five minutes, ten minutes, now it's been an hour
A letter I sent tonight. Some names have been abbreviated for the sake of any job I might want to have in the future.
KJ -
I was going to send this to a "real" email address but then I realized I don't have one for you, so this will have to do.
Having you at camp yesterday was very nice. I hadn't realized how much I had missed you until I saw you again. For all of our joking, you are a wonderful person and a great mentor.
I guess the reason I am writing is to get out some of my thoughts that have been intruding as the summer gets closer to an end.
I don't know if you know but N has also left Easter Seals, and there is a new AmeriCorps coordinator named T. She confuses me because she seems very gung-ho about AmeriCorps, but she then gives us pointless assignments at our meetings. Sometimes we watch movies, and she doesn't wake up anyone who falls asleep. Other times what we're discussing is so far from the point of the meetings (ostensibly citizenship training) that I can't even imagine where she got it from. I feel like my time is being wasted, and I absolutely resent that and hate it. I don't think there's been anything we've done in those meetings that has brought to mind "citizenship," or even increased my awareness of what being a citizen is supposed to be.
The AmeriCorps exit survey is not designed for something like this. It asks "essay" type questions but then only allows 500 characters for an answer. Anything after that is deleted. How completely pointless! Obviously it is not intended for anyone to give true, heartfelt answers.
I have not been evaluated even once this summer, and as far as I understood protocol, it was supposed to be at least twice, possibly three times. I cannot remember the last time I *was* evaluated. Thusly I have no idea what my performance is like, and I never do, unless I do something wrong because then I hear about it immediately.
I am disheartened by the lax attitude that TB takes to running camp. I don't know what his camps were like when he ran them previously, but I do not feel that he is giving Respite Camp the attention it rightly deserves. For instance, this summer we have had campers in small groups (3:2 or 2:1). Which in some cases is fine, but TB never called to tell parents that their loved one was going to be in a group. They found out when they arrived. Respite Camp is specifically for 1:1 care and I think it's ridiculous that we cannot provide that. If we're not going to be solely 1:1 then it should get changed in the brochures. For 19 years we were able to keep the standard at 1:1 - why does it only take a few months of him being in power for that to change? It makes me ill.
I am also disheartened by the fact that we did not hire enough staff. We were still doing interviews midway through July and I assume we would have kept doing them right up until the last day before the last week... all that seemed to get done was a lot of complaining about not having enough staff and a lot of getting told to suck it up, but not a lot of searching for candidates and/or hiring them.
The AmeriCorps volunteer coordinator position has NEVER been talked up this summer. We have, at this point, ONE candidate. She has not been given an application, or interviewed, or gone through any of the processes to become the coordinator. She is having to make a decision ASAP about whether or not she's going to grad school, but any movement on that front keeps getting put off for some unknown reason. I think that this will eventually end badly - either we will have no volunteer coordinator at all, and the work will get put off on K (camp head nurse), or we will have somebody in the position who was slap-dashed in and doesn't care.
TB's attitude seems to be one of passivity. Ordinarily I am a passive person myself but after 7 years in camping I have realized that this attitude is not one that gets things done. We were approved for money to redo the sensory room floor... in January. Because I did all of the research, I know exactly what floor we're supposed to be getting and I could order it right now. I keep mentioning it to TB but nothing gets done about it. Every time I remind him about it, he says, Oh, it will get done. Now we're approaching the end of the summer, the floor is grosser and more in-pieces than ever before, and nothing has been done about it. I fear that when I leave I will take the drive for new flooring with me and nothing will *ever* get done about it.
TB delegates all of the jobs that I saw you take so much pride in - attending FFEs, leading grace, loading tractors, sitting with campers at meals, showing up at campout to say "hello," etc. He is accessible by walkie but not much otherwise. It seems like the ad staff are pulling a lot more than their weight and getting screamed at because somehow they're still not doing enough.
Counselors have their cell phones out constantly. The dress code (including close-backed shoes) is not always enforced. When things are done poorly or not well, we get empty threats with no follow-through. It seems to take everyone SO LONG to do the things we know we need to do, like everyone's just mucking around doing nothing and we're not moving forward. TB definitely plays favorites - and the counselor he brought with him from his previous camp (now working as the outfitter) is the obvious one.
I honestly don't understand how K is still here. She gets treated like shit on a daily basis and if I was her I would have quit. Thank God that she loves our campers - it's why she's still here. There is nothing I could do that can ever express how much I appreciate everything she does, and I think I've spent the whole summer trying to figure out exactly how to thank her.
