
of going “Dude, just relax,” it’s not, it’s like, when they say that, not letting
down, because it’s like you’re trying to be in that mindset when they’re not.
It’s just, like, restraining myself, not yelling at them and stuff. I have, I’m sure
I have been acting childish, too, like we all have, but, it’s just like knowing
when it’s time to be serious, and when you’re serious and other people aren’t
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serious and you want them to be serious. I think that’ s the biggest challenge
I’ve faced.
Are you pleased with how you’ve handled it?
Yeah. There was some where I could’ve…I think there was some where I
could’ve maybe gotten, maybe, like, not have backed down as much when
they’re like messing around, like, “hey, we’ve got to get this done,” and
they’re like, “no, dude, just chill, relax,” instead of, like, saying, okay,
whatever, just like, actually been like “No, we’re not going to relax. We’re
going to relax once this is done.” Just, like, something like that.
If you could have done something differently this week, what would it have
been?
I think it would have been more, like, being more, like, forceful, and not
letting down when people say, “No, let’s not do this,” when I know we have to
do it.
And then what are you most proud of in the last week?
Um, I think the canoeing trip, just being a strong canoer. I know it wasn’t that
hard…
The actual paddling?
Yeah, and just, like, not complaining. Being at the head of the group. Feeling
like a leader.
Of note is the way, even in talking about what he wishes he had done, he talks about leading others in the first person plural instead of the second person—“we need to do this” instead of “you need to do this.” It showed an identity closely linked to the
CIT Program 112 success or failure of the group. In the case, Graham’s ties to the group dynamic of the CIT cohort facilitated an inclination towards leadership.
We held the lead position most of the day, and the conditions were forgiving enough to allow us to race against Max and Furry a little bit. I played the experience card, using the trick learned in a lifetime of immature, meaningless competition to let them near on the side on which I was paddling from the stern of our canoe. Once they got close, I changed my grip on the paddle and started shoveling water like mad back on Max, who was paddling in the bow of their canoe. He laughed and attempted to splash back, and Furry and Graham got into it some. This set the tone for the rest of the paddle, any change of lead predicated on acceptance of a dousing. We all dished out and took our share. Well, Max had to take it a little more than the rest of us, but he took it well. Though Max was not one for wrestling, this playful hazing was of the same vein, not intended to be mean or at anyone’s expense, but to include everyone on the joke, participants openly encouraged to reciprocated against authority figures.
A van from the outfitter picked up the canoes, and we followed them back to their shop to get everything squared away. We drove east to the coast of Lake
Ontario that night and stayed in a large state park campground. Things were mostly idyllic; we did laundry, feasted a on a ten dollars per person budget at McDonald’s, and headed back to the campground where Furry and I checked in with Dodger on the phone while the kids fell into a whimsical game of leapfrog. Said Josh later:
We were doing leapfrog, and Jason, he did almost a face-plant, and it made
me think how great it is that we can laugh at someone and they’ll be totally
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fine with it and be a good sport about it, and we’ll know that we’re like a
group and just, it made me think, like, wow, we’ve been together with each
other for, like, ever, and we haven’t had any problems. Like, we’ve had
problems, but we’ve always been able to solve them, and that made me
happy.
Explicitly here, Josh is commenting on the emotionally safe environment created by the group dynamic of the CIT cohort. From there, we played Pelt, and then goofed around some more, when Evan and Jason decided to insist that Furry wrestle with them. Furry resisted, but they kept baiting him. Something, I’m not exactly sure what, happened, though, and Evan got hurt. Not seriously hurt by any means—there were no effects later on, let alone any lasting marks, but he felt pain and got upset and embarrassed. It was a very large campground, and it was getting dark, so we had previously told them to take a buddy when going to the distant washhouse— this makes it harder to get turned around, as well as reducing stress when a pair is missing instead of an individual. I bring this rule up because it was at this point that
Evan stormed off. The notes from my field journal follow. I had to step in a little more here than I normally would have on this trip because Evan was so mad at
Furry—I would normally let Furry have “the talk,” and I would hang back and follow up. In this instance, I had to be the source of mentorship of older staff.
Furry sent Jason to stick by him so he wouldn’t be alone, which Evan wasn’t
thrilled about. Furry followed a minute later, and about three minutes after that,
when I got to the bathroom building, Evan was walking around the building
saying he wanted to be alone, while they slowly followed.
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I asked Furry and Jason to wait nearby, then told Evan to have a seat with me.
He resisted at first, then agreed. I knew what he needed more than anything was a chance to calm down, so I figured I’d talk, and maybe he’d listen to some of it, but mostly he’d cool out. These are the points I covered:
1. Evan knows I like him. He knows Furry likes him and cares about him like
family. He knows the other kids like him. We all might not like a given
action of the other here or there, but there is established kinship here. I
also pointed out that Jason was being a very good friend to him by
sticking by him during this (no small thing, considering how they pick on
each other).
2. That said, he’s acting selfishly here in a way that hurts the group. He
complained that Furry had gone too far, and I pointed out that he had
initiated the wrestling, and this is what sometimes happens. Furry wasn’t
trying to hurt him.
3. I told him about why I teach 11th graders, and why camp picks this age to
make a transition—they’re at an age when they start to develop empathy,
when they start to understand a world beyond themselves. This is a move
past the egocentrism of childhood, when kids think the world revolves
around themselves.
4. I explained that the storming off was an egocentric action. I made clear I
didn’t think he was an egocentric person, and he understood that. His
actions, however, forced the whole group to pay attention to him and
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worry about him, disrupting whatever else we were doing. This campsite
was too spread out, confusing, and unlit to wander.
5. Evan said that when he had problems at home, this is sometimes what
worked. I explained that the difference here is that everyone has to react
and conform to him. I pointed out that it simply can’t be that way when
he’s in a cabin, and that he was going to give Furry the impression that
he’s not ready to be staff.
6. Evan went the self-pity route, claiming that he is, indeed, not ready to be
staff. I called BS, explained he was going to be great with the little kids,
but he can’t act like this—he can’t get upset with his co-counselors and
storm off.
7. He agreed to head back after he pooped. Jason waited for him.
A half-hour later, when Jason was looking for someone to sleep outside with
him, Evan volunteered. They talked quietly, goofy kid bedtime chatter, for
about an hour or more before going to sleep. At one point, Evan got up to
mess with Furry, all forgiven.
Important here is the activation of both developmental expectations, of which Evan was falling short, and the expectations of the caregiver role to try and elicit more appropriate conduct.
E. July 10
We drove about halfway across southern Ontario before stopping for the night. As per Josh’s birthday request, I made jambalaya that night, and we had
CIT Program 116 secretly bought a cake for his birthday. What should have been a mere nuisance that night that turned into an event was that a bottle of liquid laundry detergent had leaked in the back of the van, primarily on the carpet along the bumper. It had been steeping for most of the day, and though the kids worked on it throughout the evening, the stain did not want to come up. I was a little frustrated, and I worked with them a little bit, insisting that we not return the rental van to camp with damages.
After dinner, I went up by the campground offices to shower. When I was walking back, Furry met me about halfway.
“Evan’s pissed at you,” he said.
“Why?”
“Because they’ve been working hard on the stain, and Evan thinks it’s good enough, but he thinks you won’t think so and are going to be mad.”
“So he’s pissed at me because he thinks I’m going to be mad at him in the future?
“Yep.”
“Awesome.”
“I know.”
I put my stuff up and went to work on the stain myself for a little bit. I’m not sure how eight gallons of detergent fit into a 32-ounce bottle, but that’s what appeared to be soaked into the carpet. From my field journal:
I got back and started working on it myself, neither criticizing nor
commending the work that had been done. Evan made a suggestion about how I
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should do it, which I didn’t take, and I explained why I was doing it the way I
was. He blew up and went and sat by the other end of the van in tears. I sent the
group down to the playground and sent him along—knowing full well he was
upset by how he expected me to act rather than how I had acted. He resisted but
went. When I went down there a few minutes later, I started to explain that the
spill was an understandable mistake, but we want to try to avoid those things.
Evan farted. Loudly.
I took him aside and reamed him for the disrespect—in my quiet but angry
voice. He agreed that he had gotten upset over how he thought I was going to
react rather than how I did act, and he apologized for the fart. The bottom line,
though, is that he doesn’t get it. He doesn’t get that he had something to make up
to me before the fart, and that it was an inappropriate time to try to be funny.
He’s told Furry he’s anxious about being back in camp, but he has been
inexcusably on edge all weekend. It takes very little to get him riled up. He needs
to even out soon—if he keeps having these tantrums when he’s supposed to be
staff, he’s not likely to last the summer, which is a shame.
Looking back, this assessment was pretty harsh. I didn’t do a great job of placing Evan’s actions within a developmental context and considering the degree to which his displays of immaturity were a manifestation of his anxieties about taking on the role of the adult, the caregiver instead of the care-receiver. I’m guessing I was still pretty angry about the ill-timed flatulence when I wrote it. At this point, a couple of days removed from the relaxation of the canoe trip, my mind was on logistics and getting us halfway back across the continent with all the kids
CIT Program 118 and equipment in one piece. My stress level was pretty high, so I was less sympathetic to Evan’s anxiety in the moment than I am now.
F. July 11-12
The next day, we crossed back into the U.S. and arrived at a YMCA camp run by Sid, an old friend, just in time for lunch. It is pretty traditional for the CIT trip to visit another camp along the journey. It helps them better understand what their own camp does. This one was run by a guy my age with whom I had worked on camp supervisory staff. He had eventually gone off on his own to work as an assistant director under Streisand at an Upstate New York Y camp, and when
Streisand left for grad school, Sid took over. That lasted about a year, and he had eventually landed at this camp.
I’m a big guy, but Sid is both a good bit heavier and a good bit shorter than me. That never stopped him from anything—he’ll run just as hard as anyone, swim just as far, and, well, engage in social activity to a more heightened degree (speaking euphemistically) than anyone. Though his impish grin implied he could still be complicit in the bad ideas of others, his pregnant and highly intelligent wife, an
Eastern European professional translator whom he had met at the New York camp, now kept him in check. He had a beautiful young daughter, a toddler whom he called his “little communist.”
Though Sid had left camp the summer before even Jason and Max had arrived, they all took to him immediately. He was cheerful and encouraging and warm, and he made sure they felt at home. As a member of the fictive kinship
CIT Program 119 network of the camp, they had enough in common and a shared bond that required no previous interaction.
He and I had discussed the boys doing a service project for the camp to earn their night’s room and board. He took this suggestion to heart; the camp’s
“boathouse” was the basement of a building that opened to the lake. The lake had risen recently, flooding the boathouse and leaving behind all sorts of crud. This was compounded by all of the gear—sails, life vests, ropes, stays, masts, booms, etc.— that was everywhere. The task was for the boys to clean out all of this gear, sweep out and scrub down the boathouse, and then organize all the gear. It was miserable, smelly work. They loved it, at least according to their reflections in that evening’s focus group:
Philipson: On that subject, what do you guys think of how y’all did on that
service project this afternoon?
Evan: Fantastic. I think they wouldn’t have got it done without us.
Josh: Team-work (sing-song).
Max: It would never have gotten done.
Evan: They didn’t have any time to do it. They wouldn’t have time to pull six
people.
Jason: I like that I finally got to do manual labor. It’s been a long time, so I got
to break a sweat, and it was fun.
Quint: Yeah, I know for me it was a totally different situation. Like, at home, I
do a lot, but it’s great to know that these guys, like, whatever, the
maintenance guy was, what was his name? (several answered) Um, but like,
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it was nice to know that everyone was kind of coming to us, and especially
him, and, like, “we couldn’t have gotten this done, like thank you.”
Graham: Like, “You guys are awesome.”
Josh: It felt good.
Quint: Like especially when, uh, …
Graham: The only part that didn’t feel good was slicing my thumb.
Quint: …the buff guy (discussion of his name) he came over to us like “you
guys are awesome.” Even if he was kind of like, just being super-excited, it
still like, it really felt good having people be, like, “Nice, good job, thank you.”
Evan: And that definitely rubs off on his campers and us, too.
The vibe all-around was very positive. I had introduced the question, though, to get away from Evan’s complaining about how he didn’t agree with being held to a certain standard of conduct when they weren’t around younger kids. He was clearly agitated at getting corrected for things all the time, and he was using the open forum of the focus group to vent that in a way that wouldn’t be tempered by a response from Furry or me.
What grew out of this shared endeavor, though, was a belief that they could contribute something to somebody, particularly as a group. Their background of relative privilege appeared to be a nonfactor in terms of how menial this chore was—though they may have been less sensitive to its status because of their limited experience to manual labor in the world at home, part of attending camp is sharing duty for all aspects of maintaining the facilities they used. Kids cleaned their cabin each day, took turns raking detritus from the manmade beach on the camps
CIT Program 121 waterfront, and took on tribal projects such as building picnic tables or cleaning up roadside trash in order to serve the camp and its immediate surroundings.
This particular day of labor and the enormity of the task contributed to their performance expectations for themselves, reinforcing a sense of self-efficacy by showing they could take on an adult role and be successful, and the verbal encouragement and recognition from others reinforced that. It was important way to close the travel portion of the trip before heading back into camp the next day.
Also of note is the way that both the focus group and interviews at this point had finally come into their own. The kids were more eloquent, reflective, and on point than they had ever been before.
In many ways, the boys offered the appearance that the four-week travel portion of the program offered a ramping up, a period of preparation for what lay ahead. It’s not that they couldn’t have cleaned out a boathouse when they first arrived, but the enthusiasm and joy with which they did this was quite remarkable.
They had spent the last two summers and the first half of this one on travel programs that focused on them—learning the backcountry, learning responsibility, and now they finally had a task that focused on serving others, something they knew they would be doing (with the exception of Max) for the second half of the summer.
They were also starting to develop a language for talking about their challenges and accomplishments, a mere hint of what was to come in the ensuing weeks.
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VI. Discussion of travel portion of program
A. Ethnographic challenge
As expected, maintaining the role of objective researcher is quite difficult when working with a research site with which the principal investigator has so much history. Early discussions with the CIT leader, Furry, revealed just how much my early attempts to abdicate my former status within the organization were a bit of pretense. The fact that the acclimation period for this study would take place off-site for four weeks aided greatly in at least perpetuating that fallacy until an open channel of communication between participants and researcher had already been established.
As the trip progressed and after it had been well-established that I was in no way trying to overrule or wrest control from Furry, the need arose to truly serve as a second staff member on the trip. Furry’s role was to provide mentorship and guidance to the boys in preparation for their apprenticeship as well as guide them through this one last travel program, and I found myself supplementing and supporting his work. Ironically, I was more of an authority figure on trip, away from the camp, than I was once we had returned and my interaction with the boys was primarily focused on the study. Participation in this manner on the trip did not diminish access, though, and it increased direct interaction with the participants, helping to establish trust and communication. Had not the interviews and focus
CIT Program 123 groups begun to improve in quality and depth of data prior to return to camp, I would have thought this to be hindrance. To the contrary, however, at one point in
Evan’s last interview on trip, he complained about some elements of the trip in a way that showed he knew the demarcation between our conversations as part of the study and our conversations as trip leader and trip participant. In fact, he appeared to be using the forum to make some assertions that he knew I would not refute in the interview format but would in an ordinary conversation.
B. Identified antecedent factors
The research question identifies several antecedent factors to growth. Chief among those identified during these first four weeks are the mentorship of older staff, the group dynamic of the CIT cohort, and the culture of camp and expectations of staff conduct.
In terms of the mentorship of older staff, I was quickly taken aback by the level of hero worship afforded Furry and, to a slightly lesser extent, me. The boys parroted catchphrases and quickly tried to set our values as their own. They relished attention, and for Jason and Evan in particular, relished physical contact in the form of wrestling with Furry. Of particular note here is how a sulking Evan had his spirits renewed on July Fourth when Furry refused to accept his disengagement and gave him what could be best be described as a playful beating, closing with Evan chasing Furry around the park, both of them laughing.
At the close of the night, when we were often sitting around a campfire, the boys would ask Furry and me questions about being a counselor, already thinking about the expectations of the caregiver role and seeking our advice to help prepare
CIT Program 124 them. In the case of Evan’s meltdown after a dispute with Furry, it fell to me to try to mentor him back to a mindset from which he could see himself taking on that caregiver role and the developmental expectations that come with it. Along the way, a visit with one of the mentors from my time as junior staff gave occasion to muse upon how neglectful mentorship can miss an opportunity to keep poor choices in check.
That visit was one of three such encounters with members of the camp’s fictive kin network, an important part of the culture of the camp and the expectations for staff conduct. Being a part of this particular camp often means remaining a part of this network well into adulthood, and those displays of closeness and persistent connection display a desirable attribute that the younger staff and campers see in the older staff. It reinforces in their minds how important a part of life camp can be to someone and raises the esteem of the in-group in their eyes.
