Your Child’s Work Future & the Urgency of Social-Emotional Learning

You know Camp Fire’s mission is to help kids and teens find their sparks right now. But we also know that giving youth the tools to thrive today means they’ll keep on thriving tomorrow. So, we want to take a quick break from our usual present-focus to talk about how Social-Emotional Learning (SEL) sets kids […]

How Social-Emotional Learning Helps Your Kids Thrive

On a gut-level, Social Emotional Learning (SEL) makes total sense. We know young people need whole-life tools to thrive. But what does the research say? In short, Social-Emotional Learning works. Here’s a run-down of some leading studies tracking social-emotional learning outcomes in the classroom and beyond. Social-Emotional Learning programs improve performance in both SEL areas and […]

Let’s Dive Deeper Into Social-Emotional Learning

Social-Emotional Learning (SEL) can be a big topic to wrap your mind around at first. Last week, we covered how Camp Fire fits into the greater SEL conversation What in the World is Social-Emotional Learning?. Today, we want to give you a couple further resources if you want to go deeper. Hey, maybe SEL is […]

What in the World is Social-Emotional Learning?

We’ve spent some time on the blog this year helping connect the dots between Camp Fire’s long legacy of leadership and the movements happening in the wider youth development world. You may remember our post about how Positive Youth Development research has backed up Camp Fire’s kid-first approach. Today, we’re looking at another trending term […]

Little Kids, Big Impact

The research is undeniable: Early childhood education lays the foundation for lifelong learning, health and well-being. Studies show that sustained, high-quality early childhood education narrows achievement gaps1, improves health outcomes, increases high school graduation rates and is linked to better jobs and higher earnings in adulthood.2  But access to high-quality early learning opportunities is far […]

Center Humanity, Honor Identity, Promote Healing & Cultivate Liberation: This Is Transformative SEL

We have talked quite a bit about SEL over the years. This #SELday, Sr. Director of Program Effectiveness, Nikki Roe Cropp, shares more about how we use SEL in our programs and why it is essential to the work we do. We know that kids who have a certain set of competencies and skills are […]

Growing Up is Hard – But You Can Make it Less Lonely 

You can’t be a growing human without experiencing some amount of pain, discomfort and suffering. But the past few years have introduced new challenges to being a kid: Pandemic isolation, climate fears, political instability, and constant availability of tech tools designed to hijack our brain chemistry to maximize use. Just to name a few.  In […]

Camp Fire’s People & Impact: 2021-2022

Over the past few years, as we’ve continued to navigate COVID-19 and its challenges, we served over 100,000 young people virtually, which is incredible. But now, as we’re able to operate programs in person (and we see growing waitlists for our programs), we’re again able to offer the kind of unique, safe spaces and intentional […]

Youth in Crisis: Statistics

CAMP FIRE ADDRESSES multi-faceted problems GROWING UP IS HARD Young people today are facing so many challenges; a national mental health crisis, bullying, political attacks on their identities, a global climate crisis. We could go on. It’s never been more important to provide access to safe spaces where young people can have fun and be […]

Programs

CONNECTING YOUTH TO communities & nature SCHOOL YEARPROGRAMS After-school & club programs TEEN SERVICE& LEADERSHIP Leadership programs CAMPS & OUTDOOREDUCATION Nature-powered programs THE CAMP FIRE journey Our program framework is a comprehensive look at what we do and why it matters. WHY IT MATTERS Youth develop essential skills & mindsets Connection to Outdoors Connection to […]