Living out your values is never easy. One of our core Camp Fire values is, “We honor the power of young people.” To us, honoring power means sharing power through significant youth participation and decision-making.  

But what does this look like in practice? We’re working hard to authentically integrate youth voice through all layers of our organization. It takes forethought and extra energy to upend the adult-led status quo, but it’s worth it if it builds a Camp Fire truly for and by young people.  

It’s a matter of equity 

Youth Voice isn’t just a nice-to-have. It’s a justice issue. 

“A huge part of it for me is the equity piece,” said Ben Matthews, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion & Access Manager. “Young people are also a marginalized and oppressed group of people, because of their age and adults’ assumption that they don’t know how to make decisions for themselves.”  

This bias is called adultism, and it’s pervasive in our culture. Ben explained that a major red flag for an adultism attitude is responding to questions from young people with “Because I said so,” “Because I’m the adult,” or “Because that’s just the way we do things.”  

“It’s so much easier to shut down the conversation, rather than to reflect on, ‘Wait a second, why do we do that?’” Ben said.  

Being open to questions doesn’t mean a rule has to change. But treating young people as valuable members of a community means listening to their concerns, brainstorming solutions, and letting them share responsibility for taking action. After all, being a kid or teenager now is completely different from being a kid or teenager 20, 10 or even five years ago. Every generation has unique experiences, challenges and needs. Growing up is hard. 

“Technology, language, the way relationships work—all of that has changed so much,” said Ben. “There’s really no way an adult or anyone more than a couple years older can have any idea what [young people] need right now,” said Ben.  

Challenging adultism by championing youth voice ensures young people get the Camp Fire they need, not the one adults want them to have. 

What is youth voice? 

Inspired by the David P. Weikart Center for Youth Program Quality’s work on youth voice, Nikki Roe Cropp, Senior Director, Program Effectiveness, explained that when youth voice is fully integrated into an organization, young people share leadership with adults. On the way to that holistic collaboration, organizations often start with seeking youth input and giving young people more choices. The goal is to build on those valuable beginnings to arrive at true power-sharing.  

• Input: Creating opportunities for youth feedback on activities, programming aspects, and more. 
• Choice: Creating opportunities for young people to make relevant, meaningful and authentic decisions.  
• Shared Leadership: Creating opportunities for all youth to lead in diverse, varied and age-appropriate ways. 

“Youth voice has been a crucial part of Camp Fire for a long time,” said Nikki, “but it’s one of those areas we need to talk about, concentrate on, and ensure we’re doing intentionally—and developmentally.”  

Going from status quo to youth-led 

Making the shift to shared leadership means overcoming ingrained cultural beliefs about how adults and young people are supposed to interact. Both Ben and Nikki emphasized how liberating (and even relaxing) it can be for adult leaders to share power with young people. 

“It’s really getting adults to act as facilitators of learning rather than instructors of content,” said Nikki. “It’s having power with young people instead of power over.”  

Sometimes organizations think of youth voice as something for older teens only, but shared leadership can start early and deepen as children grow alongside their leadership skills. Adults still need to be responsible for making safety decisions along the way, but other leadership roles can be shared at all ages. Youth voice isn’t always a linear trajectory, and Camp Fire creates space to share power in multiple overlapping ways. The leadership opportunities listed below roughly correlate to developmental stages, but don’t underestimate younger kids’ abilities to carry out more high-responsibility power-sharing. We want young people to be the leaders they are today, not just build leadership skills for the future.  

• Lower responsibility leadership tasks:  
• Handing out materials 
• Presenting ideas to a small group 
• Helping peers 
• Setting up snacks 
• Helping a group stay positive 
• Taking responsibility for daily routines 
• Explaining directions 

• Intermediate-responsibility leadership tasks:  
• Leading a group discussion, song, project, event, etc. 
• Co-facilitating program activities with an adult 
• Participating in a program task force or leadership program 

• High-responsibility leadership tasks:  
• Planning program activities 
• Facilitating program activities 
• Mentoring other youth 
• Participating in a youth advisory group 
• Starting their own initiative or group 
• Shared power in organizational decision-making 

Advising the adults 

Youth advisory groups deserve a special mention in any discussion of youth voice. They are a powerful channel for integrating youth voice into the larger organization—if the advisory component is prioritized. Leadership programs aren’t the same things as an advisory board whose function is to practice leadership. It’s easy for adults to blur the lines between youth programming and youth advisory cabinets, but adult sponsors can help maintain the focus.    