Looking to a subset of that in-group, the group dynamic of the CIT cohort, the first half of the trip saw a rapid reconnection of peers. Though some, Jason, Quint, and Evan, offered the appearances of feeling more immediately at ease than the others, within a few days, the time we saw them spending time in Bar Harbor as a group instead of split into pairs and threes showed a rapid identity formation as a group. The boys had not chosen which of the other members of their age set would return this summer, and they had not necessarily been members of the same clique in years past, but they all connected rather quickly.
This was aided by their construction of inclusive activities during down times, such as the game of Pelt. It was tested as tensions ran highly on the canoe trip and
CIT Program 125 the rift between Evan and Max threatened to force others to choose sides, but, within twenty-four hours, they were attempting to paddle with six people in a lightweight canoe as water came rushing over the gunwales, all for a laugh. What’s more, a few nights later, despite Evan’s tantrum that diverted group attention, Josh remarked on how well they fit as a group as recalled affectionately their decision to play a game of leapfrog while Furry and I were on the phone with camp.
C. Self-efficacy
According to Bandura (1977a), efficacy beliefs are based upon four components: performance accomplishments, vicarious experience, verbal persuasion, and physiological states. The biggest self-efficacy challenge for these boys was one of anticipation: would they be ready to become apprentice staff members when we returned to camp? They had been collecting vicarious experience as long as they had been at camp, watching their counselors work. This was their last chance to do that before they would be expected to begin enacting these lessons. They gathered what they could from watching Furry and me, but they also asked direct questions about our experience to help prepare them, and they shared what they had observed over the years with each other.
We spent a lot of time on verbal persuasion, both in an intentional way as we sat around the fire at night and described what the boys would be doing, and also in talking with them about their conduct. Evan’s tantrums at the end of the trip may have been problematic at the time, but they served as a demand for precisely this kind of verbal persuasion. He knew he shouldn’t be conducting himself the way he was, but he needed to force our hand and make us tell him that he could be a
CIT Program 126 good counselor once he stopped doing these things. Essentially, he was demanding that we help manage his physiological states to prepare him for success, not all that different from Jason’s direct questioning to the same end.
In terms of performance accomplishments, the physical challenges were no greater than they had been for the boys’ previous summers, and, in fact, were a little less grueling. The difference may have been that the boys were given increasing choice and control along the way, choosing canoeing over hiking for their final backcountry excursion, structuring their free time more themselves. Perhaps most impressive, though, is the cleaning out of the boathouse, an accomplishment that created a major shift from an inward to an outward focus, showing them that they could labor selflessly for others and even enjoy doing so.
D. Resilience
Resilience came mostly in the form of testing the group dynamic. The bickering they encountered at times tested them, and they did not always adapt in a positive manner. As the physical challenges were significantly less than previous summers, and the one hiking ascent that tested wills was turned around, there were few great accomplishments in this regard. The fact that, on this particular hike, things went badly and the boys still found positive ways to frame the experience, however, shows a propensity for positive adaptation that would serve them well in the second half of the summer.
E. Developmental observations
For the most part, this beginning portion of the trip was very similar to previous summers for the boys, and few new developmental traits were required of them.
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The bickering and occasional egocentric behavior were characteristic of the adolescent behavior they would have displayed the previous summer, particularly in regards to Evans challenges at the end of the trip. Nevertheless Evan’s, as well as the group’s, ability to recover from these challenges and self-correct in terms of conduct bode well. Later, at the close of the study, most of the boys would remark with wonder about how they had conducted themselves in a self-centered way on the trip compared to their later conduct, a criticism that, while sounding harsh, merely refers to the difference between the typical ego-based behavior of adolescents as compared to the boys’ later accomplishments.
The interviews and focus groups, as they progressed, also showed an increasing capacity for self-awareness and reflection that complemented the caregiving role that lay ahead of them. They were purposefully thinking and talking about positive adaptation to adversities big and small, and this is something that grew from week to week. Though these sessions were not intended to serve as a form of intervention, they were increasingly becoming quite useful to the boys as such, and this would continue to increase as the study progressed.
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VII. The Apprenticeship, July 14-21
A. July 14
Midnight Pizza is always supposed to be a surprise, though the older kids are smart enough to figure out when it’s coming. At the end of first session, the CITs return and put it on their first night back. The JLs do the same when they return at the end of second session. It’s a tradition that started in 1988. I know this, because I was part of that half-scared, half-elated group of kids that evacuated to the lodge in the middle of the night to be surprised by blasting dance music, flashing lights, and all of the baking sheet-sized pizzas we could eat. Twenty-three years later, the fear was all gone—kids knew why they were being rousted. It was also more like 10:30 than midnight to allow more time for kids to get back to sleep, but no one seemed to mind as long as it was dark and everyone was in their sleep clothes.
“Wow, I’m pretty sure I just fucking shit my pants,” Streisand said, waving the air behind him. We were in the back of the kitchen, putting together a strategy of attack for making the pizzas. Jason and Evan both looked at me with panic in their eyes. They weren’t worried about the cleanliness of Streisand’s underwear—they got that he was being hyperbolic in discussing a bout of flatulence—they didn’t know how to react to this sort of language, the kind of talk we had been weaning them off of, coming from the mouth of the assistant director. Here was a guy they had looked to as an authority figure their entire camp lives, a role model at the top
CIT Program 129 of the supervisory pantheon, finding a new low in terms of crassness. In the context of the mentorship of older staff, he was making a joke that we had trained them to believe was wholly inappropriate. I wanted to back Streisand off a little so they didn’t get confused, but I couldn’t come up with a way to do so that wouldn’t look like mom and dad were bickering in front of the children. I shrugged at the kids, and
Jason, at least, smiled, getting the subtlety here—this is how we talk sometimes when kids aren’t around, but that doesn’t mean it’s okay for you to join in. This was important step in starting to gather the cues of the culture of camp and expectations of staff conduct—Streisand was treating them as staff by not censoring his humor in front of them, but such a joke would be less welcome coming from them. It was not a total free-for-all.
“You and Dodger need to lay off the Fiber One bars,” I scolded, knowing that my two friends’ attempt to round out their dietary needs as we all crept toward middle age was the acknowledged source of Streisand’s somewhat regular gastrointestinal distress. Despite the flatulence, he was and is a brilliant and insightful guy, and at the time of this writing is in the middle of a postdoctoral research fellowship overseas.
“Never.” Streisand smiled and released an exclamation point of methane. He picked up where he had left off a few minutes ago. “We need one cheese-less for the lactose intolerant kid, and I’d say somewhere about a third to half vegetarian. You should set aside a few to get creative with.”
Partially because they had done this before as JLs, the kids and Furry, with the help of a few staff without cabin responsibilities, were an efficient machine
CIT Program 130 when it came to preparing the pizza, serving it, and scrubbing the pans. They had put together a clean-language dance playlist on an iPod (as opposed to, no doubt, the mix-tape we had listened to in 1988, or the CDs we had burned when I was on staff, or even the staff garage band we had put together a time or two, with me stepping in to sing an off-key lead on a few songs). The playlist was mostly foreign to me, but the CITs knew what they were doing, and the campers ate it up with as much enthusiasm as the pizza, dancing and frolicking in an un-self-conscious way few would have done had there been girls around to impress. It was all over in less than a half-hour. This was an important introduction. They entered camp and were reintroduced to the community at large by their labors in service to others. They had cooked and served the pizzas, decorated the lodge and run the program, and then cleaned up when it was all done. They were born anew, their caregiver role established in the eyes of the camp.
B. July 15-16
The next day was all about the labor. This is, in part, a function of being the junior-most staff. The counselors had been hard at work for a month, and this was the CITs’ chance to catch up. In terms of rites of passage, the manual labor heaped upon them was their chance to prove their worth. Furry and I had prepped them for this through our mentorship. If you want the respect of the staff, you earn it by busting your butt, we told them. Volunteer for whatever tasks come up. Everyone respects and appreciates the workhorse. The surest sign of immaturity or that you can’t be counted on is to shirk or even joke about shirking labor.
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First we cleaned out the vans and checked in our group gear, and then Furry and I took turns running the boys on a luggage crew, collecting first session duffels for shipping and sorting the already-received second session duffels in storage. It was sweaty, taxing labor. Furry bore the brunt of it, mostly out of his own workhorse nature. It was no accident that he had moved up through the camp pantheon faster than the others in his age set.
This was Max’s last day, as he was going home with the session one campers so that he could go off to attend an academic camp for the second half of the summer. Such is the state of summer camps like this one. My family and most of my friends had always been eight-week campers. Now, a significant majority of the kids only came up for four weeks, at least until they reached the oldest stages of camp, because, for members of this socioeconomic class, there were so many other
“obligations”—year-round sports, debate camps, band camps, camps for every special interest a kid had. At any rate, Max was passionate about what he was doing, and though he expressed regret about leaving us, there was no doubt that this opportunity was important to him.
Final words: Max
Faced with his absence, I discovered that I was going to miss Max. I was a bit wistful as we sat down in the lodge for our final interview. Max was easily the most reflective participant of the bunch, and this was the most thoughtful interview we did, so I feel compelled to include as much of it as is practical:
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This is our last chat, so, Max, let’s start off with the usual questions. Since we last met on Monday, which is just three or four days ago, has there been anything that you would say has been your biggest challenge?
My biggest challenge has been actually sticking to my decision to leave for debate camp, because everyone’s like ‘So, you sticking around for the last four weeks,’ and I’m like, ‘No,’ and everyone’s like ‘Yes,’ so I feel entirely left out and disappointed, like ‘Why are you leaving us?’…For some people, it’s like, ‘Oh, nice,’ and for other people, it’s like ‘Why?’ and it just becomes hard to maintain the focus to say ‘I want to go there; I want to do something different with my summer,’ which I haven’t been able to do for the last seven years.
So you have this challenge of balancing the world of camp, which you do love, right?
I wouldn’t…it’s not that I want to leave camp, it’s that I have to do something else…
…If you could have done anything differently in these last three or four days, what would it have been?
We’ll see, maybe I’ll email you later and be, like, “I wish I had stayed,” but I think the best thing I could’ve done has probably just been, like, made the most of today, because it is my one full day in camp, and, I mean, I did wash the vans for, like, the beginning of the day, which wasn’t exactly the thing I was thinking of doing, but I, I did get to hang out in my brother’s cabin for like an hour, which was great, and, so, maybe a little bit more of that would
CIT Program 133 have made this challenge easier, because I was able to see everybody in camp, and it was just better than if I had stuck with luggage duty the entire day.
And how are things with Evan?
What I mean when Evan has been authoritative is he’s taken the direction he’s had at camp, and he knows what he needs to do, he knows what everyone needs to do, however, he just seems to push the boundaries of what he can and cannot tell people forcefully, and some people won’t respond to it well. Some people will respond to it fine, however, it’s better that he did it here than on trip, because on trip people have a lot less tolerance for stuff like that, whereas in camp, it won’t be good, but at least people won’t become incredibly angry at him, and I think as he continues on the summer, he’ll find that he enjoys being in camp more, and that CIT will work out for him if he just eases up a bit.
…Do you think this trip has changed you in any way, or have you learned from it? What can you say just reflecting on the trip as a whole?
Um, I think, um, I’ve learned a lot more actual. Like, mind restraint. I know I haven’t been the cleanest camper that we’ve had.
By that you mean, like, language and that sort of thing.
Language, mind to place, thoughts, but I think I have learned some restraint, as in I know what boundaries to push for some people and what to not. Some people are better at it; some are not. On the trip, however, I think I’ve learned more about that when to, when to not… setting versus people…versus actual,
CIT Program 134 like, actual discretion you should use regardless of people, and this trip has been more eye-opening as in it’s been more growth oriented than JL or 21-
Day ever was, than necessarily just experience-oriented. Like, the experience of CIT has been great, but I think the idea of CIT was more to grow into being a counselor than to grow into being a person necessarily.
Do you feel like there’s anything from this you’ll take back into the world when you leave?
Um, well, at [my academic] camp, I’m not sure if these people will be sheltered, will be less inclined to vulgarity. I’m not sure, I mean, some could be, some could not be. My hope is that with the discretion that I’ve gained from CIT, I will know if that person is the right person to make those kind of jokes with. Or to not, because that could make or break me easily, and I think it’ll have some applications for it. School’s a different story. That could go either way.
Do you think you’ve learned anything about, um, meeting challenges in general and reacting to setbacks in any way.
Setbacks this trip have been very similar to the ones of JL and 21-day.
However, I think there’s been a lot more emphasis on actually learning from the setbacks instead of just rectifying them on this trip than on any of the other ones. On 21-day, it was “You did this, how could you? Never, ever do that exactly again?” and similarly on JL. However, here it’s “You messed up, notice, understand how the situation got there, and then know exactly how to
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diffuse that situation in the future,” and I think that’s been much more
beneficial than we’ve given you credit for.
Any final thoughts on the trip, the experience, participation in this?
It’s definitely made it interesting. I mean, I never, well, I did expect it after I
read the email, but I didn’t expect, um, on CIT that, I didn’t expect to actually
be giving interviews to my counselor and seeing him in this light, as, uh, but,
it’s made the trip much more memorable. Like, 21-day, each day blurred
together. Not just because the rain blurred together, but because it was just
the same thing constantly every day. We reminisced about stuff, but it was
always constantly hitting us, and JL we kept seeing completely different
sights...It was just many different things. We would just be living in the
moment and only focused on the moment. Whereas here, on this trip, thanks
to this, we’ve lived in the moment and then been able to relive those
moments that were either challenging or inspirational.
Despite what I perceived as a nuanced way of saying that the kids sometimes complained that we made them process their mistakes too much, I was flattered and concerned by what Max had said. His remark about the other trips helping them grow as people versus this one helping them become a counselor would have been disturbing out of context, but the rest of his comments clarified this—under the guise of growing as counselors, they were learning how to be adults and how to self- regulate their actions. On the one hand, I was also a little worried that I was, in some ways, creating what I was observing. That is, if the interviews were a significant part of the growth I was seeing, my conclusions would not necessarily be about this CIT
CIT Program 136 program as a whole, but a CIT program that included this element I had introduced; the act of observation was altering that which was being observed. Given that these are, essentially, case studies, I decided that as long as my methodology was clear and the potential effect of this process is discussed, the validity should stand, but any future application must be aware that these outcomes are moderated to an indeterminate degree by the collection of data. In other words, an important element of this particular program was the weekly processing, both in interviews and in focus groups, of challenges faced, how they were overcome, and what achievements had been accomplished.
Also important here is the emergence of the awareness that a dialogue with a mentor about behavior helps the participants better understand their behavior and, ideally, make better decisions, a form of cognitive behavioral therapy. Stumbling upon this felt like an original finding at the time, at least until
Tough (2012) published a very similar finding in his examination of character education in schools.
D. July 18-20
In the opening days of the session, the compliments to the CITs began pouring in. They had all taken to heart what Furry and I had both driven into their heads that the fastest way to earn the respect of fellow staff is to work hard and volunteer for anything that needed to be done. Even Jason and Evan, who had demonstrated the least maturity on trip, were working hard and rapidly earning respect. I wandered the villages as best I could during unstructured time, and
Jonesy, the head counselor of the youngest village who had been only a few age sets
CIT Program 137 behind me coming up through camp, made a point of inviting me to his village activities. I also popped in on activities, trying to split my time into even thirds between observation, write-up, and helping out Dodger, Babbs, and Mutt, the special programs director who had been a young counselor back when I was a camper.
What I liked about the reception of the CITs is that it ran counter to the more typical cycle of the camper-turned-staff. Often, campers see staff having such a good time and think that once they’re finally in that role they can get all of the privileges of being an adult along with the relative freedom from accountability they had as a kid. Essentially, they don’t get the difference between paying to be at camp and getting paid to be there, and every once in the while it requires a mid-summer termination of employment of one of their own to get the group’s attention. Camp puts up with them because when they do mature, they make pretty good, experienced counselors. I started off in that mode, though I had friends who knew better and influenced me to get my act together quickly. Among those friends, David and Esau had represented the better model of the camper-turned counselor— mature beyond their years, responsible, and adept at all of the minutiae of camp.
That is the model our CITs followed. No matter how much they might bicker among themselves, they deferred to older staff, they worked hard, and they were patient and enthusiastic with the kids. They had one of two paths to choose within the culture of camp and the expectations of staff conduct, and they had taken the higher road.
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One morning, I was sitting with my coffee in the back of the lodge, working up the energy to go back to my cabin to work on transcription, when Furry settled in next to me on the bench.
“So, you know how Graham’s girlfriend broke up with him the other night?” he began without prelude.
“No.”
“Yeah, well, she did. Leaving for college and all that.”
“I didn’t realize she was older,” I said.
“I know. I guess he’s kind of a stud. Anyway, now we just found out that his aunt died suddenly.”
“Crap. When?”
“I guess yesterday.”
“Crap. How’s he doing with it?
“He’s seems like he’s taking it in stride, but who knows.”
“Funeral?”
“Don’t know yet. Likely to be up here though. Her family lives, like, a hundred miles from here.”
