camp guide 2016 (february)

CAMP GUIDE CJN.ORG | CLEVELAND JEWISH NEWS | 25 FEBRUARY 26, 2016

CAMP GUIDE 2016 Read more camp guide at cjn.org/camp2016 Read more camp guide at cjn.org/campRead more camp guide at cjn.org/camp2016A Cleveland Jewish News Special Section

Hathaway Brown

CAMP GUIDE26 | CLEVELAND JEWISH NEWS | CJN.ORG FEBRUARY 26, 2016

Educational opportunities abound with fi eld trips JONAH L. ROSENBLUM | STAFF [email protected]

If camp fi eld trips were once piling children onto a bus and taking them to an amusement park, they’ve expanded since. Camp fi eld trips, in addition to being a fun chance

to leave “campus” and don colorful camp shirts, are also about education and integration, according to lo-cal camp directors.

Rhonda Rickelman, director of auxiliary planning at Gilmour Academy, stressed the educational value of fi eld trips – whether it’s learning how to get along with other people or seeing a part of the world they haven’t seen before.

“The No. 1 thing we look for is what is the educa-tional value,” Rickelman said.

The children may not realize that, however, as they sprint around the Lake Metroparks Farmpark in Kirtland, the Fun ‘n’ Stuff entertainment center in Macedonia or the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad, a few of Gilmour Academy hotspots.

Trips often correspond to a learning point that permeates throughout the session. A barnyard themed week at camp might lead to time at the Farmpark pet-ting zoo.

For example, at Ruffi ng Montessori, kids will learn

about forensic anthropology – and thus visit a DNA testing center – and do an archaeological dig.

“Kids like to do real work and they’re excited about it,” said Julia Sheehan, director of camps and enrich-ment programs at Ruffi ng Montessori.

That’s how it works at the University School sum-mer camp as well, according to director Bill Champ, with a focus on integrating trips into overall themes.

For example, some of the older children at the camp will go to a Lake County Captains minor league base-ball game, but that trip doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Children might play baseball throughout the week, draw baseball cards, watch a Cleveland Indians game and even enjoy hot dogs at a cookout to prepare for the experience – the logic being that if you just bring them to a baseball game with no preparation, many might not understand what they’re seeing and grow bored.

Just like at Gilmour Academy, the fi eld trips at Uni-versity School can be rather elaborate. Fifth-graders took a tour of Progressive Field, the sixth-graders went to First Energy Stadium and the seventh-graders went to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Other trips included mountain biking at West Branch State Park; trips to the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo and Great Lakes Science Center; and grilling out at Squire’s Castle. In part, Champ said that he wants campers to understand just how much there is to do around Cleveland.

“That’s maybe the hidden agenda, but it’s also good to get kids to try different things,” Champ said. “We be-lieve that any time you can teach and experience some-thing as part of a theme that it has more meaning.”

For his seventh-graders, there’s a particular empha-sis on traveling more, two to three times a week even, to prepare the kids, potentially, for overnight camp.

Of course, that’s not to say that getting kids out of the building isn’t a factor behind tossing fi eld trips into the schedule. Rickelman noted that after a while, camp can become “very familiar.”

“It’s good for everybody,” Rickelman said. “It’s good to get off campus for a while.”

Sometimes, it’s just about fun.Ruffi ng Montessori mixes educational trips with an

outdoor exploration week that culminates in zip lining, fi re building and rappelling.

“That’s just a lot of fun,” Sheehan said. “That third week is much more about having a ball.”

Field trips still require plenty of effort, of course. Counselors need to be particularly watchful when leaving the grounds. More preparation is required. Permission slips need to be distributed – and collected. Children need to be reminded of the rules.

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Jewish camp in former Soviet Union all the more meaningful JONAH L. ROSENBLUM | STAFF [email protected]

Many Jewish children in the former Soviet Union grow up unaffi liated.

Summer camp, as discussed earlier this month at the Jewish Federation of Cleveland’s Mandel Building in Beachwood, is a key way for those Jews to connect with their heritage.

