What parents should ask before sending kids to summer camp

As summer camps are confronted with the reality of COVID-19, some have decided to close their doors, some have gone virtual, while others are reopening with restrictions.

No matter what precautions individual organizations decide on, three UNH experts want to empower parents to make the best decision for their families.

Professors Jayson Seaman and SemraAytur along with UNH camp specialist Larry Barker wrote a comprehensive guide to help parents assess the safety of any summer camp.

Seaman, associate professor of recreation management and policy, said the motivation to create this fact-sheet was a lack of accessible, easy-to-understand resources for parents.

“All the guidelines coming down from the national associations and the state governments and all of that are really for camps, camp directions,” he said. “I felt like there was a gap between the kind of information that camps had and were working on, and then what I felt like parents could benefit from,” Seaman said.

Written in the form of a Q&A, Seaman and his colleagues wanted to empower parents to ask the hard questions.

“How do you know what the right questions are to ask? Because, you may not have all that information at hand,” he said.

They encourage parents who want to send a child to camp to ask questions like:

• What are your policies pertaining to out-of-state and international campers and staff?
• How are you managing changeover days?
• How will you accomplish social distancing?

Seaman and his colleagues said parents should listen for specific answers about how camp staff are working to minimizing transmission, monitoring campers’ health, and procedures in place in case someone becomes ill.

“Our goal really is to get parents to ask questions of their camps, because the camps are going to be the ones interpreting those guidelines. And, we didn’t really want to expect parents to be in a position of having to wade through the national guidelines themselves,” he said.

Other questions include – Will they be using/requiring/providing PPE? How frequently will campers and staff be tested? What will they do if campers or staff become symptomatic?

“Camps should have a communicable disease emergency action plan that covers topics like facilities for isolation of individuals, medical treatment, and communication with families if illness arises or protocols change,” the guide states. “Camps should be able to explain who will be conducting testing (for example, a private lab). They should also have a backup plan if a staff member needs to quarantine.”

Generally outdoor activities are safer than indoor event. Studies have indicated that chlorine kills the virus, and open, windy areas dilute the virus. This suggests that being outside has the potential of being safer because the conditions dilute the virus, making it much harder to become exposed, the guide states.

“The other thing that families should be aware of is, at least in New Hampshire, there are testing requirements and some quarantine requirements before attending camp. So, parents should be looking at the state guidelines, and again camps should be informing parents of this,” Seaman said.

For example, if attending camp, children should quarantine for two weeks prior.

Seaman said families should make their own decisions based on their comfort levels. By asking the right questions, Seaman hope parents will be empowered to make informed decisions.

“I think it would have been easy to write a guide that would have been all doom and gloom: here are all the risks,” pushing parents to keep their kids home, Seaman remarks. However, summer camp could be the safest option for a family.

Camps might be better choice for kids than staying at home, Seaman said.

“One part of our discussion in my house was, if camps do follow the guidelines for New Hampshire, it might be a safer option for kids, because there are families that are starting to get together with other families, and kids this summer are going to want to socialize with kids. And, that’s going to often be in the absence of testing, and in the absence of a fairly well-managed environment, which camps will have to provide this year. So, one way to look at it is that camps might be a safer environment,” Seaman said.

Seaman wanted to emphasize the general importance of camp for children.

“The most important thing is not stated in the piece itself: camp is such an important experience for kids,” Seaman said. “And I think that everybody should get behind the idea that camp is an important institution that we need to preserve in the long-run.”

Want to learn more about regulations in the state of New Hampshire? Click on these resources below.

Seaman, Barker and Aytur’s Parent Guide to Summer Camp.

The ACA and Y-USA resources and regulations.

The CDC’s guide for camps.

Gov. Chris Sununu’s proposed rules for camps.

How to deal with your child’s disappointed due to COVID-19, from the University of New Hampshire.

How to help your kids handle disappointment, from the Child Mind Institute.

A parent’s guide for the challenges of COVID-19.

When day camps and overnight camps can open in New Hampshire.

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These articles are being shared by partners in The Granite State News Collaborative. For more information visit collaborativenh.org.