Tremaine So­ca Warn­er

When pri­ma­ry and sec­ondary schools close their doors in ear­ly Ju­ly, many work­ing par­ents seek en­ter­tain­ment and su­per­vi­sion for their chil­dren at va­ca­tion camps. With pro­grammes in sport, art, dra­ma, cook­ing, eti­quette train­ing and more, par­ents have count­less op­tions. But what do they con­sid­er when choos­ing which camp ex­pe­ri­ence is best for their chil­dren? For a con­cerned par­ent, this list could in­clude cost, camp his­to­ry and rep­u­ta­tion, child-to-staff ra­tio, safe­ty, fa­cil­i­ties avail­able as well as the ac­tiv­i­ties of­fered.Last week the T&T Guardian spoke to man­ag­er of pro­grammes at YM­CA, Mar­garet Rigaud about the or­gan­i­sa­tion's 48-year-old camp pro­gramme. Be­tween Ju­ly and Au­gust, Rigaud said YM­CA on Wright­son Rd ac­com­mo­dates around 300 chil­dren each week.

The camp caters for chil­dren be­tween the ages of three and 13 who can be en­rolled for part or all of the two-month pe­ri­od. The ac­tiv­i­ties of­fered in­clude recre­ation­al swim­ming, bas­ket­ball, foot­ball, karate, dance and hikes among oth­ers.Asked about the cer­ti­fi­ca­tion of the camp staff, Rigaud said 30 camp coun­selors be­tween 16 and 25 years are cur­rent­ly go­ing through an eight-week train­ing process be­fore the open­ing of the camp lat­er this month. She said these vol­un­teers were all trained in CPR, first aid, wa­ter safe­ty and con­flict res­o­lu­tion. These coun­selors will be di­vid­ed and as­signed to dif­fer­ent age groups which in­clude three to six years, sev­en to nine years and ten to 13 years.Though the camp does not run back­ground checks on camp coun­selors, Rigaud says vol­un­teers are asked to pro­vide two rec­om­men­da­tion let­ters when ap­ply­ing for con­sid­er­a­tion."That's why par­ents grav­i­tate to us be­cause they know we pro­vide a safe and se­cure en­vi­ron­ment for their kids. Dur­ing swim­ming ses­sions, we have life guards on deck at camp coun­sel­lors in the wa­ter with the chil­dren."

Though the camp runs from 9 am to 3 pm, su­per­vi­sion is pro­vid­ed from 7.30 am to 5 pm with no ad­di­tion­al charge."Par­ents want to know what ac­tiv­i­ties we of­fer and who the coun­selors are. Even when the camp starts, some par­ents come to take a walk around to see what is go­ing on. So there are con­cerned par­ents."Camp ad­min­is­tra­tor of the Har­vard Club Va­ca­tion Sports Camp Ke­cia Ho­sein said par­ents feel se­cure send­ing their chil­dren to its camp since the club is known for its de­vel­op­men­tal sports clin­ics. The camp of­fers ses­sions in foot­ball, crick­et, rug­by, hock­ey and ta­ble ten­nis. Ho­sein said the camp ex­pects around 75 chil­dren each week at its Tra­garete Rd lo­ca­tion and par­ents can rest com­fort­ably since all the camp coach­es are trained and qual­i­fied.

"We use in­struc­tors who are ac­tu­al­ly na­tion­al ath­letes and coach­es in their re­spec­tive sports. We have no com­plaints from par­ents."They feel com­fort­able drop­ping their kids and leav­ing be­cause they know our com­pound is safe and se­cure.

On­ly mem­bers of the club can en­ter the premis­es and par­ents can feel free to dri­ve in and see what's go­ing on."The camp runs from 9am to 3pm each day, al­though su­per­vi­sion is pro­vid­ed from 7am to 5pm.Pri­vate camps can cost any­where from $200 to well over $1,000 per week de­pend­ing on the na­ture of the ac­tiv­i­ties of­fered. Camps which pro­vide ma­te­ri­als, equip­ment, trans­port, food or drink are con­sid­er­ably more ex­pen­sive with some reach­ing up to $2,000 for a three-week pe­ri­od. Some mu­sic and dra­ma camps of­fer schol­ar­ships for a se­lect num­ber of par­tic­i­pants and many host end-of-pro­gramme pre­sen­ta­tions to which par­ents are in­vit­ed.Care­givers seek­ing cheap­er al­ter­na­tives may opt for the free camps like those run by the Min­istry of Gen­der, Youth and Child De­vel­op­ment.