Julia Fleenor Bejarano, Camp Fire Marketing Manager, and Hannah Howard, Camp Fire Evaluation Manager, both serve as Youth Voice Coordinators for the National Youth Advisory Cabinet (YAC).  

“We think of our YAC like a person on our staff,” explained Hannah. “We treat our YAC members equally; they are important.” 

YAC members are 16 to 18 years old, have Camp Fire experience, and commit to meeting (virtually) with Camp Fire adult leaders (our CEO, president, senior directors and directors) once a month, September through May. As experts in youth experience, they are paid for their time. 

“We try to be really clear,” said Julia, on making sure other adult leaders understand the purpose of the YAC. “The youth are here to help you make decisions. Come ready.” 

YAC meetings include educational content when it’s necessary for them to fulfill their mission, but the first goal is shared leadership. YAC has advised on a wide variety of topics including website design, social media content, how to word youth survey questions, internal training courses and more. In the past, the YAC has led the redesign of awards and recognitions and traditionally been one of the first stops for strategic plan feedback.   

Julia and Hannah have led a professional learning community for Camp Fire affiliates interested in expanding youth voice and have met with other national youth organizations who want to start youth advisory groups. They report that it’s hard for adults everywhere to make the youth-voice shift.  

“It’s really hard for folks to wrap their brain around,” said Hannah. “It’s a longer process of rewiring our brains to understand that young people are equally if not more important in conversations about youth development. It’s a reframe of the power dynamics between adults and youth.”  

Learn more about youth voice at Camp Fire 

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But access to high-quality early learning opportunities is far from equal! In the U.S., only around half of 3- and 4-year-olds are enrolled in preschool programs.³ Families in higher-income areas tend to have better access to early education programs than those in disadvantaged neighborhoods. And systemic racism limits both the respect and resources available to early childhood educators: Low wages lead to high turnover and challenges finding qualified early educators, with women of color disproportionately doing this critical work. 

As the Center for American Progress notes, “Despite ongoing oppression and exclusion, women of color—and Black women in particular—have been leaders in the movement for child care, organizing community-led solutions such as family child care networks to fill child care needs in the absence of federal or state support.”⁴  

At Camp Fire, we are working to expand access to powerful early learning experiences, both by taking early education outdoors and by supporting early childhood educators. While 3% of the youth we served last year were pre-K and 29% were in kindergarten through 2nd grade, our impact on early learners extends beyond direct programming.  

Here are two great examples:  

Taking Early Childhood Education Outdoors 

Catherine Hubbard, Outdoor and Nature Programming Manager for Camp Fire National Headquarters, joined the organization in early 2023. Before joining Camp Fire, Catherine spent 16 years at the Nature School at the Schlitz Audubon Nature Center in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. She started as a teacher and ended up as the director of the innovative outdoor-based school. With co-author Pattie Ensel Bailie, Catherine wrote a book based on her experiences there, Partnering with Nature in Early Childhood to help other educators take early childhood learning outside, and she also is developing an online course, “Social Emotional Learning (SEL) Outdoors,” for Camp Fire’s staff and volunteers. 

Catherine emphasizes that high-quality early childhood programming lays a foundation of social-emotional skills that makes all other learning possible: “Anybody who works with youth at an older age is seeing all of these issues arise—with mental health, emotional health, and self-regulation—and it’s probably because those foundational skills were skipped,” said Catherine. 

She sees nature as one of our best SEL collaborators. “What I learned through my years at the Nature School is that I’m interested in how nature can be a partner in social-emotional learning (SEL),” said Catherine. Getting very young folks outside aligns with Camp Fire’s three-part vision to connect them to the outdoors, others and themselves.  (More than 40,000 kids of all ages took part in 79 Camp Fire environmental and outdoor programs across the country in our most recent program year!) 

In addition to the obvious nature tie-in, Catherine says that learning outdoors creates more equitable classrooms that enable connection to others. “There’s an endless amount of resources outside if nature is the source of your teaching materials,” said Catherine, comparing limited supplies in indoor spaces to the wealth of natural toys (sticks, sand, pinecones, etc.) and open space outside. “So there’s enough to go around. It creates this sense of community.”  

Learning outdoors also offers opportunities for self-discovery: Young children navigate new environments, solve problems and see themselves as part of a larger ecosystem. “As you’re testing your skills in an environment where you’re free to be yourself, you’re really discovering who you are.” explained Catherine. 

