Summer Camp

It can take some time after camp ends to reflect on the experience. Camp life is so completely absorbing, it helps to have a little distance from it to really understand what it meant. Back home, we can see our time at camp differently, perhaps see more clearly how it was special, how it was more than just fun.

My first thought is to be incredibly thankful for the summer, for the joy of being together at Rockbrook. It’s hard to imagine a more incredible community of friendly caring people, all contributing to the lovely spirit that defines Rockbrook. From the cabin counselors and activity instructors to the kitchen, nursing, and maintenance staff, I’m so grateful for everyone’s kind attention to making camp this summer great. I also want to celebrate our amazing campers, the bright enthusiastic kiddos that enliven everything we do. Every day, I was impressed by their love of camp, their full embrace of the many adventures to be found here. We always say it; it’s the people that make Rockbrook. Thank you everyone!

Carrying Camp Into Ordinary Life

Next, I’d say it was remarkable how both the campers and counselors grew personally from their Rockbrook experience this summer. Camp provides exactly the kind of refuge (It’s a haven!) young people need to relax and be themselves, explore new experiences, and develop all kinds of real-world skills. We watched shy campers find their voices during evening programs, saw new friendships form through simple face-to-face conversations, and newfound confidence and independence blossom beautifully. Along with all the laughter, alongside all the muffins, and dressed in the silliest costumes, girls discovered their own resilience, creativity, and capacity for kindness. Camp life simply fosters our best selves each and every day.

Now back at home, as the rhythms of regular life return, my hope is that our best selves can still shine. Let’s be the sort of friend we were at camp— caring and curious. Let’s look past what’s obvious and find the magic in even the simplest things. Let’s remember that who we are is strengthened through our relationships with others. We all know that being at camp feels really good, and we can certainly look forward to returning next summer. But in the meantime, our camp experience can inspire and guide us to connect and enjoy life more.

Thank you again to everyone who made this summer such an unforgettable success. Every summer the Spirit of Rockbrook deepens. Thank you for being a part of that.

This past summer, teenage campers introduced me to “Internet Brain Rot,” a term for how excessive social media use fragments attention, reduces thinking to hashtags, and leaves them feeling mentally drained. But the real damage goes deeper than cognition. Online life erodes something fundamental: our capacity for authentic human connection.

Despite promising to connect us, digital environments separate us physically and emotionally. They fragment our shared reality into algorithm-driven feeds, promote zero-sum competition, and reduce relationships to transactions. Young people are losing practice in the face-to-face work of navigating differences and finding identity through community contribution— suffering from too much “me” and not enough “we.”

The African concept of Ubuntu— which recognizes that we become fully human only through relationships with others— helps us understand what’s being lost. Ubuntu places compassion, mutual care, and relational identity at the center of human flourishing. That interdependence is exactly what gets eroded when we live online.

What Camp Teaches That Screens Cannot

Summer camp offers an antidote. As a lived example of Ubuntu principles, camp provides essential practice in relational skills that digital environments can’t teach. This reframes camp as crucial developmental work, and suggests that youth development programs focused solely on individual achievement may be missing opportunities to cultivate the “Ubuntu consciousness” that helps communities, and individuals within them, truly thrive.

Read the full article

Summertime can be hot, as I’m sure most of you are experiencing firsthand these last few days. The same is true here at Rockbrook where the daytime high temperatures have been in the upper 80s, even hitting 91 Monday and Tuesday (which is unseasonably warm). The great news about camp is that we have plenty of ways to stay cool even through the hottest summer days.

For example, our swimming lake is always a popular place to be. A mountain stream constantly refreshes the water keeping it delightfully chilly. The girls love doing tricks off the diving board, zooming down the 60-foot waterslide, swimming “mermaid laps,” and just goofing around in one of the many floats. In addition to the swimming activity periods during the day, there are two “free swim” times (one before lunch and the other before dinner) when anyone can head down to the lake for a dip.