About 25 people took that lesson directly from the source as two camp counselors with the Jewish Agency for Israel, Kateryna Grybtsova and Vita Krivyakova, shared their experiences. Grybtsova, of Dnipropetro-vsk, Ukraine, and Krivyakova, of Tomsk, Siberia, both stem from unaffi liated families.

For Grybtsova, her father did want to send her to Jewish school, but the school she went to, a Chabad school, wasn’t the right fi t.

“The result of this situation was I didn’t want to be related to Judaism at all,” Grybtsova said.

Camp changed that. “‘What’s going on? I can’t understand.’” Grybtsova

recalled thinking. “It surprised me so much and it re-ally changed my life.”

She has been involved with the Jewish Agency as a camp counselor and teacher for several years.

“Israel is very much home, but I’m much more needed in Ukraine,” Grybtsova said.

Krivyakova had a similar story to tell. Religion wasn’t a key part of her childhood.

“I knew I was Jewish, but I never felt anything about it, anything special,” Krivyakova said.

Even her fi rst visit to Israel failed to change that – “it was just a country with a sea.” Sunday school was merely a history class – interesting but not particu-larly personal.

A camp experience helped change that.“I didn’t know anything about Judaism,” Krivya-

kova said. “They opened a new huge world in front of me.”

She was a counselor at Siberian summer camps, moved to St. Petersburg in 2012, and in her third year there, joined the Jewish Agency’s staff, with its activi-ties center. She joined after seeing an agency advertise-ment on Facebook. She now works with kids in the areas surrounding the city, teaching dance, Jewish cooking and more.

Much of this agency work has been helped by funds from the Jewish Federation of Cleveland, according to Natalie Schnaiderman, director of development and activities for the Jewish Agency for Israel. That includes supporting hundreds of campers, more than 100 Birthright trips and more than 100 Sunday school students in Northwest Russia.

“I am really grateful to you for your help and your support,” Krivyakova said.

That was one message – one of gratitude. Eti Ganin, a member of The Temple-Tifereth

Israel in Beachwood, drew a different message. Given Grybtsova’s original negative experience with Chabad, she worried that in the former Soviet Union, there’s a sense that it’s either Chabad or nothing. She said she loves Chabad, but expressed hope that Jews there could

have options.“Chabad is not the only one,” Ganin said, suggest-

ing Conservative and Reform congregations step up their efforts in Northwest Russia. “I think we could do more.”

Regardless of denomination or strain, Ilanit Gerblich Kalir, managing director of international op-erations for the Jewish Federation of Cleveland, said Kateryna Grybtsova said Jewish Agency camp changed her life

and helped her connect to Judaism. | CJN Photo / Jonah L. RosenblumJEWISH | 28

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successful engagement is critical. “Unless it’s something that’s magnetic, that cap-

tures the imagination, it’s not going to work,” Kalir said.

As for why Grybtsova and Krivyakova came all the way to Cleveland, Barry Feldman, chair of the Jewish Federation of Cleveland’s St. Petersburg partnership committee, put it well.

“We can’t share it as well as you do, because it comes from your heart,” Feldman said, as he ad-journed the meeting.

Some stori es simply have to be told in-person.

As director of development and activities for the Jewish Agency for Israel, Natalie Schnaiderman said that the agency’s goal is to “reconnect” Jews in the former Soviet Union with their heritage.

Growing up in the Siberian city of Tomsk, Vita Krivyakova said she felt quite disconnected from Judaism until she had the chance to interact with a large group of fellow Jews. | CJN Photos / Jonah L. Rosenblum

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Appetizing, nutritious meals key at summer campsKRISTEN MOTT | STAFF [email protected]

Maintaining a healthy diet for children and teens is important, but it’s diffi cult to control what

they eat when they go away to camp. Fortunately, camps like Camp Ramah in Canada and Hiram House Camp in Mo-reland Hills are taking steps to ensure campers have nutritious yet appetizing meals while they’re away from home.