She promotes the power of unstructured outdoor play for early childhood students. “It never works to take a group of 3-year-olds outside and start lecturing them about plants and animals, right?” she laughed. “That is not how they learn. They learn with their whole bodies, and they need to play and wiggle and throw themselves into the mud puddles.” 

Catherine said this wisdom isn’t new; it’s just been discounted by those who have viewed early childhood education as “babysitting,” not foundational learning. 

“Early childhood educators have been talking about SEL for a long, long time,” said Catherine.“

Empowering Early Childhood Educators 

Camp Fire First Texas is doing the opposite of dismissing early educator’s experience: It’s amplifying through their Early Education Workforce Development program.   

Travis Davis, Vice President of the program, said the 20-year effort grew out of a long-time Camp Fire family’s passion for supporting early childhood education, the affiliate’s past experience running an early childhood center (now led by Early Head Start), and Camp Fire First Texas’s role as the area’s child care resource and referral touchpoint.  

“The initial work of Camp Fire First Texas serving as Dallas / Fort Worth’s Child Care Resource and Referral Agency has served us well to meet the needs of early childhood teachers and directors today,” said Travis. 

The Early Education Workforce Development program offers in-person and virtual workshops, an early education apprenticeship program, and Child Development Associate and Child Care Director Administrator credential courses. Travis says they try to offer professional development for people just starting their early childhood careers and those who are looking for more advanced continuing education.  

There’s healthy crossover between the Workforce Development program and other Camp Fire offerings, especially afterschool initiatives. Travis is able to offer afterschool staff continuing education opportunities. 

Most importantly, empowering effective early childhood educators aligns with Camp Fire’s mission, including helping very young children connect to others.  

“At the heart of our work is helping young children have good relationships, both with caregivers, but also with other children in the program,” said Travis. “Then that translates to good relationships with people down the road, too.” 

He cited an Early Learning Alliance study of how Fort Worth kindergarten teachers defined school readiness: Instead of focusing on academic readiness, the teachers were mostly concerned with incoming students’ social-emotional skills, such as getting along with peers, self-regulation and being able to follow simple instructions.  

“That’s what being ready is really all about,” said Travis. “And that comes back to people creating environments where children can feel included and supported. And where adults have the skills they need to help build successful relationships within their program.” 

Starting a lifetime of connection early 

We all need to feel like we belong, whether we’re 2 or 92. And we all need to feel connected to each other.  

“The essential human needs don’t change,” Catherine said. “Really small children, middle-aged people, and really old people all need to feel that they matter. They all need to feel safe and loved. And they all thrive when they have access to the outdoor world. It doesn’t really matter what age you are. It’s just a human need.”  

Find a Camp Fire program near you! 

Find Your Camp Fire!

1. “High-quality early child care and education: The gift that lasts a lifetime,” Brookings. 4 November 2021. Accessed 17 April 2024. 

2. “Early Childhood Education,” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Accessed 17 April 2024.  

3. “Enrollment rates of young children,” National Center for Education Statistics. May 2023. Accessed 17 April 2024.  

4. “Data Dashboard: An Overview of Child Care and Early Learning in the United States,” Center for American Progress. 14 December 2023. Accessed 17 April 2024. 

The post Little Kids, Big Impact appeared first on Camp Fire.

Kazumi Haag is a fourth-generation Camp Fire participant and a National Youth Advisory Cabinet member. Her dad, Eric, a biologist at the University of Maryland, started Spark Seekers, a Camp Fire group for Kazumi and her friends in College Park when they were grade schoolers. Growing up in Nevada, Eric had joined his sister’s Camp Fire troop because he wanted more outdoor experiences than he was getting in the local Boy Scouts. Eric’s dad (Kazumi’s grandfather) led that Camp Fire group. He was inspired by his mother (Eric’s grandmother and Kazumi’s great-grandmother), who joined Camp Fire in Florida in 1910, the year it began.  

Kazumi grew up hiking and car camping with her family and Camp Fire buddies, but her relationship with the environment deepened when she joined the crew team her freshman year of high school.   

“One time, we went down to this site on the water, but there was no dirt next to the river, it was just packed trash,” remembered Kazumi. “There was just layers of plastic and plastic, almost like sedimentary rock” 

“We filled up 30 30-gallon trash bags, and you couldn’t tell that we did anything,” said Eric. “The trash was sort of like a geological feature. After that, I pick up any piece of plastic I see in the gutter now because I know where it’s going.” 