E. July 21
As it happened, the funeral would be nearly a week away. A few days into the session, I volunteered to chauffer/chaperone the CITs on their day off. We started with breakfast at a truck stop known for the “Cajun Omelet.” I’d been eating them forever—when the diner in town that served them shut down fifteen years ago, this place started making them—and I still don’t know what’s so “Cajun” about
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Hollandaise, peppers and onions. The kids enjoyed it, though, having heard about them from their counselors without ever having the opportunity to go into town to try one. Jason and Graham even ordered black coffee without sweetener, something we had teased them into doing in order to impress their co-counselors with their worldliness. Even Furry and I weren’t perfect when it came to the mentorship of older staff.
During the customary Target shopping outing, Graham picked out a black dress shirt to wear to the service. He spoke little of it that day—this was his father’s sister, and he was a little close to his cousins on that side because they were his age, but he had not seen her in a long time. He mostly let himself hang out with his peers and he pushed his outside troubles aside. In his interview, he conceded that allowing the other CITs to distract him from the loss had been a big help in growing acclimated to the news. Of everything that happened this summer, this was perhaps the closest to a non-contextual adversity or trauma faced by one of the CITs. I was watching him closely for displays of resilience.
There’s a resort on the same lake as the town, just a few minutes north, and they traditionally sold six-dollar day passes to area camp staff for use of their beach, indoor pool, and workout facilities. Max might have been gone, but in his place was
Gino, who had skipped JL the previous year and worked as an early-CIT second session. He was back to do the same this year. He was a nice enough kid, but a few minutes of goofing around in the lake with everyone climbing on a floating, inflatable, 20-foot-high “iceberg” was enough for me to develop a bias against him.
Whereas the others, even Evan, understand a group-centric focus as a shared ideal
CIT Program 140 at this point, Gino didn’t get it. I set up some guidelines about conduct, appointing
Quint as the titular lifeguard since my cert was expired. Still, despite the other kids trying to gently correct him, I kept having to call out to Gino to stop doing this or that—whether it was hanging off the iceberg in a way that would make it tip or jumping from an unsafe height. I think a big part of this, though, was Gino not having the month of build-up time on the trip with us when we were constantly setting expectations and correcting the kids when they crossed boundaries. He was a bit feral, having not answered to anybody in a long time and not having given serious enough thought to what kind of role model he should be. His shortcomings were a testament to both the formal rite of passage the trip had provided and the dynamics of the CIT cohort, in part closed to Gino because he did not have the same shared experience.
Quint commiserated with me as I waded back to look over things from shallow water. I’m grateful for that particular morning spent with Quint. Having received the brush-back pitch of discovering that being a counselor wasn’t easy and that he didn’t have all the answers, he appeared to be possessed of a newfound humility. He was sincerely trying to be a good counselor, and he was discovering that it wasn’t something that came as easily to him as all of the previous tasks before him this summer. It probably helped that Jason, in particular, was taking to the role so readily. He was one of the least polished campers in our group, and one of the least mature in terms of everyday conduct on trip, but he was taking his role very seriously, working hard at it, and doing noticeably well. Quint was doing just fine himself—I heard nothing but compliments about both him and Graham from their
CIT Program 141 shared head counselor—but he wasn’t the superstar he had grown accustomed to being. He didn’t say any of this directly. As we waded, people-watching, he spoke of the challenges some of the kids in the cabin and the village presented and how he was working through the personality dynamics of his co-counselors. He was doing a good job of identifying which traits in them he should emulate and which he should avoid. He was taking the expectations of the caregiver role seriously, and while his desire to fulfill these expectations may have humbled him, that desire was also driving him.
Co-counselors were a big theme in those opening days of the session, as the mentorship of older staff was diffused from just Furry and me to myriad counselors of varying ability and experience. Josh was attempting to get to know his co-counselors, as well, watching their behavior and trying to follow their lead. There was also an interesting self-awareness to his interview in that he was concerned that he wasn’t being “self-expressive” enough, making it hard for both co-counselors and kids to get to know him. In his interview, Evan conceded he was nervous both about getting along with his campers and with his co-counselors. Incidentally, he and Max exchanged several friendly texts in the days immediately following Max’s departure. Across the board, these interviews had gone from an obligation or favor to an important venue for self-reflection and mentorship. I didn’t do much in the way of offering advice, but I asked questions, hoping to help them understand and process their challenges.
Jonesy had told me the night before the day off that there had been a conflict with Evan’s notoriously problematic co-counselor, Ugg, but that the guy had
CIT Program 142 apologized before Jonesy had to get involved. When I brought this up to Evan that day, he said the conflict was with the other counselors, not with him. I’m still not sure if he was unaware of the conflict, was covering it up due to some fault on his part, or if Jonesy had the story wrong.
As a big part of this day was the CITs seeing the inside of all the day off destinations they’d been hearing about, we went to the popular pizza place in town for dinner and I filled them in on the lore behind it—the split between the two brothers, one who owned this place and the other who owned the other prominent pizza place camp people rarely frequented, and the Olympic Curling team that had been made up largely of the staff of this very pizzeria. Learning these day off rituals was an important part of learning to be a counselor, of fitting in with the culture of the camp and expectations of staff conduct. There’s a relatively healthy set of activities that provides a way of relaxing and blowing off steam that is age- appropriate for the youngest and oldest staff alike. This first day off helped stay busy enough to not be bored and would help them fit in with the other staff when they shared the experience of goofing around at the resort or eating pizza. As these were teenagers still learning the customs of eating out in a group, ordering and paying were both nightmares, but we survived.
The waitress smiled as she stood over the table, her patience clearly tested.
“Okay, I had one-third the pepperoni, and I’ll pay for half the breadsticks.”
“I’ll pay two dollars towards the breadsticks.”
“Dude, just cover the other half.”
“I didn’t eat half of them.”
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“Who got a salad? I don’t remember a salad.”
“You wanted to order them, and I only ate one because you guys couldn’t finish them.”
“I’m only paying for my calzone. How much is that?”
“I had the salad, but I didn’t eat it. I didn’t like the dressing.”
“Fine, I’ll pay for half, but that only leaves me three dollars to put in for the pizza.”
“They still charged you for it. Did you tell them you didn’t like it?”
“The calzone is twelve dollars….seriously, you’re not going to tip?”
The waitress glanced toward the kitchen, then back at the table. “Why don’t I give you guys a minute. Take your time.”
“I’ll cover you for the rest, but you got to get me back.”
“I’ll put your movie on my credit card.”
“They might have taken it off if you told them you didn’t like it, but you have to pay for it now.”
“That’s fine. I figured I would, I was just saying I didn’t like it.”
“Is five dollars a good tip on twelve?”
“Wait, who hasn’t paid?”
What’s most remarkable about the minor bickering at dinner was how free of bickering the day as a whole had been. The group dynamic of the CIT cohort had regressed just a little, as if being on trip without responsibility for others had left them with an energy to bicker that a few days of working had sapped from them.
This illuminated just how much the expectations of the caregiver role,
CIT Program 144 focusing on others versus themselves, shaped their behavior. By the time we were walking around downtown after dinner, everyone was tired. A quick stop by
Dairy Queen, though, and the day was complete—they had participated in a ritualistic day off that consisted of pretty much the same activities their own counselors had participated in, and those guys’ counselors before them.
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VIII. The Apprenticeship: July 22-July 28
A. July 22
I was a little anxious leading Josh’s cabin through the woods to the west of camp.
“Are we going the right way?” Weller, the lead counselor asked respectfully.
“As long as the lake is on our right, we’re heading in the right direction,” I answered. “It’s been a while, so it’s totally possible for me to miss it, but even if we do, when we hit private property, we can just walk back up the road a few hundred yards and we’ll be back on the snowmobile trail.”
“Cool.”
I really hoped we weren’t going to miss it. Up ahead the trees cleared a bit. I thought maybe…just the abandoned A-frame cabin. At least we were on the right track.
Finally, a bigger opening…well, shit. “So we’re not going to play around on that,” I said.
“That’s awesome,” one kid said.
“What is it?” another one asked.
“Is that ‘The Secret Sandhill?” Josh asked.
“It is,” I said, “but it’s a lot bigger than it used to be. Guys, there’s a reason it’s a secret. We’re not supposed to be here. You can’t tell anybody that you’ve seen it.”
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Of course they could tell anybody they’d like, but I wanted to up some of the excitement since it wasn’t going to be safe to run down. I had told Dodger exactly where I was going to take them. The Secret Sandhill wasn’t exactly secret, it was just tough to find. Ten years earlier, it had been a steep fifteen-foot incline of loose sand where a backhoe had removed some dirt for another building site, then moved on. It had remained unchanged for quite some time. Now, though, more earth had been removed at the bottom of the hill, resulting in something more akin to a thirty-foot cliff. The march of progress.
Once the appropriate oohs and ahs were out of the way and the cabin of seventh graders felt properly initiated into the upper echelons of camper hierarchy, we continued on toward the snowmobile trail, a six-foot-wide swath of grass that ran mostly just parallel to a blacktop road. This was a hiking conditioner, the daypacks stuffed a little extra to provide them with practice carrying weight before a backcountry trip. The older villages were geared much more towards backcountry than the younger ones, and kids were expected, for the most part, to go through a progression of increasingly longer backpacking, biking, or canoeing trips.
Pretty soon, as was per usual, one kid fell behind the group. While the other two counselors weren’t doing anything wrong, necessarily, they seemed less concerned with this kid than Josh did. He fell into step with the straggler. I didn’t want to awkwardly hover, so I asked him about the experience later.
Tell me your biggest challenge this week.
Um, my biggest challenge this week, was, uh, dealing with one of the kids on
the half-day conditioner, because he was having a tough time hiking. He
CIT Program 147 thought his pack was too heavy. He wasn’t thinking positively, and I told him,
“hiking’s all mental, and anyone can do it if they’re positive,” and told him,
“you just have to distract yourself from the physical part of it, and you have to have conversations with other kids rather than just look down at the ground while you’re doing it.” So, that was tough.
What was the other thing you told him?
I reminded him of things that he did in the past, that, if he could do that, he would be able to do this.
So you looked at past challenges he had as ways to show him that he really could achieve this next challenge…
Yes.
That it wasn’t a big increment, it wasn’t an insurmountable task, it was something in line with things he’s done before.
Right.
Where did you learn how to do that?
I don’t know, I just kind of figured that out. Maybe you did it at some point with me or a different camper.
No, probably wasn’t necessarily even me, but do you think, like, when you were younger and you had trouble, a counselor probably did that?
Probably.
Do your parents ever do that with you?
Yeah. He kept saying “I’m a weak kid, I’m really skinny.” I’m like, “okay, seriously, look to your left. Look how skinny I am. You can do it.”
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So you were drawing on your own experiences when you felt challenged as a
hiker.
Yeah.
And you knew that you could do it, so you knew that he could clearly do it.
Yeah.
I have no idea where Josh drew out this idea of scaffolding efficacy beliefs through verbal persuasion, but it reads like something directly from Bandura’s
Social Learning Theory (1977b). It also showed the participant, presently being studied as the recipient of this kind of programming, actually administering it to another. He had integrated past mentorship of older staff via the culture of the camp and the expectations of staff conduct, and he was now putting these ideas to use build up the self-efficacy of a camper in his charge. Of course, not only was one of the participants excelling at his job of being a counselor, but it was the participant who was perhaps the quietest and least self-assured at the start of the program.
B. July 23
Standing amidst the crowd at the fundraiser, surrounded by visiting camp parents and alumni, I caught a reflection of myself in the window. Dodger had talked me into tagging along for his outing into town that night. It was rare to be dressed this way during the summer, a polo shirt and jeans, but the image staring back at me was as expected; remaining hair on my head buzzed away, the hint of crow’s feet at the eyes, no question that I was a lot closer to the age at which Elvis died than to my teenage and preteen years. Nevertheless, looking around the room, I was assaulted
CIT Program 149 by faces from my childhood. I saw the married couples who used to populate the staff village, including the grey-bearded riflery instructor, the mustachioed waterfront director, both now grandparents, and any number of people with less interesting facial hair; I saw the cute girls’ camp counselor we all had crushes on when we were kids; I even saw the ageless Slim and his equally ageless wife. I felt a hand on my shoulder and half-expected Marley’s ghost (Dickens, 1843) to tell me that it was time to go. I turned.
“Bruno? You’re Brad, Randy’s brother, right?”
I glanced at the nametag as I shook his hand, looking at yet another familiar face: my brother’s old cabin counselor, now a camp dad heavily involved in the scholarship fund benefitted by the night’s auction. The room was peppered with other camp parents, but it had a bit of a clubby feel, parents who had not worked at or attended camp more hesitant to venture into the silent auction room from the main floor of the restaurant, which itself was half taken over by parents’ weekend attendees ushered off of camp grounds by well before dinner time.
I found Slim again later. “Slim,” I said, “I think Cecil Andrews pulled ahead of you on the canoe kelly with a phone bid.”
“I can’t have that,” he said rushing off to the table filled with extraneous camp memorabilia being auctioned off. He did not pause to think about the fact that Cecil
Andrews’ name had been added to nearly every camp list from about 1987 through the mid-nineties, ending about two years after he had stopped coming to camp. The special programs director would read off a long list, then, in unison, the entire camp would say, in a singsong, “…and Cecil Andrews.”
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He walked back smiling. “Okay, you got me, Brad.” I don’t think it was by accident that he called me by my camper/real world name instead of my staff name.
Important to understanding the culture of the camp and the expectations of staff conduct is understanding the fictive kin network created by the camp. This may not be true of all camps, but this camp is not alone in creating such a network; I have discovered others over the years, as camp people have a tendency to sniff each other out. Nevertheless, the fact generations of staff and campers find ways to reunite, often decades after their last formal connection to the camp, is quite remarkable.
The older staff their, now in their sixties and seventies, not only raised their own children while working at camp, those children went on to work at camp, and their grandchildren will likely attend the camp. This bond, and the fact that they remain connected to people like Dodger and others who still work there, create a sort of trust; the current staff, at least the ones who have returned for multiple summers, understand that they are the current caretakers for an institution that existed long before them and will exist long after them. My experience has shown that many good schools and other institutions create such a bond, which in turn decreases staff turnover and strengthens institutional culture.
C. July 24-28
Most of the focus group that week was spent discussing how the boys went about doing their jobs as counselors. Josh asked about what to do if you found yourself not liking a kid. The answer—spend more time with them until you do, as opposed to avoid them—surprised them. Jason and Quint talked about homesick campers, and in explaining their efforts and discussing the matter with other CITs,
CIT Program 151 they arrived at some sturdy conclusions about how to approach the matter. They asked about appropriate disciplinary responses, prompting me to explain “natural consequences” and “logical consequences,” as well as joke about more draconian steps that they should never take. I also shared what I had learned as a school administrator—that the conversation you have about the consequences can be far more effective than the consequence itself. They exchanged notes about the challenges of getting kids to clean the cabin without just performing the various cleaning tasks themselves when the kids have trouble doing it. The vast majority of the session was spent raising the various problems of the job and brainstorming responses. Though this could seem like a construction that results from the format of the study, that summer as well as my many summers before, I had been privy to such conversations, usually sitting around a table in the lodge after the campers were asleep. It would not be uncommon for one or more experienced counselors to sit with a group and help them work through responses to challenges in a very similar fashion and on an entirely impromptu basis. Not only is the mentorship of older staff a big part of how counselors are expected to learn their job, but the culture of the camp and the expectations of staff conduct dictate such a collaborative approach. The group dynamic of the CIT cohort had absorbed this value and was putting it to use as they attempted to fulfill the expectations of the caregiver role.
One problem that did not get solved was Evan’s challenges with his co- counselor. Ugg was running hot and cold, nice one minute and mean the next. He had had some trouble with his responsibilities outside of the cabin, too, but he was a
CIT Program 152 young former camper, and the culture of the camp is one that tries to rehabilitate someone like Ugg several times over before cutting him loose. I don’t know Ugg’s backstory, but he was one of us, so he stayed on, even returning the next summer, much to Evan’s chagrin. Regardless, the problem of a moody, hard to get along with co-counselor was a static, not evolving one for Evan, so the challenge was to cope with a difficult situation, something all the other CITs agreed he was doing very well.
In that week’s interview, Graham recounted the visit to his aunt’s funeral and again his conduct reflected a commendable maturity:
… I’d say the other thing was my aunt’s funeral, like going through it with my
three cousins and their dad, because they were taking it really hard. It’s like,
the dad doesn’t know what he’s going to do. I think they’re broke, I’m not
really sure. That was hard, to, like, see them like that, because I think of my
cousins as, like, these rough-and-tumble [Midwesterners], and, like, seeing
(one of them) just, like, sobbing, for four or five hours straight. Um, that was
hard.
So, what did you do?
It was kind of like, being supportive. There (were) a lot of people there. But it
was, just kind of like being there, even though I’m not, I don’t live by them or
anything, but just, know, like, they have support. I think that was good. And
then, just, like, letting them know that you’re there and it’s not the end of the
world. But also making sure it’s not the only thing you talk about. They don’t
want to focus on that. They want to get over that. I think that’s hard because
that’s all that you’re thinking about, but they want to just move on…I think
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also they weren’t exactly expecting me. You don’t really expect your cousin
that lives far away…
Did they know you were in the area for the summer?