For the longest time I thought that the reason I didn't like TB's style was because I was so loyal to you, and to the idea that my previous two summers had provided for me. I thought I was upset about the change in leadership, and that once I got to know Tony I would feel much better about him being in charge. I am realizing now that this is untrue. It's not about him usurping your leadership - it's him.
TB is a nice guy. But he is not the guy that I would have chosen to lead my beloved camp (and a lot of other people's beloved camp as well). Unfortunately those of us who end up spending most of the time with him never got a say. It's fine for corporate to hire someone - they don't have to live with him every day. He is very good at talking up things at meetings, telling everyone that things are just fine, making things sound great. But in daily practice he is lazy.
As the summer slips away I have no idea what use, if any, these words can have. I feel that if I speak with KS (the director of camping) he will rebuff me, if I speak with the AmeriCorps coordinator she is too new to know what to do, and if I speak with TB, it will just be shoved off like everything else I talk to TB about.
But I love Respite Camp and I'm not willing to give up on it. This place means so very much to me and it cannot possibly mean nearly as much to TB - he has only been here since November. He cannot possibly love it as much as I do, as much as K does, as much as B (rope coordinator, been here 8 years) does, as much as any of our staff members who adore camp but for whatever reason could or could not come back this summer - the "lifers." Camp is a special place and I would hate to see it ruined by someone who just sits back and lets his underlings do the heavy lifting.
In the 7 years I've been camping I've had a wide variety of "bosses." For my first year we had the president of the organization that owned camp as the director. Being blind himself, he was so involved. He attended so many activities and led some. He helped with cooking, cleaning, maintenance - he truly *lived* the camp experience.
My second year there we had the previous summer's program director as the camp director, and I am still very good friends with her today. She went out of her way to be involved. Again, she led activities, helped with everything, was present in the cabins, offered support to all of the counselors (not just some), listened to everyone, truly was unafraid to make a fool of herself in the name of camp.
At another camp I worked at the directors were these two bitchy ladies who didn't seem to appreciate their counselors, but I have to give them credit for loving the campers. They always put the campers first, *always*. They made it their mission to give the campers the best care, to make sure that everything related to the campers was perfect.
And now we have a sloppy staff, lousy conditions, ad staff getting yelled at constantly, and no real team spirit. It's only when I'm with the campers that i feel proud to be here. The leadership is failing all of us.
It's for the campers that I'm writing. If you have any advice, I would be most appreciative of it.
Thank you for everything you've done for me. I cannot express in words how much that is and what it means.
Sarah
KJ -
I was going to send this to a "real" email address but then I realized I don't have one for you, so this will have to do.
Having you at camp yesterday was very nice. I hadn't realized how much I had missed you until I saw you again. For all of our joking, you are a wonderful person and a great mentor.
I guess the reason I am writing is to get out some of my thoughts that have been intruding as the summer gets closer to an end.
I don't know if you know but N has also left Easter Seals, and there is a new AmeriCorps coordinator named T. She confuses me because she seems very gung-ho about AmeriCorps, but she then gives us pointless assignments at our meetings. Sometimes we watch movies, and she doesn't wake up anyone who falls asleep. Other times what we're discussing is so far from the point of the meetings (ostensibly citizenship training) that I can't even imagine where she got it from. I feel like my time is being wasted, and I absolutely resent that and hate it. I don't think there's been anything we've done in those meetings that has brought to mind "citizenship," or even increased my awareness of what being a citizen is supposed to be.
The AmeriCorps exit survey is not designed for something like this. It asks "essay" type questions but then only allows 500 characters for an answer. Anything after that is deleted. How completely pointless! Obviously it is not intended for anyone to give true, heartfelt answers.
I have not been evaluated even once this summer, and as far as I understood protocol, it was supposed to be at least twice, possibly three times. I cannot remember the last time I *was* evaluated. Thusly I have no idea what my performance is like, and I never do, unless I do something wrong because then I hear about it immediately.
I am disheartened by the lax attitude that TB takes to running camp. I don't know what his camps were like when he ran them previously, but I do not feel that he is giving Respite Camp the attention it rightly deserves. For instance, this summer we have had campers in small groups (3:2 or 2:1). Which in some cases is fine, but TB never called to tell parents that their loved one was going to be in a group. They found out when they arrived. Respite Camp is specifically for 1:1 care and I think it's ridiculous that we cannot provide that. If we're not going to be solely 1:1 then it should get changed in the brochures. For 19 years we were able to keep the standard at 1:1 - why does it only take a few months of him being in power for that to change? It makes me ill.
I am also disheartened by the fact that we did not hire enough staff. We were still doing interviews midway through July and I assume we would have kept doing them right up until the last day before the last week... all that seemed to get done was a lot of complaining about not having enough staff and a lot of getting told to suck it up, but not a lot of searching for candidates and/or hiring them.