Kazumi’s crew team has a strict prohibition against plastic bottles and is working to reduce trash at their boathouse. They volunteer to help clean the smaller streams that flow into the Anacostia and plant trees, which help catch trash and filter stormwater runoff.  

“Camp Fire changed my perspective; it took me from loving animals to wanting to save them,” said Kazumi. “But also Camp Fire helps people just take a breather. Camp Fires helped me and the other kids in our troop see that if you take a second to be outdoors and be at peace, it definitely helps.”  

Eric echoes the importance of understanding the natural systems we live in. “It’s around you all the time if you open your ears to it,” he said, citing neighborhood organizations doing grassroots environmental work, the vast educational resources at state parks, and scientists like Jason Munshi-South, who study wildlife in urban environments. 

The post Embrace your own ecosystem appeared first on Camp Fire.

You’ll find in this report the many ways that we continued to learn and grow as an organization. Advancing equity will remain a priority as we move forward as a values-led organization and strive to be relevant to today’s youth and families, meeting the current moment we all find ourselves in.

Our 46 affiliates in 24 states served more than 713,000 youth, adults and families across 5,100+ program sites over the past eight years. Numbers are important, but what really matters are the individual stories of impact at the local level.

We share the following snapshot of Camp Fire’s impact across the country to connect you with the work you make possible. Thank you for being with us on this journey.

Wishing you more courage for more connection,

Greg Zweber, CEO | Camp Fire National Headquarters

Download the Report

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We know that kids who have a certain set of competencies and skills are better able to navigate through challenging times and cope with adversity.  The process in which youth gain these necessary skills and competencies is called social-emotional learning or SEL.  Social-emotional learning is nothing new—teachers, counselors, coaches, and youth workers have been modeling and teaching social and emotional development strategies for a long time.  There are decades of research that illustrates the benefits of SEL for kids both in and out of the classroom.   SEL is infused into Camp Fire’s program framework, making it a cornerstone of the Camp Fire experience.     

SEL has changed over the years.  It was changing before the pandemic as folks implementing it started recognizing that this process of building social and emotional skills needs to be contextualized to different cultures, norms, and priorities. Just as regular teaching has evolved over the years to include more culturally responsive practices, so has SEL. And then during and after the pandemic and racial unrest in our country, SEL had to evolve again—as kids’ needs changed during that time.   

Transformative SEL was born in response to us finally acknowledging the disparities in education and opportunities based on a kid’s socioeconomic status, race, zip code, home language, disability status, and other factors. “Transformative SEL” is a form of SEL implementation where young people and adults build strong, respectful, and lasting relationships to engage in co-learning. It facilitates critical examination of individual and contextual factors that contribute to inequities and calls for collaborative solutions that lead to personal, community, and societal well-being.  It recognizes that youth can be a part of creating just environments now and for the future.  

Today’s young people are primed for Transformative SEL. Search Institute recently reported that youth are more invested today in caring, equality and social justice, cultural competence, and valuing diversity than they were in 2016.   

Graph to the right: Internal comparison of trends between 2020 and 2022 Attitudes & Behaviors Survey aggregate data 

We know that empathy and compassion are not enough to advance equity.  At Camp Fire, we employ practices and programming that center humanity, honor identity, promote healing and liberation, and build skills needed to act and advocate for social justice.   This is Transformative SEL in action!

Want to read more about SEL and Camp Fire? Check out Building Equity with Social Emotional Learning (SEL).

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The Biden-Harris Administration is announcing today its Improving Student Achievement Agenda for 2024, which is focused on proven strategies that will accelerate academic performance for every child in school. There is nothing more important to our future than ensuring children are equipped to compete in the 21st century. That’s why the Administration is laying out an agenda for academic achievement for every school in the country, using all of its tools—including accountability, reporting, grants, and technical assistance—to intensify its drive for adoption of three evidence-based strategies that improve student learning: (1) increasing student attendance; (2) providing high-dosage tutoring; and (3) increasing summer learning and extended or afterschool learning time.

Today, several philanthropic and national organizations are announcing commitments to support academic achievement. The Administration will continue to work with these kinds of organizations to further build on these commitments. Read about the commitments from the organizations below here: (see Camp Fire under AT&T!)