I don’t think they knew. The cousins that picked me up knew. But, I think, I
think (the dad) knew because my dad talked to him on the phone. But I don’t
think anybody else. Like, I don’t think my cousins knew. I think it was, kind
of, like, ‘they live in [far away], but they care.’ That kind of thing.
That is nice. Do you feel better for having gone?
I felt like it helped. Just to have another family member instead of just a ton
of friends and stuff.
I wasn’t getting as much daily interaction with the CITs now that they were dispersed, but that was definitely making the interviews and focus groups more lively. They were starting to come into the interviews eager to share things they had been saving up now that they were familiar with both me and with the format. They appeared to be thinking about their answers ahead of time and had more to say when we sat down. Now that they were familiar with the questions, they were recognizing the adverse challenges they encountered, and the question of “are satisfied with the way you handled that” echoed in their mind. What we had created, within an already healthy culture, was an additional layer of expectations where positive adaptation to adversity had become a guiding principle.
I enjoyed observing the CITs interacting with the older staff, as well, being treated as peers despite a clear difference in bearing and confidence. It was the
CIT Program 154 beginning of the diminution of age set boundaries that occurs when campers become staff. What was particularly rewarding was watching how the competency of this group exceeded that of many of their older peers. They were more engaged with the campers, and though they were sometimes prone to standing around and socializing with other staff, they seemed to have a clearer sense of purpose when it came to the expectations of the caregiver role.
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IX. The Apprenticeship: July 29-August 4
A. July 29
On the night the youngest village had their first overnight, their head counselor, Jonesy, invited me to hop on my bike and ride around with him to the in- camp campsites so that I could check on how my CITs were doing. Three of the five were in his village.
I grabbed my bike from behind my cabin and followed Jonesy out of the staff village. There had been some light rain, not so much that we hadn’t stuck it out for our barbecue, but the leaves and branches we brushed against once we turned down a narrow horse trail soaked us thoroughly. We found the first, CIT-less, cabin group in repose around a fire. They were playing a game, and Jonesy and I sat down and joined for a while. They, too, had stuck it out through the light rain. They had their rain gear on, as was appropriate, and were doing quite well.
We rode the horse trail back into the main camp property and crossed to the site that was closest to the villages. “The sandhill” as opposed to “the secret sandhill” covered the slope from the uphill villages to the soccer field. Every few years it was replenished with a fresh truckload of sand. Just off the top of the hill stood a large canvas teepee fifteen feet in diameter. The camp left it up for the full season for overnights such as this, allowing the very youngest kids to not have to set up their own tents.
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Jason’s cabin was running up and down the sandhill, not as part of any game, but rather as an expulsion of excess energy and expression of pure joy. Jason stepped away to talk to us.
“Jonesy, we need to talk to you about Howie.”
I almost cracked up at the gravity of his tone.
“We’re not sure what to do about him. We’ve tried…” He went on describe some very reasonable steps, and Jonesy, appropriately, counseled patience. This exchange was fascinating both because of Jason’s efforts to be mature and responsible, as well as his confusion that the authority figure didn’t have any wisdom to offer that would make the problem go away. He was seeking mentorship of older staff to solve a problem created by the expectations of the caregiver role.
Nevertheless, Jason had really done all he could do to solve the problem; sometimes, things can’t be made perfect or whole, an important lesson for him to learn. His faced turned quizzical as he appeared to contemplate this notion.
From there, we rode through the downhill villages and left our bikes beside the services area, then walked along the shore to get to the site next to the now closed-down house Slim used to live in during the summer. Quint was standing aside with his co-counselors, watching the kids. Unfortunately, he was mostly following their stand-offish example. The mentorship of older staff was not of great aid here. They weren’t bad counselors, and the kids were active without doing anything wrong, but it wasn’t the engagement we had seen with the first two groups. They did gather a bit when I told them the story of Slim discovering a forest fire started by a lightning strike. It was the autumn after my second year as a
CIT Program 157 camper, and he was overdue to return home to the town where the camp was based in the winter. He should not have been there, and the fire logically should have progressed into the pine strewn service area, but he was there, the fire progressed more slowly than it should have (in part due to his handy bucket work), and, eventually the fire was defeated before significant damage was done. The trees behind the service area still show the scars from the fire. This sort of lore was an important part of the culture of the camp. Everyone likes to believe that there is something mystical about the camp, that some divine being is watching over it and keeping it safe. This increases the status and prestige of the in-group, making membership that more important to its members.
Once we recovered our bikes, we rode to the opposite end of the shoreline to find Evan’s group, sitting together to watch the sunset. There was little of interest to report, which is remarkable in and of itself; bickering between Ugg and Evan, as well as between Ugg and the other co-counselors, had become the norm. They were together as a group and in good spirits.
B. July 30
Josh and Graham had older kids and were not on the overnights. In Josh’s case, though, I had the opportunity to pick his cabin up from their three-day backpacking trip a few hours away. They were tired, smelly, and happy when they approached the van.
“How was the trip?” I asked.
“Good,” they all said. “But the bugs were kind of bad,” one of the campers added.
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“The bugs were absolutely horrible,” Weller, the British lead counselor added loudly. “Trip would have been brilliant without them.”
“The bugs weren’t that bad,” Josh asserted quietly but clearly enough for me to hear him from where he was standing at the back of the group. No one contradicted him.
I had to have been grinning. He understood how to lead better than the titular lead counselor—in processing the trip, you celebrate the accomplishment while downplaying a nuisance like bugs—it helps to shape the campers’ memory of the trip. I also liked the respect he was accorded. He stated a contradictory opinion, and no one disputed it or argued. In this instance, he understood the expectations of the caregiver role better than his co-counselor. Despite being the youngest staff member, he, in this case, was the one offering mentorship.
C. July 31
I didn’t get a lot of time with Graham around his campers, but his issues appeared to fall into the normal range of his fellow CITs. That is, his first concern was being a good counselor and the expectations of the caregiver role. He managed to compartmentalize what was going on at home and focus on the work in front of him. His interview that week reflected this, and it also provided an opportunity to talk about the personal issue that had been set aside by the funeral:
What has been your biggest challenge this week?
I think, just, I think it’s been, um, I have a group of maybe three campers that
I particularly find, well, and my co[-counselors]s find quite annoying. They’re
not, like, bad kids, and they don’t cause problems, but they’re just, like,
CIT Program 159 they’re always talking, they’re always yelling, they’re running around, like, not wreaking havoc, but, like, irritating people, and I think my biggest challenge has been like, handling them, but also, like, not being too harsh on them to where they feel like they’re being singled out. They need to know that they’re doing something wrong and correct it, but I need to make sure
I’m not being a total jerk about it, and also make sure I’m not showing favoritism to the other campers that I find less annoying.
Do you think you’ve handled it well?
Yeah. I think me, myself, and my co[-counselor]s have handled it well. It’s these three kids and we’ve told them, it’s getting later in the summer, we’ve been with them a while, and, like, we all need our space, and we need to give each other our space, and we talk to them about that. It’s helped a lot, I think.
Actually, we had a camper who was homesick the entire summer, and he’s no longer homesick, and he’s actually not homesick. He’s a fantastic kid. We forced him on the sailing trip and he loved it, and that helped a lot. Since he came back, he’s been perfect.
What about personal stuff? How are you doing with all the stuff you’ve had to deal with this summer?
I think I’ve pretty much gotten over my aunt passing away, like, I’m moving on pretty well from that. It’s not too much in my head anymore. Camp’s helped a lot with that, too, because there’s some much to do that it keeps my mind on other things.
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This display of resilience, of positive adaptation to traumatic events, was encouraging, but he did not offer enough data to make the case that he would not have found similar coping methods at home.
Was there something with the girlfriend at home?
She tries to text me every once in a while, and then it gets awkward, but,
otherwise, I haven’t been thinking about her much at all.
When did y’all break up?
Like, uh, two days, how long ago did I go to the funeral, two weeks ago?
Time is a blur here. Uh, ten days ago?
So, like, twelve days ago, so almost two weeks.
Was it tough dealing with that being far away?
No. I think it would have been easy if I was home. But, like, I mean, I was just,
like, okay. It was, kinda mutual. It was legitimate in my mind, too, because
she’s going away to college, and, like, “our relationship is not going to work if
for two years, I’m seeing you once every four months.”
How long had y’all dated?
Half a year?
So a long time, but not, like, your entire high school career or anything.
Yeah.
It didn’t hurt that a girl who worked in the office, two years Graham’s senior, had a huge crush on him.
For all Evan’s success, he perhaps met with the biggest challenge that week.
Curly had been the director when I was his kid, and his daughter now owned the
CIT Program 161 camp and served as Dodger’s counterpart at the girls’ camp across the lake. At eight years old, her son was among the youngest campers in camp, though he was big for his age. The size was actually a problem; he looked older than he was, so people tended to be surprised when he acted his age. He had been acting up in some way in the lodge, and he wouldn’t leave Evan alone. Evan lost it and yelled at him. There was a physical element to it, too, but not at a level of abuse. I never got a clear picture of that part, but the end result was that the child was in no way physically hurt, but the physical element accompanied by the yelling had scared him that much more.
This sort of thing happened all the time, and had any other member of supervisory staff seen it, they would have quelled it, then taken Evan aside to coach him about how to approach the situation. If it had been an experienced cabin counselor or activity specialist nearby, it wouldn’t have even made it up to supervisory staff, let alone to the directors. Unfortunately, though, the person who saw it this time was the child’s mother, who happened to have come across the lake for a meeting with Dodger at the time.
It would have been Furry’s job as CIT coordinator to sit in on Evan’s talk with
Dodger the next morning, but since he was on his day off, Dodger asked me to do it.
We had barely sat down in the eighth grade village fire ring before tears started to well in Evan’s eyes. Suddenly, the camper I had seen so much of on the trip was back.
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Dodger explained his interpretation of what had happened, and Evan agreed that it was accurate. Dodger explained why such a thing couldn’t happen, and, sniffling, Evan agreed. He apologized and promised to do better.
At no point did he make excuses or devolve into self-castigation and self-pity.
Maybe this wasn’t the Evan I knew on the trip. Evan had made a mistake, was taking ownership of his choice, and was learning to grow from it. Rather than allow this mistake to undermine his efficacy beliefs, he was using it as a means by which he could become more competent. In this particular context, as evidenced by the tears,
Evan felt a very real emotional threat; he had been doing his job well, and his confidence had been bolstered by this, and now he was presented with evidence that undermined that self-concept. Faced with this adversity, he was choosing to be resilient, to adapt in a positive way.
E. August 2-3
The final failure in my attempt at being a faceless observer occurred the day after the time off:
“And now Bruno has a special announcement.”
I stepped up to the microphone, and I saw the smiles on the faces of all the former campers on the staff. I used to be funny on the microphone. I used to make up a lot of stories, playfully call people out, and generally be goofy. This was no longer the case. Nevertheless, it was time to roll out the greatest hits to the gathered crowd of nostalgia-seekers.
I skipped any introductory pleasantries and slapped on my best smirk. “Who likes food?” I shouted.
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Cheers and laughter.
“Who likes Bruno?” I shouted.
Even louder cheers and laughter.
“Who wants to spend more time with Bruno and get to eat awesome food?” I shouted.
It was a tougher sentence to follow, so the cheers were not as loud. I decided to get to the point. “On Wednesday’s sign-up, you can choose ‘Outdoor Cooking with
Bruno’ and have the rare opportunity to spend time with the Bruno while preparing his delightful backcountry specialty, jambalaya. If you’re lucky, he’ll even let you eat the jambalaya while he teaches you how to refer to yourself in the third person.”
Pause. Silence.
“And who likes referring to themselves in the third person?” I shouted.
Cheers and laughter.
The day of the cooking class, close to half of the kids who were not out on trips showed up to the ballfield for the cooking class. With the help of the CITs, I had set up five tables equipped with camping stoves, a bucket of ingredients, and a copy of the recipe. Each CIT was assigned a group of about eight to ten kids, and I moved between the groups as they cooked, expecting to troubleshoot.
There wasn’t much troubleshooting to do. From my field journal:
They kept the kids engaged, they kept things safe, they succeeded in the task
(making Jambalaya) and when things went wrong—the recipe required more
water, some of the stoves didn’t work that well, etc.—they reacted with
aplomb…Graham’s stove was proper f’ed, but once I sent him for a new
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pump, it worked—and he was forty minutes behind the other groups. Still,
his kids turned down the opportunity to eat someone else’s product and
waited patiently for their own.
I couldn’t have been more proud as I moved between the groups. Every one of them beat the pants off the jambalaya sometimes prepared by the otherwise talented kitchen staff. Though only Quint had ever formally learned my recipe previously, they all displayed enough self-efficacy to tackle the task before them. The expectation of the caregiver role was that they take initiative, problem solve, and run their meal preparation in a way that put the kids enjoyment, participation, learning, and satisfaction first, and they all excelled.
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X. The Apprenticeship: August 4-11, Post-Program Conversations
A. August 4-11
I had discovered upon my arrival at camp that summer that Mutt would have to leave about a week early to report back to his school, so falling prey to one of the hazards of using a research site with which I had so much history, I agreed to help out with his duties for those few days. This pulled me away from direct observation a little bit, limiting first person observation, but, given the intimate nature of those cabin conversations in the waning days of a summer, it was probably good to give the CITs a little space and let them report events back to me.
As kids get ready to return home, they tend to vacillate between extreme attachment to camp and attempts to disassociate themselves from it. This can be tough on the staff, themselves attempting to come to terms with the close of season and a return to a world less idyllic than that bounded by these few hundred wooded acres. Staff tensions could run high, and nuisances can become near-crises, as Quint discovered during an assignment to Pottery:
Quint: I think one of my toughest moments this week was—I just got, I don’t
know. Yesterday I was assigned to Pottery, and I was like, “Stache (the
pottery activity head), I’m assigned to pottery” at lunch, and he was like, “all
right, you’re going to do some work,” and I just walked in and he undermined
me to a point where I just wanted to walk out—
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Evan: Happens all the time.
Quint: But, like, I’ve had a good summer and stuff. And, like, I don’t know, he just undermined me and stuff, and he was, like, “How’s it going?” and I’m
“This isn’t what I usually do but I’m doing it,” and he was like, “Aww, wah,” and I’m like, “Stache, I do work at home.” I was just, I don’t know. It was like he was being a complete d[ouche].
Josh: What’d he have you do?
Quint: He had a sink full of things, and he was talking to me and I’m like,
“What have these been here all summer, “ and he’s like “Nope, they’re fresh just for you.” And I’m like, “cool,” and he’s like, and it was just, like, he kept on going at it, and I just wanted to walk out, and, I don’t know. It was one of those moments where I—
Philipson: So you felt like he was kind of talking down to you—
Quint: He was completely talking down to me.
Jason: He always does that.
Evan: I go to pottery all the time. That’s all he does.
Jason: Does that bother you? I would hate to work at pottery all the time.
Evan: I’m like, “do you know what this is,” and he’s like, “figure it out. C’mon, you got this. You’re here. Figure it out. It’s your turn.” I’m like, “Hey, Stache, I can’t find this,” he’s like “too bad. Figure it out.”…
Philipson: Does he treat other counselors like this, or just CITs?
Jason: I heard he just doesn’t like CITs or something.
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Quint: It was one of those moments where I was, like, “This isn’t what I usually do.” And he was, like, “Aww, do you want me to send you to Furry and you can do something else,” and I’m like, “if I got sent to Furry, he would give me work that would help the camp.” I just want to be like, “Stache, shut the eff up. I’ll do your crap, but don’t undermine me.”
Evan: I’ve had experiences with him like that, too. He only treats CITs this way. He lets (names another counselor) make his own things and glaze his own things.
Quint: Yeah, he doesn’t respect—
Philipson: I wonder if he had a bad experience with previous CITs or something.
Quint: Even if he did, like—
Graham: He’s always nice to me.
Quint: It’s not like, respectful if we—
Jason: I’m scared of him, kind of.
Quint: I’m not scared of him, I—
Jason: Like, I try to impress him, but—
Evan: Yesterday, at dinner, I tried to offer him egg rolls, and he’s like, “Fuck, no.”
Philipson: That’s just funny.
Quint: That’s funny
Evan: After he already ate two.
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Quint: I don’t know. It was one of those moments standing there, like, I don’t
need to be doing this, and I’m doing it.
Philipson: But you shut your mouth and you did it.
Quint: Yeah. I wasn’t going to turn around and be, like, “Stache, shut the fuck
up. I’m doing this for you. I’m doing your shit. I can walk out of there right
now and go talk to (the program director)…
Jason: So, how do you think you handled it?
Quint: I mean, I think I handled it—there were two like, I kept thinking in my
mind there are two situations right now that I can do. One, I can, or three,
One, I can just walk out, throw all the crap down…Two, I can turn around
when he says something and start yelling, or three, I can just shut up until it’s
done.