Another place to cool off at camp is in the creek that runs through the center of camp, in front of the Goodwill cabin and behind the Curosty cabin. This creek, along with Dunns Creek that feeds our lake, is another favorite spot. You’re bound to find campers with their feet in these creeks. They might be weaving a basket, working on a painting or drawing, or looking for salamanders in the WHOA activity. Some girls just like to sit near the creek when they have free time, reading or tying knots in a friendship bracelet.

Whitewater Rafting on the Nantahala

Whitewater rafting is a more adventurous way to cool off at camp. Any Middler or Senior who is interested (and who earned a blue swim band) can take a whitewater rafting trip on the Nantahala River. Rockbrook is known as a rafting camp since we take so many girls down the Nantahala. We have a special permit to use our own equipment and guides allowing us to easily take everyone who wants to go. And just about everyone does! It’s a splashy whitewater experience, full of laughing and goofing around. There are plenty of chances to pose for the camera between the rapids stretching along the nine mile section we run. With the water temperature of about 50 degrees, the girls are definitely staying cool!

A Break from Outside Pressure

There’s one more way that I think camp helps the girls here cool off. It’s a bit more abstract, but in some ways more lasting. It’s the cooling off they find from the pressure and stress they often experience at school. Of course this varies from person to person, and is more prevalent in older children, but it seems that kids these days endure a lot. They are subject to a vast array of expectations to perform, thrown into all sorts of competitions, and fed flashy idealized versions of what it means to be successful. Think of what online media is teaching. It might be easy to forget, but it takes work to be a kid, to measure up in these ways. It takes a lot, and our girls can feel that heat.

Fortunately, camp provides a release from all that. Life at Rockbrook is an unburdening for kids. Living mostly outside, away from the lure of technology, as members of an accepting, encouraging community of caring people, being active and engaged in the real world, free to explore, discover and meander with friends —camp is a relief. That’s why the girls will tell you they “feel really good” at Rockbrook, all while having a really great time. That’s what I call pretty cool.

A quick note about mail. Your girls love receiving cards and letters in their mailboxes, but there’s a balance to be found. When it comes to letters to camp, quality beats quantity. Read this article for tips about how to write to your camper. It spells out a few ideas about what to write, and what to avoid writing about. I think you’ll find it helpful.

With the second session of camp now closed for the summer, I want to thank everyone who helped make it so wonderful. After all, it’s the people of camp— the counselors and supporting staff, and of course our amazing enthusiastic campers —who create the special experience we all enjoy. It’s the people who are kind and caring, supportive and encouraging. It’s their friendly attitudes, their “happy relaxed” approach to just about everything, that colors our camp days. Together we found a spirit that propels this community to do more, experience more, and enjoy more.

Reflections from the Spirit Fire

At our closing campfire of the session, the “Spirit Fire,” we were reminded of how life at camp means this much. Campers talked about discovering new interests, making their very best friends, and feeling completely at home at Rockbrook. Staff members expressed their gratitude for being at camp, and for having the opportunity to know so many great people. One girl simply said, “I love everything about camp, and I love all of you even more.” It’s remarkable how close we’ve all become over these last few weeks.

Camp reminds us of the good stuff. It helps us see the magic in most things. It encourages us to explore and discover the incredible beauty of the real world, to trust each other, and be courageous even when something may be uncertain. Most clearly, we now know how incredible camp life feels.

Yes, it’s sad that something good is ending… for now. But I believe we carry camp with us. We can remember that being kind, and being a little silly, will help us. We can sing a favorite Rockbrook song anytime we want. We can stay in touch with camp friends. And we can look forward to returning next summer.

To all our Rockbrook girls: we miss you already. We’re thinking of you fondly, holding tight the memories of our great camp session together. Thank you!

Until next summer, be kind, stay curious, and remember: the Spirit of Rockbrook is with you always.

