Good Sports
Athletes Find Opportunities at Summer Camps
Let's preface this article with a small disclaimer: it's about sports and kids, and what the benefits are for athletic kids of attending ACA-accredited summer camps in New England. Of course, many of our summer camps offer many activities besides competitive sports. Lots of them focus on areas other than sports, in fact - everything from the outdoors to computers, from music to studio arts. Lots more offer sports as part of a larger program, but de-emphasize competition. There are summer camps for everyone; this article just focuses on a particular population and a certain misconception.
Children who demonstrate talents in particular sports at a young age often put their parents in difficult positions. During the summer, there can be intense pressure to push athletically gifted children into high-powered clinics, or to sign them up for travel teams or individual coaches. The promise of standing out on a high school varsity team, earning a college scholarship, or even receiving a professional contract can entice lots of families to focus exclusively on that sports dream. For most children, though – even those who excel at soccer or baseball or basketball – a summer at camp, one where sports are but a component of a larger program – can provide great and long-lasting benefits.
Many experts with whom we spoke pointed to the risks involved with focusing on one sport at an early age. Megan McHugo, the Ivy League’s Compliance Coordinator, said that “broad based participation in multiple sports allows different muscle groups to develop. Working on skills in multiple will ultimately make a person more well-rounded (muscularly), and can also aid in injury prevention by not overusing the muscles from constantly repeating the same motions of one sport.”
Maureen Sullivan, a high school varsity basketball coach and a parent, said, “Our youngest daughter just began college. At age six, she broke records in the backstroke. At ten, she was an accomplished diver. At twelve, she was star of the basketball team, and then at fourteen, she took up the game of golf. Once an athlete, always an athlete, and over the next four years, she became one of the top golfers in our state and secured a golf scholarship to college. The best gift a parent can give an athletically gifted child is the opportunity to participate in a myriad of sports over the course of the year. Cross-training affords a child an opportunity to participate on a team where he or she is not the best on the field – always a good lesson to learn.”
David Hixon should know better than most about what helps young athletes succeed. He is the longtime head men’s basketball coach at Amherst College; in 2006, they won the Division III national championship. His wife, Mandy, was the head diving coach at Amherst before becoming the head diving coach at UMass in 2000. She competed in the 1984 Olympic Trials. Their 15-year-old son, Michael, is on track for the Olympics in diving, too. He earned two bronze medals in the junior Pan-Am games in Calgary this year. While he trains year-round in that sport, his parents know all too well the risks of injuries from playing only one sport. “One of the problems,” Hixon wrote, “is that coaches – particularly outside of school, but sometimes in school – discourage kids from playing another sport and ‘demand’ that kids only play their sport. We are fighting a battle to keep kids involved in more than one.” Regarding their son in particular, he wrote, “His coach – his Mom – and I insist he diversify. He is going to play high school basketball and should make the varsity this year. Michael plays golf, too. I also believe that competition is competition, and the more times you put yourself into the fire, the better you’ll be, whether it’s on the board needing a big dive, at the free throw line needing a make to win, on the 18th needing a putt to win – it all is the same.”
Michael Buttrick, who entered high school having excelled at basketball, only to discover that he had gifts for rowing and cross-country running and is now at Yale, rowing for a lightweight crew that finished second at Nationals last year, worked as a counselor at Camp Timanous in Raymond, ME, for two summers. He said there are older campers there who have opted to go to specialty clinics. “We are trying to provide as much opportunity as possible, offering strength and conditioning, running and speed training. I think camp is a great option, and in the long run is likely to be a more meaningful experience than a sports [clinic].”
Most of those interviewed noted that, at a certain age, when an athlete needs to make a serious commitment to become an elite athlete, attending specialized programs is probably a necessity. But there’s no rush to do so. Buttrick wrote, “As kids become older – high school age – it often is advantageous to go to some prestigious camp or development team that gets serious exposure to college coaches. Nevertheless, if a kid is talented enough, he will probably 
get recognized no matter what he does during the summer.” McHugo echoed that sentiment: “Once young athletes are sophomores or juniors in high school, specialization and more singular sport focus may be more important in terms of getting out in front of coaches.”