We all agreed that Quint had done the right thing, the mature thing, by swallowing his pride and enduring. He had been presented with poor mentorship of older staff, and though the trauma was relatively minor, it was a situation that could have turned very bad should Quint have chosen to confront Stache further in that moment. His choice to swallow his pride and knock out the work for the good of the kids present showed both resilient positive adaptation to adversity and a healthy respect for the expectations of the caregiver role by avoiding a confrontation between authority figures in front of the kids.
When Jason told of how badly he wanted to lose his temper with his campers while packing them, he showed similar restraint. Putting their responsibilities and the well-being of others ahead of their own impulses, both had acted admirably and
CIT Program 169 with a presence of mind beyond most sixteen year-olds in fulfilling the expectations of the caregiver role. Interestingly, of all the focus group sessions and interviews, this last focus group was the only time they used foul language. No one looked at me to see if I would correct them, as they would’ve earlier in the summer. They seemed to have finally understood the duality of how staff act around each other versus the kids. This is an important subtlety in the culture of the camp and expectations of staff conduct. Their “filters” as they called them, were internalized enough to be switched on and off.
All was not sunshine and roses when it came to their comportment, however.
They told me the story of what had happened when, as a group, they ventured to the ballfield with large quantities of water balloons to fulfill a cabin’s scholarship auction item, “throw water balloons at the CITs.” It wasn’t necessarily a creative auction item, but a very satisfying one for the winning cabin group. Trouble arose, however, while waiting for the event to begin. The subject came up as Graham discussed his challenges for the week:
Graham: The summer’s winding down, and we’ve been with a lot of people,
like in our village, and all of camp, our campers, for three and a half weeks,
pretty much, and it’s just getting to that point where the little things people
do are starting to get on your nerves. Like, like, everyone has their habits that
you’re just kind of getting sick of. Like, they’re behavioral things. Not so much
my campers, but just, like, some counselors. Not that I’m getting angry at
them, just that they’re getting irritating. Like, little habits, like, even among
CITs and stuff that just gets more, like, you start to get on edge with people
CIT Program 170 the longer you’re with them. Like, if I’m with my cousin, like, back at home for more than a week, I can’t see him for like a month.
Philipson: So how do you deal with this?
Graham: You just kind of have to, like, step back and just kind of be like
(exhales).
Philipson: Have you lost it with anybody?
Graham: I almost lost it the other day with Evan during our scholarship auction.
Philipson: So how’d you handle it?
Graham: Well, Jason was there to help us back away from each other. But that was more of a habit thing. Like, there was some reactions, and then something happened…What happened was, we had the water balloon thing going, and we had been, like chucking water balloons at each other, and…
Evan: He had this giant one…
Graham: No, I had three in my hand. It wasn’t one large, it was three water balloons in one hand.
Evan: Well, that’s why it hurt so bad.
Graham: We were chucking them at each other, and he had been chucking them at Jason from point blank, so I came up behind him and hit him in the back with three water balloons.
Evan: I just went, like, I had shiver going down my back and it hurt so bad.
Graham: Yeah, I’m still talking. So then I was like, he was like “oh, that hurt really bad,” and he was like, “I get a free punch,” and I was like, “No, you
CIT Program 171 don’t. We’re doing water balloons. You don’t get a free punch.” So then he punched me, and then I stepped back and I had one more water balloon in my hand and I threw that one at him after he punched me. And then, after that, he got really angry and he grabbed me in the inapro-pro spot.
Evan: It was just the first place I saw.
Graham: My balls hurt.
Philipson: Grabbed?
Graham: It was a grab.
Philipson: (Confused by the tactic) Grab and squeeze?
Evan: No.
Jason: More like squeeze, yes.
Graham: There was a squeeze.
Philipson: Cup?
Quint: Tickle?
Graham: No, they hurt. There was intent for pain, and it hurt.
Evan: There was intent for pain.
Jason: It was ridiculous. I saw it.
Evan: And then Jason flipped.
Josh: And the campers were there.
Philipson: And so, how did that not end in a fight?
Jason: If I didn’t have a voice, like, I didn’t have a voice, so I couldn’t, like, yell at them, but, luckily, none of the campers saw, but they, they, Graham and
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Evan almost dropped the gloves…They were about to fight, but lucky none of
the campers saw. It was really immature…
Philipson: What was going through your mind when Jason was backing you
down?
Graham: He didn’t really back—
Evan: He just said, “guys, stop it.”
Josh: He just told them off and wa—
Graham: He just started yelling—
Josh: He was telling them don’t be immature and like—
Graham: “guys don’t be immature,” and like—
Josh: It was ridiculous, and then that kind of stopped that.
Jason: And then we talked later after the kids left.
Quint: As soon as the last kid was out of the gate, [Jason] was like, “what the
fuck was that?”
Jason: I was so angry. You would have been really angry if you were there.
Philipson: You think?
Graham: I was angry. I just had my nuts fondled.
Quint: By a man.
Philipson: But you were able, given some time, you know, you’re okay with
each other.
Graham: Yeah. I’m not mad at him right now.
Graham had certainly taken a step too far. He saw Evan treating Jason unfairly and wanted him to pay for it in some way, hence the three-balloon smack. This was more
CIT Program 173 than a protective instinct; developmentally, it was an age inappropriate action to take out some aggression on a peer who had been bothering him in a way that he thought would morally defensible and socially acceptable. Evan’s reaction, in the mean time, showed just how far he still had to go. What’s important to keep in mind, however, is Evan’s starting point, his own developmental trajectory. Given his tantrums on the trip and his relative success as a cabin counselor, he had performed admirably.
Graham had not totally forgiven Evan, however. Later, recalling the laborious task of collecting camper duffle bags to ship home, Graham described bickering about Evan not performing his share of the work. Given the exhaustion of this period, a regulatory depletion model could explain Evan’s struggles at this point; things were tense with his co-counselor, he was preparing to return to a less than ideal home situation, and he had been working hard. Under Muraven, Tice and
Baumeister’s regulatory depletion model (1998), he simply had less energy for self-regulation at this point.
By this point in the summer, Quint had eased through the transformation for which I had been hoping during the trip out east, and though I still probably cut him less slack than the other kids, he had evolved, rediscovered humility bringing him back to the group and allowing to put his ample outdoor skills and friendliness to use for the benefit of the camp. His time on staff had been an unequivocal success.
Josh had evolved, too, as this last focus group evidenced. He was more assertive, refusing to let people talk over him and making sure his voice was heard. He was
CIT Program 174 also crushing it, to use a term of art, as a cabin counselor. He described the following in his last interview:
Thinking back on the last week of camp, what would you say was your biggest
challenge?
Um, probably knowing how to deal with the kids when they didn’t want to
leave. Like, what am I supposed to say to them when they say, “I don’t want
to go home.” No one ever told me.
Yeah, my bad. So what did you say?
Um, well they didn’t, like, say that specifically, but they kind of acted it out. I
just said, “hey, you’ve been here for four weeks, you’re coming back next
year, and if you came here all the time, it wouldn’t be as special.”
Nice. That’s impressive. Had you heard that before, or…
No, I just kind of thought of it.
This wasn’t the first time Josh had said something that appeared to come right out of a (nonexistent) textbook on how to be a camp counselor. Whether it was the result of the mentorship of older staff provided by having good counselors as a kid or just natural intuition, he had the sort of responses to camper challenges that would normally only come from a counselor with far more experience both at camp and out in the world. He took to the expectations of the caregiver role in a very natural way.
When I was a young counselor, we used to cynically joke that the close of camp was manipulatively plotted to elicit wistfulness and nostalgia, a means of ensuring everyone’s return the next year. First, there’s the big blowout, “Coed
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Specialty Day,” where the entire girls’ camp traveled to our side of the lake for intra- camp contests, a carnival, and a talent show. Next came the village campfires, where the age groups gathered to receive activity certificates for achieving various levels in sailing, swimming, riflery, archery and the like. The penultimate event was the
“Closing Council Fire,” where the whole camp gathered on the shore of the lake in a site used only for this purpose and only at the start and end of each of the two four- week sessions. In Mutt’s absence, I was left in charge of this one, and, with Furry’s help, managed to begin the ceremony with the oft-attempted and rarely executed
“magic fire” trick—we had buried stereo speaker wire running from the fire ring to a marine battery hidden behind a woodshed thirty feet away. The end in the fire was attached to either tip of a spring from a ballpoint pen, then covered in gunpowder, cotton wadding, and kerosene-soaked sawdust. Dry logs and kindling surround the incendiary little pile, and, at my signal, Furry touched the wires to the battery, the resistance to the electricity heated the metal spring, lighting the powder, which lit the wadding and sawdust, which lit the kindling. Whoosh! A campfire suddenly started as if by magic. Cabin groups each got up and said something about their summer, counselors and kids stood up with guitars and performed songs, and the setting sun turned the western sky an awe-inspiring array of colors. For the close of the ceremony, everyone joined hands and sang the same three songs with which we had closed since I was a kid, and then Dodger recited the same “Irish Blessing” we had heard from Curly for so many years. These rituals provide another example, like the story about the services area but on a much grander scale, of how the culture of the camp is designed to make participants feel like they are part of something
CIT Program 176 special. These rituals create greater demarcation between the in-group and the outside world, the implication being that no one else can understand how special this experience is. This increases the salience of in-group membership in an effort to imprint its importance on participants before reentering the outside workd.
The final night, after a day of packing, consisted of the candle-lit final banquet, a traditional turkey dinner topped off with grasshopper pie. The tables were arranged in long rows and covered in butcher paper, and the Junior Leaders in various costumes served as waiters. When that was all over, everyone gathered in front of the lodge, a flatbed trailer as a stage for one final talent show. The last song of the talent show, as tradition, led by Jonesy, was Leaving on a Jet Plane (minus the verse on infidelity). Dodger said a few words, and then everyone returned to their villages, mostly in tears, for a few hours of sleep before the first buses left for the airport at dawn.
B. Post-Program Interviews
Due to the crush of activities, it was all we could do to squeeze the focus group in before everyone left, let alone the interviews. Instead, the interviews were conducted by Skype a few days after everyone had returned home. Each CIT reflected upon packing up the kids and various other challenges of the final week. I also asked them about their transition back to their life at home, an added advantage of these interviews taking place after they had left camp. The most common theme appeared to be the transition from a focus on the self to a focus on others in fulfillment of the expectations of the caregiver role. Several of them commented also on how the interviews and focused groups helped
CIT Program 177 them throughout the summer. Even in writing this now, I feel a little sadness about the end of a great summer. Much as each musician often takes a solo in a band’s final song of the night, I’d like to close this narrative section of the study by allowing the remaining five participants to speak for themselves via my last formal, recorded conversations with them.
Final words: Josh
Josh was less verbose on Skype than he had been at our last meeting, but he nevertheless did his best to share his thoughts. From Josh’s final interview:
Do you think you matured over the course of the summer?
I think I did. Um, my parents asked me what I learned, and I was like, “I can’t
really say specifically, but I can, like, I’m sure it will show as the year goes
on.” But I think I learned a lot, because I babysit kids, and I think that was a
good start to it, but I think it was a totally different experience living with the
kids.
It’s like you’re a parent almost at the age of seventeen, sixteen. Isn’t that an
MTV show?
Yeah.
Have your parents noticed any change in you?
I think they have, but I don’t think they would be able to point it out easily. I
don’t think it’s a very specific thing.
What about your brother, does he say anything?
When we got home, well, on the way home, I was like, “you have to do this,”
and he wouldn’t do it, and he was like, “you’re just a CIT,” and I was like, “are
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you seriously going to pull that on me now. My campers didn’t even do that
and you’re doing that.”
Brothers are the hardest sell. What are you most proud of over the course of the
summer?
Um, I’m not sure if I’m most proud of the being a counselor part or the
physical achievement. I think I’m more proud of just becoming a counselor
and having the kids respect me from the start pretty fast and just getting
along with them and they were just, I don’t know, we got along well, and they
just listened to me, and it was a good summer, and I’m just proud that
everything worked out well. I thought people would undermine me a lot, but
I guess not.
What Josh did not mention in the interview was something he had said in out last focus group: “My mom said she’s really proud of me.”
Final words: Evan
From Evan’s final interview:
Looking back on the summer as whole, what do you think you got out of
the experience?
Well, I think there’s two different experiences we experienced. There’s the
first part, the trip, and then the second part. I feel like they were really split
up, only because, kind of unlike the other big trips, you’re not in camp first,
and that separates it a lot by having two completely different, like, years. The
first four weeks are trip, and I’m very proud of my physical ability and mental
capacity for pushing myself. I think Furry would agree with me on this that I
CIT Program 179 did a much better job on this than I have in years past, and that’s when I’m really proud of for that. I guess the last part of the summer with being a counselor in a cabin, I was just proud of going into a situation, well, not a situation, going into the whole counselor thing being, not blind, but, being, like, not really knowing what to do. Even though I have dealt with kids in the past, it’s just a different experience.
Do you think you grew more this summer than other summers, or less, or how does it compare?
Actually, I think definitely more. It felt like a shorter summer, but I think I developed more skills, improved in more areas than in the past, only because
I was given the opportunity, I think.
So you feel like the opportunity for responsibility for becoming a counselor, um, gave you even more growth than all the physical challenges you overcame the last could of summers?
Yeah, uh, it was almost, you know, it was great that there was a small group you could kind of get tied into and, you know, (unintelligible), I think it was mostly (unintelligible), and you’re now twenty people, and I think that helped a lot. Everyone had known each other for at least two or three years, and most of us five or six or seven, and so, that was nice being able to have that, and also watching other people grow, and over there stuff, that was also cool.
So you feel like you’ve grown a lot this summer; do you think you’ll be able to stay where you are, like, stay this more mature person now that you’re back
CIT Program 180 home?
I think so. It’s not the same situation and, like lifestyle, but I think there’s a way to stay, like, comparatively mature to what, like, in the past summers, if that makes sense.
Makes sense. So, have your mom, or your brother, or anyone noticed any difference in you since you’ve been back?
I mean, yes and no. I mean, it’s always different when you haven’t seen someone for a few weeks. Um, but, I think the situation, like, at home, is a different way to show what we did, like at camp. I think someone at school, that might be a little easier compare to and see differences, because there are other kids and other adults, and at home, I think that there’s not really, there’s stuff to improve on, but there’s not a lot, like, of things that we worked on at camp that apply to home.
So the challenge for you will be, really, when school starts up, when hockey starts up, to stay who you’ve become?
Yeah, I think that, that will happen.
All right. With this being the last interview of the study, I mean, you’re welcome to email me thoughts or call me up and tell me stuff you want me to use, but at the end of the formal part of the study, is there anything else you want to add?
Um, I mean, it’s kind of sad, investing so much time in it and it coming to an end. I think it was actually nice to have the study. It let you reflect on your thoughts, not just personally, but also publicly and get other people’s feelings and opinions. I think in the future years of camp, that would be kind of cool,
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and other people could use the same type of thing that helped me. It helps
you look back on your strengths and your weaknesses and what you should
improve on in the future. And it lets, yeah….It’s definitely had a positive
impact. I don’t see any negative impact, except maybe an hour taken out of a
road trip to do an interview.
Final words: Quint
From Quint’s final interview:
Is there anything you wish you could’ve done different in that week?
I don’t know. I think maybe making better, like, connections, with more of my
campers, like finding a closer connection. Where, I mean, some of my
campers, I gave them my email, but others of them, they were like, eh, I’m
leaving, or like, eh, whatever.
What are you most proud if in that last week?
I think I’m most proud of finishing it. Like, finishing a first, like, session, as an
actual counselor, which I didn’t fully connect to until after camp, really, when
Jonesy wrote me on Facebook saying, “you’re off confined Facebook because
you’re finally staff.” One of those great moments.
Do you think you grew over the course of the summer.
I for sure think I grew. But, like, throughout the whole summer, I started off
looking at camp as more of a camper view, and then once I finally got to
camp, you guys prepared me a lot for being a counselor, but, then, once it was
all said and done, I feel, like…I’ve become more of a adult in kind of how …to
talk about something and when not to. Now that I’m back home, a lot of my
CIT Program 182 friends, they’re talking about something the way they usually would, but it’s weird because they’re like, talking about stuff, or, like, they’ll be cursing in the middle of the hallway, and, like, for me, it will be just, like, whoa, you can’t do it. I still have the mindset where I can say the things that I wouldn’t say in front of the campers, like, at school, or, like, those kind of things.
So you’re thinking about your conduct more and how you come across. Have other people noticed a difference in you?
I don’t think. I haven’t really asked. One of my friends said you’re not being as fun anymore.
Nice. What about your parents? Have they noticed any kind of a difference?
I don’t know. I don’t ask. These are the things I don’t really ask.
Well, no, they might say something. Do you think you grew more or less this summer than other summers at camp?
I think I’ve actually grown more just because of having to be in the responsible situation of, like, having to actually deal with other people other than just myself and having to watch over them and not just me, a couple other guys, but other guys for the entire session…
Thinking back over the summer and knowing this is a study about resilience, which means reacting to adversity and persevering through obstacles, and self- efficacy, which means, like, believing you can do the things you set out to do, what do you think is important for me to know about your experience?
What do you mean?
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It’s sort of the catch-all question. If there’s something that’s important to this
that I haven’t asked you about directly, what is it?