• Afterschool Alliance
• Attendance Works
• AT&T
• Boys & Girls Clubs of America
• Charles Stewart Mott Foundation
• National PTA  
• National Summer Learning Association
• Overdeck Family Foundation
• Parent Teacher Home Visits
• Wallace Foundation
• YMCA
• Zearn

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Our values are our North Star. They guide our strategic vision and our day-to-day work. We’ve been a values-led organization since 1910, and it’s what has allowed us to survive for 114 years and it’s what will help us continue to meet the current moment.

On our journey to inclusion, which includes a commitment to expanding spaces for young people to “simply be”, we sought to understand how the intentionality in which we create programs impacted participants. We asked the question,  

“What impact (if any) do gender-inclusive and gender-affirming measures have on young people, their caregivers, and their camp experience?” 

This question led to a year-long study at two of our camps, which engaged transgender and non-binary youth and their caregivers following their summer camp experience.  The result is this report, a product of the vulnerability and honesty the participants were willing to share with us. We are honored to share with you and the world today: the first-of-its-kind report around the impact of both physical spaces and psychological conditions that allow youth “to just be,” with an emphasis on identity and gender-affirming practices for transgender and non-binary young people.

We believe all young people deserve to belong and access opportunities to thrive, so we intentionally craft our Camp Fire programs and spaces in ways that make this possible. Inclusion, belonging, and thriving don’t just happen by accident – it takes a lot of thoughtfulness, attention, and work.

The Othering and Belonging Institute website says, “The concept of belonging describes more than a feeling of inclusion or welcome. Its full power is as a strategic framework for addressing ongoing structural and systemic othering, made visible, for example, in the wide disparities in outcomes found across a variety of sectors and identity groups.”

Camp Fire isn’t just implementing gender-affirming practices, we’re expanding opportunities for young people to exist in their fullness through any means necessary – looking at and updating our policies, practices, language, operations, and structures.

We believe this report is just the tip of the iceberg. Our goal and hope is to scale the research in the years to come and continue to learn and grow, while always centering youth voice. So Camp Fire can continue to best serve our incredible transgender and non-binary youth. 

Download the full report below.

Download the Report

Space for Identity Exploration: Through the Lens of Gender © 2024 by Camp Fire, is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International 

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Camp Fire: How has an understanding of nature led to your work and where you are today?

José González: The most recent element that has shaped my work is how nature heals severed connections. The land can be instructive for creating the conditions, structures, and elements for people to have a livelihood and to relate with each other. If we continue via a reductive, mechanistic approach, then all we’re doing is perpetuating harm. How can we be truly revolutionary? The root of the word revolutionary means revolution — cycles. If we were to design a workforce with regenerative cycles, it doesn’t mean money disappears overnight. It doesn’t mean you can’t have an iPhone. But you now have to approach work with different responsibilities and logic. It allows us to see people as complex, not just elements in a pipeline, and imagine a career path more like a braided river.

Camp Fire: How does making the shift to a nature-based metaphor for work help young people imagine different futures?

José González: I think it’s having a sense that there’s an agency of co-creation in that vision versus just taking what you inherit and playing the role. But it’s a both/and. I understand the frustration, the urgency to say: “Burn it all down! This capitalist, colonial, extractive, consumer-based economy and structure is no good. Be gone!” I say, “Yes, and…” Just like prescribed burning, there’s an intention and an approach. Here’s that mentorship from the land again: You have to look at the conditions we’ve inherited. If any spark makes the whole forest go away, that’s not good. At the same time, you can’t ignore all the underbrush and the necessity for prescribed burning. What does it mean to be a responsible fire tender? What does it mean to burn to create a healthy landscape? For young people, I say channel it. Help others envision this solar punk future that you’re so excited about. What are the careers? What does it mean to have a livelihood with roles that give your life meaning and don’t just treat you as another bit of the productive, mechanistic infrastructure? 

Camp Fire: What are some ways you’re seeing “responsible fire tenders” create careers and livelihoods for themselves? 

José González: A lot of young people are moving back on the land, so to speak. They are working with environmental justice, renewable energy and fossil fuel consumption. They are looking at the challenges around affordable housing and creating more community-oriented types of living. I think it’s important to ask the question: How does this job give meaning and serve my community, versus only being driven by a paycheck? 

Camp Fire: What are other ways nature metaphors are playing out in the organizations you consult with? 

