Promoting inclusion on summer camps

Dear Readers,

With the summer holidays in full swing, I wanted to pick up on a topic that Leanna Barret, Head of Liberty Woodland School in London, spoke about at Goldman Sachs’ neurodiversity conference in April: how to manage school trips and going to unfamiliar places.

Leanna described the anxiety that many children can feel when going on school trips. Before taking her class on a recent trip she arranged for the minibus to visit the school the day before. All the children were encouraged to have a look inside and practice going to their seats and putting on their seatbelts. The next day, the children were excited when the minibus arrived to take them on the trip. Everyone joined in, including some who had previously felt too anxious to go. Interestingly, Leanna felt strongly that everyone had benefited from seeing the minibus in advance, not just the neurodiverse children, and that this made for a calmer and happier trip all around.

This summer I decided to set myself a challenge: to attend a summer camp organized by the National Citizen Service without my family or friends. I chose the Caldecotte Xperience Centre in the UK, a specialist adventure centre which offers accessible land and water-based outdoor education activities for young people with disabilities, including those with complex needs. The instructors and staff have all received specialist training and are experienced in delivering sessions with varying support requirements. In this post, I wanted to share with you some of the steps that the staff took, so that all activities could be enjoyed by participants, whatever their ability.

The NCS team called my parents and me a few weeks before the trip to give us more details of the accommodation and activities. This enabled them to understand my needs better, make sure the provision would be suitable, and for us to ask any questions.

We also attended a Zoom call with the rest of the NCS team so that we knew who would be looking after me. We were shown pictures of what my tent and the site would look like so that it felt familiar when I arrived.

Before I left, I practiced setting up my camping gear at home, so that I could understand how my equipment would work.

Another thing that helped was meeting my wave leader at the bus stop on travel day. I could introduce myself and remind her of the additional needs and worries that I had. All my information was noted down, photographed and sent to the other staff working at the site. Someone was expecting me when I arrived and I only needed to tell them my name before someone made their way over to help with my bags.

On arrival at camp, I was given an hour in my tent to unpack and get settled before my first activity. I didn’t feel too overwhelmed when I first met everyone and I was able to process my thoughts before meeting my campmates. We were given at least 1 hour each day to rest before dinner. I could enjoy evening activities to the fullest without getting too tired.

I was surprised about how well I was cared for by all the staff at the camp. The first evening activity was a bouncy castle. Usually, my Kabuki Syndrome means that I am not able to take part in case someone knocks into me. So the staff ensured I had a chance to go on by myself.

My wave leaders were very kind to me. I was encouraged through all the activities. I had  underestimated my ability to take part, and with a bit of extra support I managed to surprise myself! Each member of our team was encouraged in the same way, and we were all considered for the daily awards for commitment and bravery.  

My experience at summer camp was one of the best I have ever had as a person with additional needs. All the staff went above and beyond expectations to make sure that I was included and happy. The steps they took were straight forward to implement and, as Leanna found, benefitted everyone attending.

I’d love to hear of other summer camps who have been great at inclusion in this way, and about any other strategies you have experienced that really help.

I hope you enjoyed this blog post, and I can’t wait to see you back next week!