I don’t know. I think you’ve really asked most questions…but one thing I feel
has stood out a lot was just that first month of when we were on trip of, kind
of, getting everything together and having everything good to be down and
be a counselor, and to be a staff member at camp. I think that was one of the
things that really helped me, especially, or maybe helped other people the
most to get back into camp, and then, like, it was kind of like with a driver’s
license, where you drive with your parents, and then I’m put into the actual
situation. In the first week I think I learned the most, but I definitely needed
that first bit to understand what to do.
Final words: Jason
From Jason’s final interview.
Let’s think summer. Overall, course of the summer, what are you most proud of?
I think I came to camp pretty immature, and I think I left camp pretty mature.
I feel like over the course of the summer, I was yelled at a lot when I did some
dumb mistakes. After I started understanding that I was a counselor and I
had to be responsible, I think I started buckling down and acting more
mature. Like, I learned when I have responsibilities, I start becoming more
mature in the situation. The first four weeks, I was slightly immature, but
then I started gaining maturity right when we went back to camp, and I think
that’s when I started getting mature. I transitioned well. It’s what I’m most
CIT Program 184 proud of, I think. Also, I transitioned well from a camper to a counselor. I think that’s one of the two most things I’m most proud of…
You said that having responsibilities made you be more mature.
Yeah.
How does that translate into being home? You’ve only been home a week, but do you feel like the maturity has stuck with you? Have you noticed a difference?
Have your friends noticed a difference? When you get back around your friends are you getting back like you were before? What do you think?
I think I am getting back like the way I was before, but, like, I’m always still going to have that maturity, but there’s always time to play around, but I think, I don’t think my dad notices. I think he thinks I’m still immature. I’m sure once school starts, he’ll understand that I’ve gained some maturity, because I think that school actually will bring out my maturity once I get all the work, and all that stuff, so I think that’s where my maturity is going to be instrumented.
Does your brother notice any difference in you? He’s been observing, and he sees you both places.
I don’t know. He never told me anything.
He’s your big brother. He’s not supposed to compliment you ever. Talk to him about it…
He tells me more stuff now that I’m a counselor.
What kind of stuff?
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I don’t know. All the gossip that goes around camp. He just discusses it with me.
He’s treating you more like an equal than he did before.
It also happened when I went into high school, the same high school as him.
So he probably starts to see you differently.
Yeah.
So, thinking back on the summer, do you have any regrets, things you wish you could do differently?...
Maybe the overnight, the first overnight, because we were all really frustrated for some reason and really annoyed. I wish would have not yelled at them as much. I wish I would have observed a little more. It was in the middle of the summer, and kind of at the beginning but kind of nearing the middle, and I wish I would have observed more to see their behaviors, like how they act at the beginning to the end. The overnight, they were just so annoying, and I really liked them at the end. I wish I would’ve just looked at the overnight as a whole. I wish I wouldn’t have yelled at them as much. I wish I would’ve enjoyed it more. But the second overnight was fantastic…
This is a study about how you guys become more resilient and how you handle adversity better, and how you grow up a lot as sort of working at this camp.
What is it about camp that really does this? You’ve touched on this already…What about camp helps you grow and become more mature?
The first four weeks, we went on the trip, and we were still campers, we still had supervision, and once we transitioned into being counselors, we were
CIT Program 186 still CITs. We were at the bottom of the totem pole, we did all the crap jobs.
We were just viewed as CITs. The situation that we were put in helped us mature, because we needed to learn how to buckle down quickly so that we weren’t the immature still-campers. We needed to become counselors instead of remaining as campers like we were first session. So that’s like a hard situation camp put us in. We recently acted like campers, and then we were supposed to act like counselors right away. We had to mature quickly so that we weren’t viewed as campers still.
So entering the world of all these adults, the role models that you looked up to your whole time at camp…you had to grow up to be judged fairly by them. Do you think that you grew more or less this year at camp than other years at camp?
I’d like to say I grew more this year than any other year. The second would probably be PNW year…For sure this year, because I was becoming a counselor and had actual responsibilities. For sure the biggest year that I matured. Because with responsibility comes maturity. They expect you to be mature.
Is there anything else you want to tell the recorder.
I think, like, as a conclusion to this study, I think it helped a lot, like, gathering our thoughts. Especially once we got back to camp, the focus groups were more helpful, because we got to respond to our fellow peers’ problems. And also, they responded to my problems, too. And really, the interviews helped
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me gather my thoughts about how camp was going and how I should
transition into being a counselor.
Final words: Graham
From Graham’s final interview:
Do you feel like you became more mature over the course of the summer?
I would say definitely. Like, I think just like getting home and, like, noticing
myself doing things that, like, before I came to camp and was a CIT, I was like,
yeah, I’ll do it later, like when they needed to get done and stuff, I think I
gained a lot of, like—
Like chores and stuff?
Just like things like that aren’t even like chores, I don’t need to do them, but it
would be more helpful if I did than if I didn’t, just like, stuff like that. Like the
trash isn’t full but I have nothing to do, like taking it out. Not like chores that
I’m supposed to do, just helping around in general. A lot of little things… and
also, I think it helped me, like in soccer practice right now, like, when it’s
hard, I kind of think, well, if I can overcome the things I overcame in camp, I
can do this, so I think it also gave me a sense of confidence as well as more
responsibility.
So when you have, like, a hard practice or something that makes you want to
quit or isn’t fun, you remind yourself of tougher things you’ve done.
Yeah.
Awesome.
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Not even if it’s like physically tougher, I think, “that week was way more hard than this; I can handle this.” Even if it was just, like, mentally hard.
Nice. What about camp do you think caused this change, and do you think this summer caused it more than other summers?
I think a lot of what caused the change was kind of the pressure because it’s become, even though it’s become more and more comfortable there over the years, and this is my fifth year, but the pressure to be asked back, and the drive to want to be asked back made me kind of step up, and it’s just consistently doing something. It’s like practice makes perfect. You have to be consistently responsible over two months, or you work on it for a month and then you have it consistently for a month every day. I think it’s kind of like, it’s a way of practicing volunteering and things like that. And also I think it’s, like you’ve always been this camper that’s had—I think it’s also just the sense of giving back to camp. Like, we had four, five years of camping, of being campers, where every summer we’d go home, get off the plane, say “Mom,
I’m going back next summer. This was the best summer of my life.” I think after, like, five years of that, when you have the kids that are Siouxs and
Crows, you remember what it’s like being there, sometimes more than other counselors because it’s been so long since they were a camper. To give that back to them, I think, also helped. And then it’s easy to transfer that back over because you’ve been doing it so consistently.
And so do you think in part it was because you had these adult expectations put on you that you hadn’t had before?
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Yeah, I think that helped a lot. We weren’t getting our hand held as much. I get home, like, even when you don’t want it, oftentimes my parents or like a teacher or just a friend is, like, holding your hand the whole time, and your responsibility is all for yourself; it’s not for a lot of others. There’s obviously some other people you’ll be responsible for, but it’s more, you have a lot more responsibility for yourself, and then at camp you have yourself you’re responsible for, and then, like, twenty other kids or whoever’s with you…
When you think back on the summer, is there anything you wish you could have done differently?
I kind of wish…I feel like this year…Last year, since I did AQ, last year was my first year with a lot of this age group, because no one from AQ group or anyone I’d been with before had come back, so, like, JL was my first year with all the kids that were on CIT, so last year I wasn’t very social with them. I was friends with them, I just didn’t know them very well. They’d been tripping together for the last five, six years and I was new to them. And then this year,
I think I bonded a lot better with them. Like, I actually, like, last year, I was the quiet kid last year, and now, this year, and I just wish I had been a little more social with the CITs, like Max and stuff. And, also, I wish I had gotten to go on a trip with my campers. That’s one thing I wish. Like, I didn’t even get to do an overnight.
…What are you most proud of over the course of the summer?
I think just being consistent. I don’t think I had a single kid—I think I am most proud of getting… one of my campers who had been homesick for six
CIT Program 190 weeks straight, to in the last two weeks, every single day see a smile on his face, and him, like, playing and laughing, and have him go from saying, “I’m not coming back next year, I don’t even want to be a four-weeker,” to have him saying, “I’m definitely coming back next year and you better be my counselor.” I think that was what I was most proud of.
Nice. Looking back on the whole experience, and keeping in mind that this is a study about resilience and reaction to adversity, and self-efficacy, which means believing in your ability to accomplish the things you set out to accomplish, is there anything you want to add in terms of reflections?
Um, I think the transition to being a camper to counselor but sometimes being treated like a camper but keeping your head up, I think that transition was, I think one of the hardest I’ve done… Like, my transition to high school from eighth grade to freshman year, like, you’re going from the top of the chain in eighth grade to the bottom of the chain, but to me you didn’t have that much expectations as a freshman, like no one expected that much of you, like socially, so like that, and responsibility, so like them you were still an eighth grader, and because you were an eight grader and saw these high school students every day, you didn’t feel like you were top of the ladder, so that wasn’t a big transition, really, but then doing it kind of again, from going to a, like, the JL’s like the eighth-grader and the CIT is like the freshman.
Making that transition again, but this time having a lot more expectations for you, because now you are taking care of kids. I think, just, handling that is just really important, and I think that’s a big difference maker in how I
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became more and more responsible when I got home, and I think that’s one
of the toughest challenges I face, and I think that’s what is going to help me
become more responsible at home, and that’s going to help me, like, that’s
going to be one of those moments where I look back, and, like, if I can do that,
if I can take care of six kids for two months, for a month, I can do this.
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XI. Discussion of apprenticeship program
A. Ethnographic challenge
The ethnographic challenge diminished somewhat upon my return to camp. The participants had a strong understanding of the nuance of my role. My ties to the camp may have occasioned me to act as an authority from time to time, but that was not my role with them, and they appreciated having access to someone with my seniority without having to worry about what I thought or how I was going to evaluate them. They were comfortable with me and my functioning outside of the camp hierarchy—even if I did get the occasional request to persuade Dodger of this or that. At the end of camp, when I had to take on more responsibility, they treated me as their inside man, their point of access into the inner workings of camp. Within a week or so, the CITs campers and co-counselors had come to understand my role and understood that when I was hanging around, it wasn’t to supervise or report on them, but rather to see how the CITs were doing.
B. Identified antecedent factors.
While the mentorship of older staff and the group dynamic of the CIT cohort continued to play important roles in how the CITs learned and grew during the apprenticeship, the culture of camp and the expectations of staff conduct played a larger role than that factor had previously. Most significantly, the expectations of the caregiver role had become a major guiding factor in the decisions the boys
CIT Program 193 made, and it propelled them significantly toward prosocial conduct. An additional antecedent factor to positive psychological growth also surfaced in this segment of the study, and that is the study itself. Interviews and focus groups examining responses to challenges began to shape the way cognitive processing of the boys as they addressed the challenges themselves. They envisioned how the conversation would go, and whether they would be happy with how they would handle the challenge, and that helped them to make good decisions.
Early indoctrination into the culture of camp and the expectations of staff conduct from the staff side of things came from their exposure to Streisand’s vulgarity and flatulence in preparing for Midnight pizza. This was an important lesson in when it was okay to indulge in frat-house humor and when it was not— they had all known Streisand since they were little, and had never seen him let his guard down in front of them like that. This was a challenge to put in the context of mentorship as they attempted to discern between good and bad examples and advice offered by the staff around them. Within this context, they began to learn the limits of mentorship, such as on the sandhill when Jason sought help from Jonesy and discovered there was nothing more he could to remedy a camper challenge, when Josh corrected his more senior co-counselor in framing the challenge of the bugs on the hiking trip, and when Quint had to choose to be the mature one and defer to a pottery teacher ten years his senior when he decided to abuse his power and take advantage of Quint’s labor.
The focus groups and interviews provided opportunities to seek mentorship from me, which I offered when directly asked, but also from each other. They
CIT Program 194 would pose challenges and questions to the group and collect feedback on how they could have handled something better or should handle something in the future. This leads into the group dynamic of the CIT cohort. The boys gained a positive reputation as a group for their hard work and perseverance, and this positive identity appeared to increase the salience of their in-group membership. They now had a reputation to uphold as good counselors, and they spoke well of how their CIT peers were doing their jobs both in and out of each others’ presence.
On an individual scale, the boys were driven by the expectations of the caregiver role, and this dominated their interviews. They wanted to do their job well, and the highlights of their experience were the successes they had with campers, just as most of their challenges came from trying to solve all of the intricate problems presented by that role. It was that caregiver identity that drove them all to handle their groups admirably in the jambalaya cook-off, that drove
Graham and Quint to work so hard at helping homesick campers, that inspired Josh to talk his camper through physical challenges, that kept Quint from saying the wrong this that day in pottery, and that inspired Jason to quell what could have been a serious altercation stemming from the water balloon fight.
The importance of the caregiver role was heavily reinforced by the culture of a camp that, while silly and fun a lot of the time, takes itself very seriously. While the rites and rituals that close out the summer may seem far less important to someone outside of the in-group, the connection of the fictive kinship group that returned for that auction and remains connected to the camp decades after formal ties have been severed is undeniable.
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C. Self-efficacy
To review, according to Bandura (1977a), efficacy beliefs are based upon four components: performance accomplishments, vicarious experience, verbal persuasion, and physiological states. What we saw throughout this apprenticeship provides ample development of efficacy beliefs. Performance accomplishments started early with physical tasks, building upon cleaning the boathouse in Michigan with Midnight Pizza and spending two days hauling duffel bags for departing and returning campers. Next, came the actual work within the cabin. The demonstrations of hard work continued, which facilitated positive appraisal from their supervisors and co-counselors. By the time the kids arrived, the verbal persuasion offered had heavily reinforced the notion that the CITs would do a good job. When they met with initial success with the kids, this was reinforced.
Vicarious experience was, for the most part, behind them, but they still watched other counselors for tips as to how they should go about tasks, and they made good use of this. Because everything was going so well, their physiological states were primed for success.
Although self-efficacy does not automatically transfer from one arena to the next, the closing interviews reflect that the CITs saw in themselves a newfound confidence and sense of responsibility, and they felt that they were better people, better sons and brothers, and better students as a result. The permanence of these efficacy beliefs is not measurable in this study, but this initial step is encouraging.
D. Resilience
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The CIT who had the biggest challenge with resilience on the travel program was perhaps Evan. When met with ego threat, including anticipated failures, he acted out. When he was confronted about mistakes he made with the camp owner’s son, despite the fact that his success as a counselor was such a point of pride for him,
Evan may have shed a tear or two, but he took responsibility for his actions, promised to learn from them, and then demonstrated that he had learned from them. This was a very real threat, for Evan, but he demonstrated positive adaptation.
Graham suffered significant adversity through the death of his aunt and having his girlfriend break up with him. Nevertheless, he displayed nothing but positive adaptation throughout. He credited being at camp and pouring his energy into what he was doing as a major factor in his success. There is no way of knowing if he would have handled the situation equally as well at home, but this data is worthwhile nevertheless.
E. Developmental observations
The displays of empathy and the focus on others these boys showed ran significantly counter to what society expects of adolescent boys. There were particular highlights, such as when Jason, the youngest and smallest of the group, not only corrected his peers for behavior that violated the trust of the caregiver role, but was thanked and appreciated for it by his peers. Nevertheless, what these boys were doing every day, the way their lives abdicated ego in favor of service, showed a huge developmental leap across the board. In theory, adolescent boys simply don’t act like this—but in this setting, they did.
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The dominant values of this group were success in the caregiver role and positive adaptation to adversity, great or small. That’s no small thing. They became role models not just for campers, but for each other and for older staff, too.
This was a highly successful year for the CIT program, as reflected upon by the camp directors and the village head counselors. These boys have a lot to be proud of.
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DISCUSSION
I. Revisiting the research question
This study posed the question of how a residential summer camp counselor-in- training program may foster displays of resilience and self-efficacy in adolescent boys. In particular, it asked, what are the roles of the following factors in the facilitation of these displays:
• The culture of the camp as a whole and the expectations placed on staff
conduct;
• The developmental trajectory of the individual;
• The individual’s past experience with adversity;
• The individual’s self-concept both at a given point of observation and over
time;
• The group dynamic of the CIT cohort;
• The mentorship of older staff;
• The formal training as a counselor;
• The expectations of a caregiver role.
In order to address the larger questions of resilience and self-efficacy, we first need to look at the component factors proposed.
A. The Culture of the camp
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The culture of the camp played a significant role in the conduct of the boys, for good or ill. They began the trip a bit rowdy, a bit feral from their previous travel programs, the staffing of which typically included fewer counselors fully indoctrinated into camp culture. Having not just Furry, but two kid-first trip leaders quickly brought the group back to what conduct would be like when they returned to camp. What that meant, though, is that we began holding them to an in-camp standard while we were out-of-camp. They bucked against it some, but because
Furry and I had such extensive credibility within this camp, they bought in to our message. The boys had been raised within this system to believe in the authority of the older staff and in competency as a counselor as an ideal. The culture of the camp had always been such that people who excelled at the caregiver role were given the highest esteem. And they entered this very formal rite of passage with the expectation that they would be taking on the role once they returned to the camp itself.