José González: I tell people nobody is going to a meadow and saying, “You’re not meadowing enough today.” What does this tell you about how you can move with cycles of productivity? You can’t always be in the blooming and fruiting stage. And yet think about how often that’s exactly what’s expected or demanded of you! It’s like saying to a tree, “You know, what your issue is, tree? You’re suffering from burnout.” And the tree is like, “Yeah, it’s called fall. I’ll see you next year.” We can ignore these cues from our non-human kin, but it’s perpetuating a separation from nature. I’m not going to be exactly like the squirrel or exactly like the raven — being human is its own beautiful mess. But if I ignore what some of those natural relationships are, then I’m only deepening harm. What is the healing process? What does it mean to reconnect all of these different elements?

Camp Fire: How can we reconnect with cycles and seasons of rest, especially when our macro-culture isn’t supportive of that? 

José González: Step one is struggling with (and having grace for) the question: Where’s the urgency behind this coming from? Am I treating work like an emergency room situation as a default? Second: actually getting out in nature. I have to challenge myself to go for that walk, go for that jog, spend time in the garden, talk to the tree. The last part is acknowledging privilege. I can’t callously say to someone: “You need to go out in nature and chill!” And they’re like, “Yeah, can you pay my rent?” Don’t be fooled by thinking it’s only an individual choice. I applaud and support self care, but I don’t want us to ignore community care and structural care, so that the onus is not just on individuals. So when people say, “Hey, the outdoors is for everyone,” that’s an invitation to say, “You’re right, but why does not everyone feel that’s true?” We can ask what are the social constructs that we have agency to change.

Interested in “planet, inclusion and adventure”? Take the Outdoorist oath. 

The post How can nature help us reframe ‘work’?  appeared first on Camp Fire.

At Camp Fire, we’re relentlessly focused on now. It’s one of the things that makes us different from other youth organizations! We care about how young people are connecting to themselves, nature, and each other today. We like to say that we’re not overly fixated on the future.  

But a funny thing happens when you do what’s best for now — being present, following your passions, prioritizing connection. Those seeds grow. And keep growing! That’s what has been happening with science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) learning at Camp Fire: We’ve been planting seeds for more than a century and just recently naming the forest we’re thriving in. 

Embracing our STEM roots 

A few years ago, Camp Fire started surveying our affiliates about STEM learning practices.  

“One of the really interesting things we found was that a huge percentage of our programs were informally incorporating STEM,” said Shawna Rosenzweig, Camp Fire President. “But they didn’t consider their programs to be STEM programs.”  

For example, outdoor programs were teaching kids and teens to be curious about their observations in nature, to ask questions and to learn more about the ecosystems they live in. In other words, they were teaching young people to think like environmental scientists!  “But many of our direct delivery and program staff said they didn’t consider themselves to be STEM educators,” said Shawna, “even if they were facilitating STEM activities or leading environmental education programs.”   

Shawna and the leadership team saw that there was an opportunity to help both staff and program participants expand how we define STEM, get more strategic about STEM programming … and claim the name. 

Collaborating with Imagine Science 

To that end, Camp Fire is collaborating with Imagine Science, a nonprofit that works with youth programs to help bring equitable STEM opportunities to more than 18 million young people around the country.  

“This partnership helps us scale a national STEM strategy,” Shawna explained. “It also sets us up to collaborate with other organizations supporting young people.”  

Camp Fire and Imagine Science are going to build a community of practice across Camp Fire affiliates, beginning with an initial pilot group of five this fall. 

“We’ll be sharing best practices and experiences, participating in professional development together and using a set evaluation tool for continuous improvement,” explained Shawna. The affiliates won’t be tied to a specific curriculum but encouraged to design programming that fits their local needs and opportunities.   

“We’re excited to think about how our mission of connection to the outdoors, others and self-integrates with STEM,” said Shawna. “I think it’s going to be a really fun process to see what Camp Fire’s unique flavor is in this space. I think we’re going to find that so many of our practices and ways of working with young people are indeed STEM-related.”  

The Imagine Science collaboration is being supported by two corporate partnerships (official announcements coming soon!), which are helping fund professional development and providing access to other STEM learning resources. For example, The Achievery is a free digital library of STEM learning content. You can use the QR code below to sign up and explore.  

Imagining a STEM-ier present — and future 

Building on the STEM work Camp Fire affiliates are already doing has the double benefit of improving young people’s present and future. Camp Fire offers a safe place to explore new interests and develop new skills. A kid who has struggled in a science classroom in the past, for example, may get a second chance to discover a love for science through a Camp Fire nature program.  