Sarah made a comment today that seems to sum up the vibe of camp right now. She said, “Everybody here seems so ‘happy relaxed.'” It makes perfect sense if you just look around. You see plenty of smiles, girls laughing and playing, and appearing really at ease. The two are related of course. With camp being a place where girls can be themselves without the pressures and worries of school, where they know instinctively the people around them are genuinely kind and caring, it’s natural to relax into the experience. There’s no need to guard against anything or to maintain any kind of facade, so camp provides a release of sorts. That feeling alone is enough to lift a child’s spirits, but combine it with all of the fun activity at camp, along with all the enthusiastic energy of a zany community, and you have a beautiful recipe for happiness as well.

Relaxation in Activities

This feeling shows in many of the activities. For example, in the yoga class, which meets in the hillside lodge, the girls are definitely relaxing. Spread out on their yoga mats, they’re peacefully stretching, listening to soft music, and trying different poses. There’s also plenty of giggling now and then, especially when they try an awkward position. And anything that involves two people in the pose is bound to be a laugh out loud moment.

Floating at the Lake

Swimming at the lake is another great example of being relaxed and happy at the same time. Often instead of swimming, floating is more popular. It’s a way to cool off in the refreshing water of the lake, while at the same time lounging comfortably in one of the many colorful floats available. Even more fun is when friends pile into the floats making them a little unsteady and easy to end up in a splash.

The Focus of Horseback Riding

Sometimes, this feeling arises from concentrating on something, from being completely immersed in whatever we’re doing. For example, the girls have to really focus when riding a horse, being careful with the position of their legs, their posture in the saddle, and how they are controlling the reins. This gentle coordination between the horse and rider makes horseback riding rewarding and fun.

Most craft activities at camp offer a similar opportunity to lose yourself in the moment. Working with their hands, whether shaping a slab of cool clay or weaving colorful yarn through a “nifty knitter,” campers easily become deeply engaged. There’s a strange immersive quality to many craft activities at camp, each providing another way to relax and at the same time enjoy the satisfaction of making something. It’s amazing how easily the campers are happily immersed in weaving, painting, pottery, needlecraft, and so on.

Compared to the daily lives of most kids, living the “happy relaxed” life of camp is a great gift. It proves to them it’s fun and rewarding to be active, and to really dig into creative pursuits. Most importantly, it reveals the special happiness that follows from simply being yourself in a relaxed way. The beauty of camp, and surely a big reason why girls love it, is how quickly and easily the community here evokes these feelings.

There’s a word you’re likely to hear when people describe their camp experience, a word I’ve heard from teenage campers, staff members and adult camp alumni alike. It’s “magical.” When trying to convey how special camp is to them, how extraordinary it feels to simply be at camp, they’ll talk about the “magic of camp” or that “camp magic.”

Yes, camp life is marvelous. It’s awesome, amazing, fantastic. It’s so much better than the “mundane world,” with everything having a little something extra, some power or spirit. That’s why camp friends are your closest, camp sunsets more beautiful, muffins more delicious, being silly more hilarious, and feelings of belonging more genuine. Camp life reveals a magical quality in even the simplest things, enlivening our days wonderfully.

But how does it do that? The sunsets, muffins, and the excitement of a rafting trip are probably pretty similar to what can be found elsewhere. There’s probably nothing material that would make camp life distinctly better than non-camp examples.

So what makes it magical? If there’s something profoundly different about camp life that fills it with amazing people, flashes of beauty, moments of wonder, and surprising feelings of deep happiness, then how?

Here’s an idea.

I believe camp provides the conditions where we can notice what’s been there all along. In other words, the magic is already here; we just don’t see it in our ordinary daily lives. Camp doesn’t have a special power to create magic. Rather, it inspires us simply to become more aware of subtle qualities always available in the world around us.

Rockbrook proves that everyone is a potential friend. It shows us how the briefest encounter with the natural world is wonder-full. Here, conversations are driven by curiosity rather than criticism. Camp days are filled by doing things in the real world, exercising all our senses. Here, what might seem ordinary or routine comes alive with new details, chances to learn and create.