When the job essentially consumes every waking hour, competency becomes the yardstick by which all are judged. Knowing this, the CITs ate up our advice about how to earn the respect of their peers, they took this advice, and their hard work earned them the desired respect.
B. Developmental trajectory
The developmental trajectory differed between participants. While Jason and
Evan started off as especially young-acting, Graham as someone who associates with older peers, and Quint, Max, and Josh somewhere in between, all six demonstrated growth over the course of the summer. Consistently, among the five boys that stayed
CIT Program 200 for the second half of the summer, the CITs reflected that the shift from focusing on themselves to focusing on others made them behave more maturely and responsibly. Again, consistently, all expressed hope that they could carry this newfound responsibility with them into the school year, and they saw themselves as more mature and other-focused as a result of the experience.
C. Individual’s past experience with diversity
The individual’s past experience with adversity ultimately proved hard to discern. Josh, Jason, and Evan all described challenges of feeling physically overwhelmed in previous outdoor adventures and the difficulty of overcoming their physical limitations. Max and Evan described past social difficulties. Among other significant experiences with adversity, the only thing beyond the challenge of camp wilderness trips that came up was Josh’s hand tremors which, given the fact that he was a talented drummer, seemed to have minimal effect. Not to be overlooked, however, is the 21-Day Canoe trip Quint, Max, and Evan took with Furry two summers previous. It had been rainy and buggy the entire time. Though they recalled it fondly, it was not without a certain pride in having endured the misery of the conditions.
D. Self-Concept
The individual’s self-concept typically shifted most strongly once we returned to camp. Discovering that they were good counselors, and that other people recognized this fact, changed the CITs’ comportment and appeared to change the way they saw themselves.
E. Group dynamic of the CIT cohort
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Much like the culture of the camp, the group dynamic of the CIT cohort applied peer pressure towards prosocial behavior. Because the boys bought into the values of the camp, because they all wanted to be successful, they discouraged negative conduct in each other and offered each other advice and encouragement.
The values of the group dictated that they all try to act maturely and succeed at their job, and they all helped each other do this—as compared with a typical social group of similarly situated adolescents whose values may revolve around sexual conquest or vulgar jokes. As a qualitative study, it would be difficult to precisely measure the size of effect of differing variables, but I do believe that the group dynamic of the cohort had one of, if not the, most significant effects on the conduct of the CITs. That said, this dynamic did not form in a vacuum; in many ways, it was the product of the other factors listed here.
F. Mentorship of older staff, formal training as a counselor
I cannot overstate the importance of the mentorship of older staff, and of
Furry, in particular, in shaping the group dynamic and the expectations the CITs had for themselves. They had known Furry, as well as other role models internal to the camp, for several years. Were nothing else at stake, the approval of these young men meant enough to them to guide their actions. In turn, Furry, and others like him, such as Jonesy and Streisand, took their job as role model very seriously. They simply would not conduct themselves around these younger guys in the same way they might if we were sitting around a fire in the staff village. Much in the same way
I had looked up to guys like Merv, whom they met back in Burlington, the CITs followed a code of conduct set out by Furry, emulated the way he interacted with
CIT Program 202 people, and listened to his advice. They probably took a few cues from me, as well.
Their reliance on this mentorship was evidenced not only by their questions about how to be a counselor when we were on trip, but by the way the continually sought advice from us throughout their session as counselors. This informal guidance had a far greater effect than formal training as a counselor; training inculcates new staff into the camp culture and teaches them some risk management basics, but the CITs already knew these details from their experience at camp. All they got out of the formal training was a few lessons on policies and procedures and very little on how to be a counselor, how to interact with kids on a daily basis. That they had learned from the likes of myriad mostly 17-23-year-old counselors over the course of their camp careers.
G. Focus groups and interviews
The participation in focus groups and interviews appeared to have a significant effect in setting positive adaptation to adversity as a guiding principle.
The boys actively thought about how they responded to challenges and sought to live up to this ideal. Increasingly, these conversations evolved into discussions of what they had done well and what could have done better, and a forum for advice, either from me (interview, when directly asked) or, most effectively, from their peers (focus groups).
H. Expectations of the caregiver role
Ultimately, most of the other factors teed the CITs up for their ultimate crucible: the expectations of the caregiver role. The culture of the camp, group dynamic, the mentorship of older staff, all of this set success as a caregiver as the
CIT Program 203 ultimate measure by which the boys would be judged, both by others and by themselves. The fact that they all succeeded did wonders not only for how others in the camp viewed them, but also for how they viewed themselves. Getting to the bottom of why this particular group was so successful is complicated. For one, some of the more rebellious amongst their age set did not return that summer. Secondly, they had Furry, who was not only the most accomplished and mature trip leader of his age set (or the age sets on either side of him), but he had been with most of the boys for multiple seasons. Thirdly, Furry was backed up by an experienced educator and camp veteran, potentially forcing him to be more vigilant about his job, but also, as he expressed, making it easier on him to not have to bear the same load he had born with previous co-counselors. What’s more, the study added a metacognitive process to the program. The regular reflection on performance as a group and as counselors appeared to lead to more frequent consideration of how to be successful in the caregiver role. These boys had the basic assets. They would have done just fine had Furry taken the trip out by himself and they had not participated in interviews, focus groups, etc., but in their final interviews, they all arrived at the same independent conclusion that the reflections and discussions had helped a great deal. The trick that remained, however, once the expectations of the caregiver role fall away, would be to maintain the other-focused, responsible habits that they had developed at camp. As they sat poised to begin the school year, all of the boys appeared hopeful that this would be the case, though the scope of this study does not track their longitudinal progress beyond that summer.
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II. Areas of applicability
A. Ethnographic method
Whereas Victor Turner (1967) took the approach that only the learned outsider could truly understand a culture via their objectivity, this study pretty much ran in the exact opposite direction. I chose as a study site an organization that had a significant effect on my own path in life, now under the management of one of my closest friends. I then proceeded to spend every waking minute with the study participants for the first half of the eight-week study. Our only time apart, most commonly, was when someone was in the bathroom, and an exact description of how it went was usually forthcoming when they emerged. Their chief mentor, himself not a study participant but an important force in the study outcome, became a close friend. The CITs and I spent a lot of time together, and the interviews intensified the experience by providing opportunities for the one-on-one talks that might otherwise only take place if they had done something wrong.
Despite my efforts to lay low, I did emerge as more of a “camp character” than I had intended. The staff who were former campers regaled their campers with stories from “the old days” (the early oughts), and I got dragged into some all-camp events. It is easy to let down your guard and be goofy for the sake of the kids, as well as how tough it was for me to sit back and merely observe.
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When Special Programs Director Mutt left with five days remaining in camp, I took over his duties and emerged as just another member of the older staff, which meant that my presence affected the behavior of campers and counselors a little more than it had previously. Luckily, by the time my role in the camp evolved in this way, my relationship had already been established with the CITs. They knew that by the rules of the study, I wouldn’t pass anything along to Streisand and Dodger unless either someone’s safety was at risk or the participant directly asked me to do so. The fact that they wanted my approval was more of a disincentive to reveal certain things than the worry about getting in trouble was, but I did my best to appear non- judgmental.
I liked these boys, and they knew I liked them. I was proud of them, and I told them so, and that, in turn, made them that much more eager to please me. The result was an increasing depth and flow to our conversations, both in interviews and in focus groups. They started thinking in advance about what they wanted to discuss in the interviews and focus groups, saving things up for the conversation. My history with the organization gave me credibility, and the trip developed personal bonds.
Ultimately, both the presence of a long-time staff member working below his rank and the metacognitive nature of the interview and focus groups affected the outcome of the study, but in an acceptable way. This study doesn’t attempt to draw conclusions about what CIT programs do for all similarly situated adolescent boys; it attempts to map what this summer did for these boys, and the addition of the interviews and focus groups to the list of potential antecedent factors for positive growth accounts for that.
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B. Self-Efficacy
Unfortunately, half of the closing self-efficacy surveys never made it back to me in melee of the closing days, so that instrument is unavailable for further insight on efficacy beliefs. Placing observations on the subject in the context of efficacy theories, however, leads to promising conclusions. According to Bandura (1977a), individuals look to performance accomplishments, vicarious experience, and verbal persuasion to promote efficacy beliefs. Similarly, their management of the stress can temper the resultant physiological manifestations (such as elevated cortisol levels) and can clear the path for positive efficacy beliefs.
All four of these factors came into play as the CITs grew to believe in their own capacity for success as counselors. Early in the summer, on the trip, Josh, Evan, and Jason all actively looked at their own performance accomplishments as evidence of being able to meet the physical demands of backpacking, kayaking, and canoeing, and the manual labor at the close of the trip and the opening of the apprenticeship, along with early successes as counselors buoyed the boys’ efficacy beliefs. Not only did the older staff use frequent verbal persuasion to support efficacy beliefs, Josh used verbal persuasion to activate performance accomplishments as a tool for one of his campers who was having difficulty with the hiking. At the close of the summer, having arrived back home, Graham spoke of using the challenges of the summer as evidence to enable himself to place differing challenges in a larger context now that the summer was over—soccer practice was a lot easier in comparison to working with homesick fifth-graders. That is, he felt like
CIT Program 207 things that had seemed challenging before would now seem less so in comparison with what he had accomplished as a counselor.
All of the boys who would become counselors actively looked to what their role models had done, a form of vicarious experience. Because Furry and their other counselors had met with success, they could use those counselors as models for their conduct.
As mentioned, verbal persuasion regarding efficacy beliefs came frequently in the form of encouragement from Furry, me, and their head counselors (most frequently Jonesy), but, more importantly, from each other. Talks like the ones we had around the fire early in the summer and the one Evan and I had outside a washhouse in upstate New York were important, but not nearly as important as the constant encouragement the boys were giving each other, in focus groups and along the way. Again, this is in part a case of the study format impacting the results; though the CIT director would have regular check-ins with the group otherwise, they would not be normally be as structured or as frequent, nor would they get the ramp-up of having the focus groups on the travel portion of the program.
The activation of physiological states is probably most appropriate to apply to Quint and Evan. In Evan’s case, his sensitivity and tantrums kept him from enjoying the trip as much as the other boys, especially as it drew to a close and he became more worried about fulfilling the role of counselor upon our return. Once we got back, however, the immediate needs of the job, along with positive feedback, quickly cleared the decks for him. The sensitivity and frequency of tantrums was drastically reduced, and he, and others, believed him to be a good counselor. Quint’s
CIT Program 208 case is a little more subtle. During the first part of the summer, he appeared more concerned with how he was perceived as a leader than what he was actually doing.
Having to actually meet a new challenge and do the work of a counselor took him out of this headspace and pushed him in a new direction. Instead of seeing himself as achieving yet another task that came easily to him, he could see himself as having achieved moderate success at a very difficult task.
Placing the movement of these efficacy beliefs in the context of reciprocal determinism (Bandura, 1977b), it wasn’t merely putting these boys together that made them grow; it was putting them together in an environment that challenged them and recognized and rewarded their success. Their initial efforts were validated and encouraged, and so who they were, the assets they brought to bear, pushed them further, and the environment, their actions, and the traits of the CITs themselves kept scaffolding their growth and achievement that much higher.
If efficacy beliefs require that the individual must view the goal as desirable, then they must choose to seek that goal, and they must pursue a course of action designed to achieve that goal, all predicated on an expectation that their actions will bring about a desired result (Bandura, 1991; cited in Bandura, 1997), the CITs proved themselves in spades in this regard. The one lapse is in the case of Max.
Leaving early as he did meant there was no significant goal to accomplish. The physical challenges were smaller than those he had previously mastered. The social challenges were important to him, but, in this particular group, he had already established relationships in previous summers.
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Looking at the four major cognitive processes through which self-efficacy functions (Bandura, 1993), the five CITs who completed the summer progressed through all four. The selective process was predetermined by the choice to participate in the CIT program—their peers from the JL trip disqualified themselves by choosing not to participate. In terms of cognitive processing, the cultural dynamic of the group, the shared ideal, told the CITs that the task of successfully becoming a counselor was both possible and of value. It would mean fulfilling the example set by their role models over the past several years, and they retained this belief even when the job, at times, became difficult. In terms of motivational processing, none of the four displayed doubt regarding the value of the result. Evan, Jason, and Josh all vocally doubted their ability going in, but with the one exception of Evan’s washhouse tantrum, they all remained determined to succeed, that any sacrifice of freedom or self-centeredness would be worthwhile. Very little in the way of expectancy-value calculations were necessary because the end goal was so set in their minds. Affective processing was likely the biggest challenge, as all five of the
CITs who served as counselors had to fight through a level of work-related stress they had never experienced. Evan, especially, had the biggest challenge here, but they all persevered.
All five of the full-season participants achieved significant self-efficacy beliefs as part of the counselor apprenticeship that they had not displayed on the travel program of the trip. What’s more, all five described efforts to apply these efficacy beliefs, this newfound confidence and sense of responsibility, to their world back home. They saw themselves as more responsible and mature, and they were eager
CIT Program 210 to fulfill this efficacy expectation through future action in different areas of their lives.
C. Resilience
Resilience proved a far more difficult state to measure or even detect than I expected, though placing the degree of threat within a subjective context using
PVEST helped. In terms of trauma, only the loss of Graham’s aunt comes close to qualifying as such, and there is no way of knowing whether the program had any effect on his ability to cope with this loss. He credited the other CITs with keeping him busy and moving forward, but this may not be markedly different than how he would have coped with the effect of friends at home. The CITs met with adversity over the course of the program, primarily in terms of helping struggling campers or, in Evan’s case, especially, dealing with a difficult co-counselor, but these difficulties hardly meet Luthar’s (2006) delineation of “significant adversity.” In the context of
Spencer et al.’s (2006) PVEST, however, the contextual importance of success as a counselor reframes the challenge of meeting such adversity in this environment.
Masten (2001) argues that resilience is not extraordinary, but rather common and a function of the bringing to bear of protective factors on the situation in question. Using PVEST to refrain the level of threat the challenges of the summer present, we can then consider which protective factors aided the CITs as they persevered through the challenges of staff life. These protective factors include positive attachment bonds with caregivers, in this case surrogate caregivers like
Furry; positive relationships with other nurturing, competent adults, such as other counselors and senior staff; intellectual skills, as displayed by the deft verbal
CIT Program 211 processing Josh performed with his campers; self-regulation skills, such as the postponement of tasks in their own self-interest in favor of serving the younger children in their charge; positive self-perceptions, as demonstrated by the way they talked each other up in focus groups; self-efficacy, discussed above; faith, hope, and a sense of meaning in life essentially comes in the form of belief in the values promoted by the camp; friends who are supportive and prosocial, again refers to the support the CITs offered each other; bonds to effective schools and other prosocial organizations, as well as cultures that provide positive standards, rituals, relationships, and supports ties back to the camp itself; (Masten, 2009, p.29).
According to Ungar (2006), resilience may look different across different cultures as the subordinate components, adversity and positive adaptation, may be culturally specific (Ungar, 2006). In the actions of the CITs, though, we saw what may be relatively low-stakes adversity serve as an important challenge for them through which they persevered through positive adaptation. Though resilience in one arena does not guarantee resilience in another, this is a step in the right direction.
D. Social psychology and age set cohorts
Each of the CITs brought assets to bear on their experience, but it was the shared values of the group that ultimately led to their success. Such is not always the case, even within this particular institution whose members revere it so much. Some age sets are dominated by personalities whose values are geared more towards self- interest, and they follow suit. Others lack a stable role model who returns to camp over time, like Furry. The combination of that role model and the group dynamic
CIT Program 212 lead to cohorts like that of Jonesy; of his group, several staff members continued to work at camp well into their twenties. Dodger, who led their JL and CIT trips, was the role model for that group.
Because of their connection to the camp and to Furry, what was already a good group of kids set their sights on fulfilling an ideal. Any of the bickering and pettiness that seeped out during the trip was minimized once they returned to camp and they were being scrutinized by more people than just Furry and me. We were their surrogate parents; they wanted to please us, but they knew we cared unconditionally, as demonstrated by the way we responded to their mistakes. Back in camp, they had to prove themselves in a much bigger pool. The CITs in this study belonged to an in-group whose identity evolved, over the course of the second session, as a reliable, hard-working, mature group of kids who were among the best staff in their villages. The more praise they received as a group, the more salient this group membership became. The reverse could have very well been true had things gone poorly, but in the present case, positive self-regard provided motivation to continue to work towards the prosocial values of the group and to help others do so.
Rather than compete with each other, they helped one another along.
E. Performance character, classroom applicability, the problem with
boys, and affluent youth
All of the boys displayed prosocial behavior, but their increasing maturity and responsibility translate into traits that will serve them well. Considering
Peterson and Seligman’s (2004) list of virtues, their performance as staff displayed creativity, curiosity, open-mindedness, perspective, bravery, persistence, integrity,
CIT Program 213 vitality, love, kindness, social intelligence, citizenship, fairness, leadership, forgiveness and mercy, humility/modesty, prudence, self-regulation, gratitude, humor, and spirituality. The only traits not on included from the list (pp. 29-30) are love of learning, hope, and an appreciation of beauty and excellence, and a case could be made for the display of all three by the boys who completed the program.