“My number one hope and goal is that young people, especially those who have been historically excluded, see STEM careers as a pathway and part of their potential,” Shawna said. She also called out the potential for staff members to embrace their STEM educator credentials — and see where those skills might take them next.  

This kind of growth is called “workforce development” in some circles. Even though Camp Fire is now-focused, we know making the most of today also means better tomorrows ahead.  

“Ultimately, we’re preparing young people for the workforce they want — and it’s not even necessarily the workforce that exists today,” Shawna said. “We are helping them develop crucial skills for success, however they define it, whether they are designing their own career path or landing their perfect first job.”  

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Right now, really hard. Like, clinically hard. We’re in a youth mental health crisis, and one of the underlying causes is trauma.   

What is trauma?  

The National Child Traumatic Stress Network gives us a simple definition of trauma:  

“When a child feels intensely threatened by an event [they] are involved in or witnesses, we call that event a trauma.”

Trauma has many sources: Child abuse and neglect, domestic violence, community violence, bullying, medical events, disasters or other emergencies, loss of a loved one, racism/discrimination, family instability, worldwide pandemics — the list goes on. Researchers are even beginning to make the link between climate change and trauma.  

Not every stressful event automatically leads to trauma, and individual circumstances (age, cultural beliefs, the presence or absence of a support system, etc.) around an event may lead to differing effects in different people. 

 “A particular event may be experienced as traumatic for one individual and not for another,” explains the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). 

What happens to us in early childhood influences the people we become. “[But] it isn’t just something that happens to kids,” said Nikki Roe Cropp, Camp Fire’s Senior Director, Program Effectiveness. “It’s a human experience.”   

Many of us experience adversity that has a lasting impact on our physical and emotional health — no matter our age. The book What Happened to You? by brain development and trauma expert Dr. Bruce Perr and Oprah Winfrey suggests healing can begin with a shift to asking, “What happened to you?” rather than “What’s wrong with you?” or “Why are you behaving that way?”  

What happened to us in childhood is a powerful predictor of our risk for health problems down the road and offers scientific insights into the patterns of behaviors so many struggle to understand.  

What does trauma do to the brain?  

When we experience something traumatic, our brain stem takes over to help us survive. Our stress hormones kick in and enable us to do whatever needs to be done to get through (fight, flight, freeze, fawn). The cognitive and emotional processing parts of our brains take a back seat.  

These are helpful responses in the moment, but when the danger is past, the brain and body aren’t always able to shift back into a non-reactive mode. Our brains can stay on high alert, keeping us stuck in those emergency reaction patterns, making us act, feel and think in ways that others find hard to understand.

That stuckness is particularly damaging to developing brains. The National Child Traumatic Stress Network explains:  

“When a child is experiencing traumatic stress, these reactions interfere with the child’s daily life and ability to function and interact with others. … Without treatment, repeated childhood exposure to traumatic events can affect the brain and nervous system and increase health-risk behaviors (e.g., smoking, eating disorders, substance use, and high-risk activities). Research shows that child trauma survivors can be more likely to have long-term health problems (e.g., diabetes and heart disease) or to die at an earlier age.”  

The key phrase here is “without treatment.” Trauma may be almost unavoidable, but it’s definitely not untreatable. There are many evidenced-based treatments for traumatic stress, and there are many ways that those of us who aren’t mental health professionals can help, too.  

We call those ways a “trauma-informed approach.”  

What is a trauma-informed approach to working with youth? 

“Trauma-informed care is being aware of what young people are bringing with them,” said Ben Matthews, Camp Fire’s Diversity, Equity, Inclusion & Access Manager.  

Indeed, SAMSHA defines a trauma-informed approach as:  

“A program, organization, or system that is trauma-informed realizes the widespread impact of trauma and understands potential paths for recovery; recognizes the signs and symptoms of trauma in clients, families, staff, and others involved with the system; and responds by fully integrating knowledge about trauma into policies, procedures, and practices, and seeks to actively resist re-traumatization.” 

SAMHSA lays out six principles for trauma-informed programs:  

• Safety 
• Trustworthiness and transparency 
• Peer support 
• Collaboration and mutuality 
• Empowerment, voice and choice 
• Cultural, historical and gender issues 

How does Camp Fire use trauma-informed principles? 