That’s the power of camp, how it’s magical. It encourages a “receptive awareness” that reveals the magical quality of things. By lifting kindness up as its highest ideal, it helps us be generous and see beyond ourselves. By giving us a break from the fast-paced demands of work and school, camp helps us slow down and notice the beautiful details in most things. By being a tech-free environment, it liberates us from a worldview limited to algorithms and sensationalism. By encouraging silliness and play, camp teaches us how to be comfortable with who we are. By establishing a truly supportive community, it draws us closer to the people around us. In the outside world, each of these might require a deliberate choice, but they are built right into our camp life… making it yes, magical.

So let’s celebrate the power of camp to tune our awareness, and perhaps reveal the magic in things long after the summer ends.

It’s easy these days to sense that something special is happening at camp. Now as the session has “matured” a bit, it’s even more apparent. By “matured” I mean there’s a greater sense of ease in the air, a feeling of relaxing into the rhythms of camp life, a normalizing of sorts. The girls have made more friends, opened up to the new experiences offered in the activities, and become more comfortable in our rustic outdoor environment. They’ve begun to feel included, treated with kindness and respect, brought closer by a community spirit that’s enthusiastic and supportive. As they become more familiar with camp, their confidence has grown tremendously. They’ve adopted a “camp mindset” of sorts, a way of being colored by all these wonderful qualities.

This maturing, however, takes some time. When they first arrive at camp, girls are generally more hesitant. They’re usually a little nervous about their place in the group and how they’ll do away from home. Even for seasoned campers, there’s a different mindset that takes a few days to fade.

I wonder if we can attribute this to school. Perhaps these campers are arriving with a “school mindset,” a way of thinking, or a collection of assumptions that’s clashing with what camp represents. As you know, for many kids, school can be a grind, something that requires careful steps, regular effort with competitive undertones, and often includes guarded engagement out of a fear of peer judgment. It requires a great deal of individual work, pressures to perform, and evaluations. While there may be certain legitimate educational goals this mindset serves (though that’s debatable), it’s also a burden.

With school occupying so much of their lives, it’s no wonder girls arrive at camp a little out of sorts. They’re being trained to approach the world in ways that don’t apply at camp. In a way, this is the project of camp— to unwind some of the habits and assumptions taught in school, to encourage a more genuine, playful and joyful approach. Camp is here as a form of relief.

We might be running around camp painted in colors searching for counselors. We might be dressed as Greek gods and goddesses. We might be sleeping in the forest in hammocks, or just floating in the lake in a tube. In all these activities and more— throughout our days— we’re building a “camp mindset,” a way of authentic connection, a freedom to explore, and a lightness everyone finds refreshing.

When you pick up your camper at the end of the session, I bet you’ll notice this change. In addition to the memories of camp being fun, and the many friendships they’ve made, my hope is that your girls will return home carrying their camp mindset with them. And while the pressures of school will inevitably creep back in, I hope they can move through the world with more camp confidence, camp values, and Rockbrook spirit.

Today, we woke up to a cool misty fog dulling the greens of the forest. It was only about 58 degrees, so as the girls made their way to the dining hall for breakfast bundled up in all sorts of fleecy long-sleeved things, they were clearly not at home. No climate controlled room, but instead the moist smell of crisp mountain air. No clatter or buzz from an alarm clock, but rather the ringing of Rockbrook’s 100-year-old bell. Conversation in the cabin, friendly calls of “good morning!” between cabin mates, spurred everyone along. No school, or swim practice, or carpool to reach on time, but instead a day with friends filled with different activities to look forward to. Today was when we would really dig in to camp life.

A Regular Day Packed with Action

The first thing to notice about what we might call a “regular day” at camp is that it is packed with action, completely filled with girls busy doing things in the many activities. Out in nature, together with other girls of varying ages, they’re deeply involved being challenged in sports, being creative in the arts, and being thrilled by adventure. And the variety of these experiences is incredible. They’re riding horses, shooting arrows, and climbing our Alpine Tower. They’re weaving on looms, sawing through wood, and zipping along high among the trees. They’re hitting tennis balls, and rolling out balls of cool, moist clay. They’re learning too! Learning about some of the local birds, about how to aim a target rifle, about the parts of a whitewater kayak, and about how to do a cartwheel, for example.