Last year, the min­istry ran 46 camps through­out T&T and it is cur­rent­ly plan­ning the camps for this year's va­ca­tion pe­ri­od. Though it has not get re­leased de­tails on the camp ac­tiv­i­ties and lo­ca­tions, they will tar­get chil­dren be­tween the ages of three and 17. Sim­i­lar­ly, de­tails about camps run by the Sport Com­pa­ny of T&T have not yet been re­leased. An of­fi­cial from the com­pa­ny's com­mu­ni­ca­tion de­part­ment said a list of camp venues and oth­er de­tails would be pub­lished with­in the up­com­ing week and reg­is­tra­tion forms would be made avail­able through re­gion­al cor­po­ra­tions and in the press. The camps will be geared to­wards chil­dren be­tween the ages of sev­en and 17 who can par­tic­i­pate in foot­ball, crick­et, vol­ley­ball, cy­cling, BMX rid­ing, hock­ey and sail­ing among oth­er sports.

While the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion does not run any camps dur­ing the Ju­ly to Au­gust pe­ri­od, camp di­rec­tors must get per­mis­sion from the min­istry to host camps at gov­ern­ment schools. Me­dia re­la­tions co-or­di­na­tor at the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion Yolan­da Morales-Car­val­ho said pri­vate camps do not need ap­proval from the min­istry to of­fer re­vi­sion or re­me­di­al class­es. She said, how­ev­er, if a par­ent wished ver­i­fy the qual­i­fi­ca­tions of a teacher run­ning an aca­d­e­m­ic camp, he or she could con­tact the min­istry to en­sure that the teacher had a valid teacher's reg­is­tra­tion num­ber.

CAMPS IN­FO

SPORTS

Our Sum­mer Surf Ex­pe­ri­ence

–>4 ses­sions be­tween Ju­ly 8 and Au­gust 2

–>Tyri­co Bay

–>More in­fo: Call 355-5691 or email trinidadand­to­bago­surf@gmail.com

The Har­vard Club Va­ca­tion Sports Camp

–>Ju­ly 8 to Au­gust 16

–>The Har­vard Club– Tra­garete Rd, PoS

–>More in­fo: Call 374-0032

Triathlon Fun Boot Camp

–>Ju­ly 8 to Ju­ly 20

–>Kayak Cen­tre, Ch­aguara­mas

–>More in­fo: 324-4117 or 632-9004

Tots and Tum­blers Sum­mer Fun 4

–>Ju­ly 8 to Ju­ly 26

–>31 Dun­don­ald St, PoS

–>More in­fo: Call 629-3001 or 627-2245

DRA­MA

Trinidad The­atre Work­shop's Teen The­atre Camp

–>Ju­ly 9 to 28

–>23 Jern­ing­ham Ave, Bel­mont

–>More in­fo: Call 624-8502 or email trinidadthe­atre@gmail.com

Trinidad The­atre Work­shop's Chil­dren The­atre Camp

–>Au­gust 6 to 26

–>23 Jern­ing­ham Ave, Bel­mont

–>More in­fo: Call 624-8502 or email trinidadthe­atre@gmail.com

Pa­trons of Queen's Hall An­nu­al The­atre Camp

–>Ju­ly 8 to Ju­ly 2

–>Queen's Hall, St Ann's

–>More in­fo: Call 624-1284 or email qhin­fo@queen­shalltt.com

COOK­ING & ETI­QUETTE

T&T Hos­pi­tal­i­ty and Tourism Cook­ing with Con­fi­dence for Kids

–>Ju­ly 8 to Ju­ly 11 or Ju­ly 15 to 18

–>TTHTI Air­ways Rd, Hill­top Lane, Ch­aguara­mas

–>More in­fo: Call 634-4250 or email in­fo@tthti.edu.tt

Gourmet Kids Culi­nary Camp

–>Ju­ly 15 to (South), Ju­ly 22-26 (St Joseph) & Au­gust 12 to Au­gust 15 (To­ba­go)

–>More in­fo: Call 330-2668

–>Pleas­antville Sec­ondary School, St Joseph Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­tre & the Scar­bor­ough Cen­tre for Youth De­vel­op­ment

Man­ners Maketh Me

–>Ju­ly 16-19 (East), Ju­ly 23 to 26 (South) & Ju­ly 29 to Au­gust 2 (PoS)

–>Bish­op Anstey High School East, South­ern Com­mu­ni­ty Col­lege & Queen's Roy­al Col­lege

–>Call 640-2765

GEN­ER­AL

Go Green Sum­mer Camp

–>Six week­ly ses­sions be­tween Ju­ly 15 and Au­gust 23

–>20 Trinidad Cres­cent, Fed­er­a­tion Park

–>More in­fo: Call 478-0501 or www.face­book.com/GoGreen­Sum­mer­Camp

Kids Cre­ate Art Camp

–>Au­gust 12 to Au­gust 24

–>Blue Range, Diego Mar­tin

–>More in­fo: Call 745-6816 or email ntaalex@ya­hoo.com

Maria­ma Chess Club

–>Ju­ly 8 to Ju­ly 31

–>Mann St, Arou­ca

–>More in­fo: Call 642-9921 or 752-7554