1. Trauma-informed principles are embedded into our framework. SAMHSA’s trauma-informed principles line up well with Camp Fire’s values.  
    
   “Trauma-informed care is very much baked into our program framework,” said Nikki, pointing to Camp Fire’s emphasis on safe interactions, connected relationships, youth voice and inclusivity. “These things are good for everybody, but they are particularly valuable for kiddos who have experienced trauma or toxic stress.” 
    
   Many of Camp Fire’s foundational practices — time in nature, routines and rituals, emotional check-ins, relationship building, volunteering — are now known to be trauma-informed tools that can help release toxic stress. Camp Fire also offers some specific programming for young people who have shared experiences of trauma, including El Tesoro de la Vida Grief Camp.     

2. We train our staff on trauma-informed approaches. Camp Fire’s national Learning Lab has a variety of courses to help staff learn trauma-informed strategies, and affiliates do their own training as well.  
    
   “It’s so important to understand the effects of stress and trauma on the brain and how that impacts behavior,” said Nikki. “We can look at behavior through the lens of trauma and unmet needs. It’s not, ‘What’s wrong with this kid?’ It’s, ‘What happened to this kiddo in the past and how does that inform what they need right now?’”  
    
   Part of being a trauma-informed organization is not only training staff, but supporting their mental health. “Providing support for our staff gives them the capacity to support young people,” said Ben, who shared that Camp Fire National Headquarters builds extra mental health time into every pay period.  
    
   “We need to connect our staff to themselves, others and nature before they can provide that for kids, too,” agreed NIkki. “With trauma-informed care, you have to continuously work on and care for yourself.”  

3. We do our historical/community trauma homework. “Even if we can’t be fully prepared for what every single individual is bringing in, we can know what historic trauma a community might have experienced,” said Ben. “We can educate ourselves prior to folks showing up.” 
    
   Camp Fire began adding community-specific trauma training to our toolbox alongside our CAMPER grant work to improve camp access for historically excluded groups. Camp Fire also partners closely with organizations like Transplaining for Camps, S’more Summer, The Trevor Project, the National Indian Education Association to learn how to support campers who might have experienced trauma because of their identities. 
     

4. We partner with other trauma-informed organizations. On a national level, Camp Fire has worked with Let’s Empower, Advocate, and Do Inc. (LEAD), the Alliance for Camp Health, On Our Sleeves and others to both educate staff and further conversations about youth trauma and mental health.   
    
   Our affiliates also form relationships with local organizations for both training and resource sharing. “For example, Camp Fire Green Country works with the local LGBTQ2s+ organization and the shelter that serves youth experiencing homelessness,” said Ben. “They work with these folks to know what the situation is for young people accessing their services and they also do cross training for each other.”   
    

5. We resist retraumatization by creating safe spaces. Camp Fire’s first priority is making sure young people are safe, both physically and emotionally. Camp Fire has extensive child safety and protection protocols, and many summer camps now have a designated inclusion specialist or team ready to address issues that impact emotional safety as they arise. 
    
   “It’s also important to recognize that Camp Fire has been part of trauma for particular communities,” said Ben, referencing past practices of cultural appropriation that the organization has been working to identify, address and repair.  
    
   “Our work to end cultural appropriation is a good example of learning how we harmed and turning that knowledge into program practices that minimize the potential for re-traumatization,” Nikki said.    

6. We connect young people and their families to trauma-treatment resources. When young people are dealing with serious trauma after-effects, Camp Fire helps connect them to professionals who can help. Programs held in schools collaborate with the school’s mental health staff. A few camps have social workers on staff, and all programs have local mental health resource lists and crisis contacts on hand to share with kids and families who need them.  

Our trauma-informed knowledge and practices will grow as we continue to find ways to help connect kids to nature, others and themselves. We may not be able to make growing up easy, but with trauma-informed approaches, we can make it kinder, more connected and full of hope.    

Resources:  

• “About Child Trauma” and “Trauma Types,” The National Child Traumatic Stress Network. Accessed 13 July 2023.  
• “Climate Change and Trauma,” International Society of Traumatic Stress Studies, istss.org, Accessed 13 July 2023.  
• “How Trauma Changes the Brain,” Boston Clinical Trials, bostontrials.com. 10 June 2020. Accessed 13 July 2023.  
• “SAMHSA’s Concept of Trauma and Guidance for a Trauma-Informed Approach,” SAMSHA, DHS, July 2014.

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