The AmeriCorps volunteer coordinator position has NEVER been talked up this summer. We have, at this point, ONE candidate. She has not been given an application, or interviewed, or gone through any of the processes to become the coordinator. She is having to make a decision ASAP about whether or not she's going to grad school, but any movement on that front keeps getting put off for some unknown reason. I think that this will eventually end badly - either we will have no volunteer coordinator at all, and the work will get put off on K (camp head nurse), or we will have somebody in the position who was slap-dashed in and doesn't care.
TB's attitude seems to be one of passivity. Ordinarily I am a passive person myself but after 7 years in camping I have realized that this attitude is not one that gets things done. We were approved for money to redo the sensory room floor... in January. Because I did all of the research, I know exactly what floor we're supposed to be getting and I could order it right now. I keep mentioning it to TB but nothing gets done about it. Every time I remind him about it, he says, Oh, it will get done. Now we're approaching the end of the summer, the floor is grosser and more in-pieces than ever before, and nothing has been done about it. I fear that when I leave I will take the drive for new flooring with me and nothing will *ever* get done about it.
TB delegates all of the jobs that I saw you take so much pride in - attending FFEs, leading grace, loading tractors, sitting with campers at meals, showing up at campout to say "hello," etc. He is accessible by walkie but not much otherwise. It seems like the ad staff are pulling a lot more than their weight and getting screamed at because somehow they're still not doing enough.
Counselors have their cell phones out constantly. The dress code (including close-backed shoes) is not always enforced. When things are done poorly or not well, we get empty threats with no follow-through. It seems to take everyone SO LONG to do the things we know we need to do, like everyone's just mucking around doing nothing and we're not moving forward. TB definitely plays favorites - and the counselor he brought with him from his previous camp (now working as the outfitter) is the obvious one.
I honestly don't understand how K is still here. She gets treated like shit on a daily basis and if I was her I would have quit. Thank God that she loves our campers - it's why she's still here. There is nothing I could do that can ever express how much I appreciate everything she does, and I think I've spent the whole summer trying to figure out exactly how to thank her.
For the longest time I thought that the reason I didn't like TB's style was because I was so loyal to you, and to the idea that my previous two summers had provided for me. I thought I was upset about the change in leadership, and that once I got to know Tony I would feel much better about him being in charge. I am realizing now that this is untrue. It's not about him usurping your leadership - it's him.
TB is a nice guy. But he is not the guy that I would have chosen to lead my beloved camp (and a lot of other people's beloved camp as well). Unfortunately those of us who end up spending most of the time with him never got a say. It's fine for corporate to hire someone - they don't have to live with him every day. He is very good at talking up things at meetings, telling everyone that things are just fine, making things sound great. But in daily practice he is lazy.
As the summer slips away I have no idea what use, if any, these words can have. I feel that if I speak with KS (the director of camping) he will rebuff me, if I speak with the AmeriCorps coordinator she is too new to know what to do, and if I speak with TB, it will just be shoved off like everything else I talk to TB about.
But I love Respite Camp and I'm not willing to give up on it. This place means so very much to me and it cannot possibly mean nearly as much to TB - he has only been here since November. He cannot possibly love it as much as I do, as much as K does, as much as B (rope coordinator, been here 8 years) does, as much as any of our staff members who adore camp but for whatever reason could or could not come back this summer - the "lifers." Camp is a special place and I would hate to see it ruined by someone who just sits back and lets his underlings do the heavy lifting.
In the 7 years I've been camping I've had a wide variety of "bosses." For my first year we had the president of the organization that owned camp as the director. Being blind himself, he was so involved. He attended so many activities and led some. He helped with cooking, cleaning, maintenance - he truly *lived* the camp experience.
My second year there we had the previous summer's program director as the camp director, and I am still very good friends with her today. She went out of her way to be involved. Again, she led activities, helped with everything, was present in the cabins, offered support to all of the counselors (not just some), listened to everyone, truly was unafraid to make a fool of herself in the name of camp.
At another camp I worked at the directors were these two bitchy ladies who didn't seem to appreciate their counselors, but I have to give them credit for loving the campers. They always put the campers first, *always*. They made it their mission to give the campers the best care, to make sure that everything related to the campers was perfect.
And now we have a sloppy staff, lousy conditions, ad staff getting yelled at constantly, and no real team spirit. It's only when I'm with the campers that i feel proud to be here. The leadership is failing all of us.
It's for the campers that I'm writing. If you have any advice, I would be most appreciative of it.
Thank you for everything you've done for me. I cannot express in words how much that is and what it means.
Sarah