They all recognized in themselves a performance of prosocial behavior that exceeded their past conduct, and they all hoped to carry that on into the future.
Several of the boys mentioned the expectation that this experience would make them better students. Quint even mentioned he thought it would make him a better citizen of his school. Nevertheless, the question remains whether these skills are portable to a setting that places greater emphasis on the values of conformity and performing more strictly defined sets of tasks. The growth that took place over the summer certainly shouldn’t have an adverse effect on their school experience, though the degree of the positive effect will remain unanswered. What is of use is that the “boy culture” back home should be easier to resist by activating the positive self-regard that comes from achievement and membership as the CIT group. They all demonstrated, through the caregiver role, a capacity for empathy and a propensity to put the well-being of others above their own self-interested, two traits specifically difficult to find in adolescent boys. Several of the boys mentioned that they were less likely to do some of the “stupid stuff” their friends do now.
The activation of this identity should also aid in some of the struggles of affluent youth to avoid engagement in risky behavior. Because their self-regard is not dependent on their participation in risky behaviors, because they identify with
CIT Program 214 peers like themselves who behave in a prosocial manner, they have one more tool in their arsenal to resist bad decisions.
F. Context in regard to previous OAE studies
The mountain of inconclusive studies on OAE programs is hardly eroded away by this small trickle of ethnography. What I hope to have done is identified some anecdotal success, and, more importantly, isolated the means by which they were successful. In particular, the antecedent factors enumerated above, especially the shared values of the camp, the mentorship of older staff, the expectations of the caregiver role, and the group dynamic of the cohort, all provide a unique basis upon which to base future OAE studies. What’s more, an unintended consequence of this study has been the spontaneous recognition, by the participants, of the positive effect of the formally reflective interviews and focus groups.
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III. Conclusion
The five participants who completed the study all achieved some degree of success. Taken individually, this is not of great significance, but the fact that all were successful both in terms of personal growth and in terms of objective assessment of their work as counselors is remarkable. Between the values of the camp institution, the mentorship of older staff, and the group dynamic created by the CITs themselves, the boys were set up for success, and they delivered it. All displayed growth in their displays of self-efficacy, and though circumstances prevented a more traditional observation of resilience, given PVEST and an expanded, more subtle definition of resilience, the boys showed perseverance and grit in the face of adversity. Of the five that completed the program, all five felt they had matured significantly as a result of the experience, and all five hoped to apply this growth to their world back home.
Ease of integration into a familiar study site, while providing challenges of bias, increased credibility both as a researcher and resource. Additionally, the participatory methodology provided an increased intensity of observation, as intimate familiarity with the context of the study and the ability to mentor participants along the way all contributed to the outcomes. Though the program’s outcomes are not the same as they would be absent the study, the chronicling of the
CIT Program 216 study’s contributions to the antecedent factor for success facilitates a fuller understanding of the phenomena being studied.
The CIT program run concurrently with this study was an unqualified success. This study provides an in-depth examination of a program that facilitates accelerated positive psychological growth during a liminal period of maturation.
Participants in this program, particularly with the formal and frequent reflective elements necessitated by the study, became more confident in their abilities, more focused on the well-being of others and more able to withstand challenge. The participatory research methodology of this study facilitated an application of
Masten’s (2009) theories about protective factors in resilient to OAE and affirmed some commonalities in these factors as antecedent to both resilience and efficacy beliefs.
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Appendix A: Consent Form
Principal Investigator: Bradley Philipson Study Title: How a Summer Camp Counselor-in-Training Program May Foster Resilience and Self-Efficacy in Adolescent Boys
Introduction
You (your child) has been invited to participate in a research study to examine ways in which a Counselor-in-Training (CIT) program like the one offered by [camp name redacted] may serve to foster resilience (positive adaptation in the face of adversity) and self-efficacy (the belief that one’s actions will bring about the desired results) in adolescents. [Camp name redacted] has been chosen for this study because I, as the principal investigator, have a long-time affiliation with the institution and am well-versed in its culture and ethos. You (your child) are (is) being invited to participate because of your own affiliation with the camp and your intent to participate in the CIT program.
This consent form will give you the information you will need to understand why this study is being done and why you are being invited to participate. I also encourage you to ask questions now and at any time throughout the study. If you decide to participate, you will be asked to sign this form and it will be a record of your agreement to participate. You will be given a copy of this form.
Disclosure of Potential Conflict of Interest
Though I have known the directors of [camp name redacted] for a long time, it is essential that participation in this study be insulated from your (your child’s) status as a CIT and as a potential future paid staff member. Therefore, with the exception of safety or other critical issues that may require reporting by law, at no time will I disclose any individual evaluation of you (your child) to the camp staff. Participation in the study will not be permitted to affect status with the camp.
Why is this study being done?
The purpose of this research study is figure out how a program like the one [camp name redacted] offers can help adolescent boys view themselves differently. What is it about their experience that may give them the social, intellectual, and emotional
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What are the study procedures? What will I be asked to do? All six of the CITs are being asked to participate. If you agree to take part in this study, you (the CIT) will then be asked to participate in weekly ten-minute interviews about your experiences. These interviews will be recorded on a digital voice recorder and stored anonymously in password-protected files. You’ll also participate in weekly half-hour focus group sessions, where the participating CITs will sit around and talk about their experiences. I’ll be there, prompting you with questions and making a video recording of the session. Again, the files will be password protected. The CIT director will not be present for the interviews or for the focus groups. Additionally, CITs will fill out a brief questionnaire designed to assess self-efficacy at the start and end of the summer. The questionnaire will include a number of innocuous decoy questions that don’t affect the outcome, along with questions designed to assess beliefs about abilities.
Over the course of the summer, I’ll also keep my own journal of observations, focusing primarily on how the CITs handle the challenges that come up both in the traveling portion of the trip and back in camp when the CITs are working with the younger kids. I won’t interfere with your work in these settings, and I will likely become quite the familiar figure around camp by the summer’s end.
What other options are there?
I’m inviting all of the CITs to participate in this study, and though I’m hoping all of the families will agree, there is absolutely no penalty for declining. I’ll be around camp regardless, and I would interact with CITs not participating much in the same way I would with the other campers and staff who are not part of the study.
What are the risks or inconveniences of the study?
The risks of participating in this study are minimal, but they are not nonexistent. The primary risk is the emotional one. The interviews and focus groups will require a great deal of self-reflection, and may even provide a setting where a participant shares more about themselves than intended. This can be a particular danger in the focus group. Focus group participants will be instructed that they are entering a circle of trust, and that what is discussed within the focus group should stay in the focus group.
What are the benefits of the study?
The same self-examination that provides a potential risk in this study also provides a potential benefit, as the self-awareness resulting from the interviews and focus groups may promote purposeful growth and willingness to meet challenges.
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Will I receive payment for participation?
You will not be paid to be in this study
Are there costs to participate?
There are no costs to you to participate in this study.
How will my personal information be protected?
The following procedures will be used to protect the confidentiality of your data. The researchers will keep all study records (including any codes to your data) locked in a secure location. Research records will be labeled with a unique code. A master key that links names and codes will be maintained in a separate and secure location. All electronic files (e.g., database, spreadsheet, etc.) containing identifiable information will be password protected. Any computer hosting such files will also have password protection to prevent access by unauthorized users. Only the members of the research staff will have access to the passwords. Data that will be shared with others will be coded as described above to help protect your identity. At the conclusion of this study, the researchers may publish their findings. Information will be presented in summary format and you will not be identified in any publications or presentations. Any key, audio or video recording, and other data described in this paragraph will be maintained in accordance with the security provisions of this paragraph until destroyed by the researchers.
Please note that in cases of child abuse or neglect, I am obligated to report such findings to appropriate authorities. Similarly, any findings that threaten the safety of the participants or of other children at the camp must also be appropriately reported.
You should also know that the Tulane University Human Research Protection Office, Social/Behavioral Institutional Review Board (IRB) and/or the Office of Research Compliance may inspect study records as part of its auditing program, but these reviews will only focus on the researchers and not on your responses or involvement. The IRB is a group of people who review research studies to protect the rights and welfare of research participants.
Can I stop being in the study and what are my rights?
You do not have to be in this study if you do not want to. If you agree to be in the study, but later change your mind, you may drop out at any time. There are no penalties or consequences of any kind if you decide that you do not want to participate.
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You do not have to answer any question that you do not want to answer, and this rule applies to the questionnaire, to interviews, and to focus groups.
Your standing at [camp name redacted] will not be affected by the decision to participate or not participate in this study. It will not affect duty assignments or future employment at the camp.
Who do I contact if I have questions about the study?
Take as much time as you like before you make a decision to participate in this study. I will be happy to answer any question you have about this study. If you have further questions about this study, want to voice concerns or complaints about the research or if you have a research-related problem, you may contact the principal investigator, me, Brad Philipson, at (512)796-2316 or [email protected]. If you would like to discuss your rights as a research participant, discuss problems, concerns, and questions; obtain information; or offer input with an informed individual who is unaffiliated with the specific research, you may contact the Tulane University Human Research Protection Office at 504-988-2665 or email at [email protected].]
Consent to Audio/Videotape:
This study involves audio and video recording of your participation. Neither your name nor any other identifying information will be associated with the audio and video recordings or any transcripts created from them. Only the researcher will be permitted to listen to/view the recordings.
Immediately following the interview, you will be given the opportunity to have the recordings erased.
Please initial one of each pair of options.
___ I consent to have my participation recorded. ___ I do not consent to have my participation recorded ___ I consent to have my recorded participation transcribed into written form. ___ I do not consent to have my recorded participation transcribed.
The recordings will be transcribed by the researcher and erased once the transcriptions are checked for accuracy. Transcripts of your participation may be reproduced in whole or in part for use in presentations or written products that result from this study. Neither your name nor any other identifying information (such as your voice or picture) will be used in presentations or in written products resulting from the study.
___ I consent to the use of the written transcription in presentations and written
CIT Program 231 products resulting from the study provided that neither my name nor other identifying information will be associated with the transcript.
___ I do not consent to the use of my written transcription in presentations or written products resulting from the study.
The above permissions are in effect until January 1, 2012. On or before that date, the tapes will be destroyed.
______Signature of Participant Date
Documentation of Consent:
I have read this form and decided that I will participate in the research project described above. Its general purposes, the particulars of involvement and possible risks and inconveniences have been explained to my satisfaction. I understand that I can withdraw at any time. My signature also indicates that I have received a copy of this consent form.
______Subject Date
______Parent/Legally Authorized Representative (if applicable) Date
______Person Obtaining Consent Date
I am unable to read but this consent document has been read and explained to me by ______(name of reader). I volunteer to participate in this research.
______Subject Date
______Witness Date
______Person Obtaining Consent Date
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Appendix B: Assent Form
Principal Investigator: Brad Philipson Study Title: How a Summer Camp Counselor-in-Training Program May Foster Resilience and Self-Efficacy in Adolescent Boys
Who am I and why am I meeting with you?
I want to tell you about the research study I am doing on this year’s CIT program. A research study is a way to learn information about something. We would like to find out more about the positive outcomes of participating in a program like this. You are being asked to join the study because you are one of the CITs participating in the trip.
What will happen to me in this study?
I’ll ask you to fill out a questionnaire at the start and end of the summer that will give me one measure of your beliefs about your abilities. I’ll also be around throughout the summer, both on the trip and back in camp, keeping an eye on your progress and taking notes about how you meet different challenges. We’ll meet on-on-one once a week for a ten-minute interview, and we’ll also have weekly focus groups, where the participating CITS will sit with me in a group and talk about the challenges they’ve had over the course of the week. The idea here is that if we can figure out what about this experience helps you grow, future research can look to see if the same holds true on a larger scale.
Can anything bad happen to me?
Sometimes things happen to people in research studies that may hurt them or make them feel bad. These are called risks. The risks of this study are non- physical. This sort of reflection can be tough on people some times, which is one reason to remember that you can decline to answer a question at any time, and you can even change your mind about participating at any time. If anything about the study makes you uncomfortable, please let me and your parents know right away.
Can anything good happen to me?
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We do not know if you will be helped by being in this study. It’s possible that the reflection this will require will help you with your decision making. Also, we may learn something that will help other kids.
Do I have other choices?
Sure. You don’t have to participate at all.
Will anyone know I am in the study?
All of my notes and the transcripts of audio and video recordings will use fake names. I will also remove or change any other identifying information.
Who can I talk to about the study? [Contact Information]
You can ask us questions at any time. You can ask now. You can ask later. You can talk to me or you can talk to someone else at any time during the study.
If you have any questions about the study or any problems with the study you can call me, the Principal Investigator, Brad Philipson. You can call him/her at (512)796-2316.
If you have any questions about the study but want to talk to someone who is not part of the study, you can call the Tulane University Human Research Protection Office (HRPO) at (504) 988-2665.
What if I do not want to do this? [Voluntary Information]
You don’t have to be in this study if you do not want to. No one will get angry or upset if you don’t want to be in this study. Just tell us. And remember, you can change your mind later if you decide you don’t want to be in this study anymore.
Signature
If you understand this study and you are willing to participate, please sign below:
______Subject Name
______Subject Signature Date
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I am unable to read but this consent document has been read and explained to me by ______(name of reader). I volunteer to participate in this research.
______Subject Date
______Witness Date
Signature of Investigators or Responsible Individual:
“To the best of my ability, I have explained and discussed the full contents of the study, including all of the information contained in this consent form. All questions of the research subjects and those of his/her parent(s) or legal guardian have been accurately answered.”
______Investigator/Person Obtaining Consent Name
______Signature Date
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Appendix C: Self-Efficacy Questionnaire
Self-Efficacy Scale Instructions: This questionnaire is a series of statements about your personal attitudes and traits. Each statement represents a commonly held belief. Read each statement and decide to what extent it describes you. There are no right or wrong answers. You will probably agree with some of the statements and disagree with others. Please indicate your own personal feelings about each statement below by marking the letter that best describes your attitude or feeling.
Please be very truthful and describe yourself as you really are, not as you would like to be.
Mark: A If you Disagree Strongly with the statement B If you Disagree Moderately with the statement C If you Neither Agree nor Disagree with the statement D If you Agree Moderately with the statement E If you Agree Strongly with the statement
1. I like to grow house plants. 2. When I make plans, I am certain I can make them work. 3. One of my problems is that I cannot get down to work when I should. 4. If I can’t do a job the first time, I keep trying until I can. 5. Heredity plays the major role in determining one’s personality. 6. It is difficult for me to make new friends. 7. When I set important goals for myself, I rarely achieve them. 8. I give up on things before completing them. 9. I like to cook. 10. If I see someone I would like to meet, I go to that person instead of waiting for him or her to come to me. 11. I avoid facing difficulties. 12. If something looks too complicated, I will not even bother to try it. 13. There is some good in everybody. 14. If I meet someone interesting who is hard to make friends with, I’ll soon stop trying to makes friends with that person. 15. When I have something unpleasant to do, I stick with it until I finish it. 16. When I decide to do something, I go right to work on it. 17. I like science. 18. When trying to learn something new, I soon give up if I am not initially
CIT Program 237 successful. 19. When I’m trying to become friends with someone who seems uninterested at first, I don’t give up easily. 20. When unexpected problems occur, I don’t handle them well. 21. If I were an artist, I would like to draw children. 22. I avoid trying to learn new things when they look too difficult to me. 23. Failure just makes me try harder. 24. I do not handle myself well in social gatherings. 25. I very much like to ride horses. 26. I feel insecure about my ability to do things. 27. I am a self-reliant person. 28. I have acquired my friends through my personal abilities at making friends. 29. I give up easily. 30. I do not seem capable of dealing with most problems that come up in my life. From: Firscher, J. and Corcoran, K. (1994). Measures for Clinical Practice, 2nd Ed., Vol. II. New York: Free Press.
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Appendix D: Focus group and interview prompts.
Focus Group:
1. Let’s go around the circle, and each person will share the biggest challenge they had this week and how they handled it. After they share this, the rest of the group will have a chance to tell the person how they might have handled differently (whether better or worse) and what they liked about the way this challenge was met. (20-30 minutes total).
2. Follow-up questions.
3. What does everyone think their biggest challenge will be in the coming weeks?
4. What was the best part of everyone’s week?
Interviews:
1. What was your biggest challenge this week? Why?
2. Are you pleased with how you handled it?
3. If you could have done something differently this week, what would it have been?
4. What are you most proud of in the last week?
5. Any additional follow-up questions.
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Biography
Brad Philipson is the Upper Division Director at Casady School in Oklahoma City, OK and a PhD candidate at Tulane University. A native of New Orleans, LA, he holds a BA in Public Policy from Washington & Lee University, an MA in English and Creative Writing from Hollins University, and an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of New Orleans. He has worked in Outdoor Adventure Education since 1992, including five summers leading the Open Roads program in the Pacific Northwest. He also has over ten years of experience as a teacher and administrator at the secondary school level.