Cool Mountain Air and the First Real Day

But they’re also learning something else that could be even more important. They’re learning to relax into whatever they’re doing, even when they aren’t in a group activity (a “class” with a “teacher’). Our “regular days” have three dedicated blocks of free time for the girls when they are not in a scheduled activity: a “free swim” before lunch and dinner, and a chunk after dinner we call “Twilight.” These are true free times when they can be with friends, visit the lake, play a game like tennis or gagaball, or just relax on the hill. Different from the regimen of school where each minute is “on task” for the most part, camp life provides time (and space!) to explore, discover, connect and meander no matter what a camper’s inclination. Combine that with an almost endless supply of friendly companions and we’ve got something really special. It’s both relaxing and compelling at the same time. Hmmm… is that a definition of fun? Maybe. No matter what, I’d say it’s the perfect combination to help kids grow.

Camp is great like that. It fosters so many positive personal developments, from making friends to the kind of self-confidence that sprouts from new experiences in a supportive environment. There lots more to be said about that!

For now, I hope you’re enjoying the online photo gallery we update everyday. The photos provide just a glimpse into our days at Rockbrook, but they do convey some of the action, the delight, and the spirit we all enjoy. They’re fun to see, but I bet you’re jealous you can’t enjoy it too!

Now that we’ve finished up our last session of camp, and we find ourselves reflecting on the summer, it’s again a challenge to describe it all. Friends will ask, “How was the summer?” And, I’ll stumble through an attempt to describe it by saying “Great! So many happy people, wonderful!” That’s all true, but it barely scratches what it was really like at Rockbrook this summer. There’s so much more.

Beautiful

Camp was beautiful, beautiful to see children laughing and playing. Beautiful to witness girls relaxing into the rhythms of camp life, being free to explore, play, create, and discover. It was beautiful to see kindness, budding confidence, and willing enthusiasm color whatever we were doing. It was beautiful to hear easy silliness and laughter everywhere at camp. It was beautiful to feel so close to so many people.

Magical

The summer was magical too. It was full of delightful surprises, moments when we embraced the wonders of Nature. It was magical how the simplest things were fun, often hilarious, and ended up being a source of deep comfort. It was magical how everyday was both exciting and worry free, filled with new experiences.

Refreshing

Camp this summer was also refreshing. Our drier and cooler weather was refreshing, but so was the feeling of being a part of the Rockbrook community. It was refreshing to connect with the people so easily, to make almost instant friends with everyone, and to be embraced for our authentic selves. For many, it was refreshing to simply be away from the allure of their electronic devices.

Emotional

Camp was emotional, packed with experiences that we felt deeply. We cheered for each other almost everyday. We were thrilled by all the novelty and adventure of the activities and trips. There were so many hugs, smiles, and sweet moments of affection. Sharing this much, being this open and genuine, made even the challenges we faced both manageable and meaningful.

The third session Spirit Fire brought all of this into focus. Dressed in our red and white uniforms and gathered around the blazing campfire, we couldn’t help but realize that the friendships we’d formed at camp, the experience of it all, were in a way miraculous. The speeches reflected this too. The girls talked about felling lucky to have been at camp, to have found Rockbrook. They expressed such heartfelt gratitude, and marveled at how they’d grown and “become who they are” at camp.

Yes, camp was beautiful, magical, refreshing and emotional —altogether miraculous. It was for everyone, campers, staff and directors alike, an experience that’s hard to describe, but one that we’ll cherish. We’ll remember it fondly, seek its spirit throughout our days, and yearn for its return sometime soon.

So thank you! Thank you for helping make this special experience possible, for your support, and for sending your girls. We miss everyone already. We look forward to seeing you next summer when we can come together at Rockbrook and rekindle the camp spirit we love.