Summer camps hire counselors for their ability to work with kids. Before the summer starts, summer camp staff at ACA-accredited summer camps receive all sorts of training to help them push and challenge their campers. They have the opportunity to go to teaching clinics across New England to become better teachers and coaches. In many ways, these summer camp counselors will provide more valuable, instructive lessons than a Division 1 athlete who might be working with kids at all-star showcases or clinics where coaches might be scouting or recruiting. Certainly, there is likely to be an emphasis on sportsmanship at summer camps, and on discovering the pleasures of the game.
That’s not, of course, to say that children at summer camps won’t also have the opportunity for top-notch athletic competition. Just because a summer camp offers a broad program doesn’t mean it doesn’t also offer high-level instruction and opportunities in particular areas. Windridge Tennis & Sports Camp, for instance, obviously focuses its attention on certain sports. Camp Director Norbert Auger wrote, “What I tell parents is that we’re a specialized sports camp – soccer, tennis, or riding – within a traditional summer camp setting. If you don’t like one of our three majors, then we’re not a good match for your child. I then go on to explain that you will get the same or better instruction as any specialized program. In those three areas, we go out and hire the best possible coaches. The difference is that we offer the whole traditional camp experience: the cabin life, other activities, special events, evening programs, etc. In addition, you have the cabin counselors to help you adjust to being away and making new friends in a safe, supervised environment.”
John Tilley, Director at Camp Coniston, a YMCA summer camp in New Hampshire, wrote, "Every year, there will be some activity that is 'staff driven' and we will have a coach who excels in that area. For example, we had campers on an Olympic scout team for soccer, and had a staff member who for two years parents said taught them more about the game than the training camp the kids went to for the scout team. In our case, this is not soccer every year, but we will always have staff who excel in a few areas each year."
Tilley also noted that summer camp is a place where kids are encouraged and challenged to participate in activities outside of their comfort zones. "Drama is a program that has been strong here for quite a while, and every summer, I have parents of very athletic boys who say, 'I can't believe my child loves this here. I can't imagine him being in a play at home.'"
Many summer camps offer the flexibility that allows families to enroll their children in summer camp for a few weeks and participate in sport-specific clinics during the rest of the summer. Joanne Fay, Director of Program Development at Crossroads for Kids, said, “I have had some campers in our day camp who have needed to stop coming to camp at the ages of 11, 12, 13, because their parents said they needed to go to golf programs, football camps, baseball clinics, etc. These kids have returned as staff members when they were 18 because this is where they really wanted to be. I find that many kids specialize in one sport at a young age and burn out of it before they reach middle and high school.”
Indeed, many summer camps see themselves as oases away from the grind of focusing on one sport all the time. Susan Chenet, Assistant Director of Camp Wa-Klo, a girls' summer camp in New Hampshire, wrote, "Most parents would choose our camp to give their daughter a break from the intensity of the school year. Summer camp offers a needed balance between the intensity of the competition and the fun of the sport. After camp, our girls go off more energized to accomplish any task that's asked of them during the school year." Wa-Klo offers the full range of instruction and competition in all kinds of sports.
Summer camp offers the best of both worlds: one-on-one instruction and the opportunity to play while enjoying all the advantages of a broad program in a summer camp setting. If you're wondering which camps might be a fit for your athletic son or daughter, inquire about the summer camp's athletic philosophy: does everyone get to play, or is the emphasis on competition? Are there cuts from teams? Do nearby summer camps, which might play each other throughout the summer, share the same philosophy?
There are many ways that summer camps give their charges the opportunity to enhance their skills as athletes while also giving them the chance to try new things and learn about themselves along the way.
If you'd like to find summer camps that might suit a child you know, please try our Find a Camp tool.