All of the meals at Camp Ramah in Canada are kosher and served family-style at three desig-nated times through-out the day.

“I think we try to be as healthy as possible,” said Edit Rosenstein, direc-tor of fi nance and operations at Camp Ramah. “We create a menu before the summer and send it to a nutritionist and get the green light that everything we’re serving is a well-balanced meal.”

A salad bar is available at almost every lunch and dinner, Rosenstein said, which offers a full range of vegetables, protein options and low-fat dressings. The camp also has moved toward offering fruit as a dessert, she said.

At Hiram House Camp, meals also are served family style and a salad bar remains a popular feature during lunch and dinner for the overnight camp, said Courtney Guzy, executive director there. The camp is a part of the USDA Summer Food Service Program, which dictates the type of food that can be served at camp.

“We have to be very conscious of the calorie count and how many fried foods we’re serving versus baked or grilled items,” Guzy said. “Every so often we have to send in paperwork that charts how many calories we’re serving the kids and the types of oils we’re cook-ing food in, so our staff is extremely conscious of that.”

A fruit or vegetable option is usually served with every meal as well, Guzy said, such as sliced apples, peaches or carrots. She added that many of the

campers who participate in the over-night camp program come from lower-income or inner-city families, so it’s important for Hiram House Camp to provide them with well-rounded meals.

“A lot of these kids are from families who are on food stamps, and it’s really hard sometimes for families who are on food stamps to choose healthy foods because healthy foods are expensive,” Guzy said. “These kids are used to not always having the best choices, so when they come here we try to fi nd a healthy balance so they can have three square meals a day.”

In additional to three meals a day, Camp Ramah also serves three snacks per day at designated times, Rosenstein said. The fi rst snack, which is often a fruit, is served between breakfast and lunch. The middle afternoon snack is something more fi lling, Rosenstein said, such as yogurt or hummus, to give the campers energy while they’re partici-pating in various activities. The last snack after dinner is often popcorn or a granola bar.

“We’ve been trying to improve our healthier snacks. Last year we intro-duced hummus and pretzels as a snack, as well as some healthier muffi ns. We want to serve those types of snacks that are more fi lling and yet still have healthy content,” Rosenstein said.

Food allergies have garnered a lot of attention in recent years, and camps now are making sure that all campers have food items available that they can eat.

“We have someone on staff who is completely dedicated to kids and staff members with allergies so that we can make sure that kids who have any type of allergies, whether it be gluten or soy or eggs or cheese, are taken care of every day and have meals as similar as possible to the meals other campers are able to eat,” Rosenstein said.

Every child who registers for a camp program at Hiram House completes medical records to indicate if he or she has any type of food allergies. The coun-selors also are made aware of which children should stay away from certain foods, Guzy said.

“Our kitchen staff is really good about making vegetarian options and we have a great variety of items that are gluten-free from our food vendors,” Guzy said. “We try to make sure we accommodate every child who comes here.”

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Tevlowitz named Mandel JCC J-Day Camps and children’s services directorNOELLE BYE | DIGITAL CONTENT [email protected]

The Mandel Jewish Community Center in Beachwood has named Aaron Tevlowitz director of its

J-Day Camps and children’s services.

Tevlowitz has worked in supervi-sory roles for JCC day camps for the last fi ve years. He is the assistant director of the day camp at Sid Jacobson JCC on Long Island, N.Y., and

also has served as day camp director at the Memphis JCC in Tennessee. Tevlow-itz will start on March 9.

Tevlowitz will also supervise the Playmakers Youth Theatre, Kids Club

after-school care and the Maccabi pro-gram.

“Before selecting Aaron, a national search was conducted,” Michael Hy-man, Mandel JCC executive direc-tor said in a news release. “We had a number of highly qualifi ed candidates for the position, but Aaron’s experience, dedication and enthusiasm for Jewish day camping distinguished him as the most outstanding candidate. We are excited to have Aaron on board.”

Tevlowitz served as the Hillel engage-ment coordinator at the University of Massachusetts before beginning his career in day camping. He has a bach-elor’s degree in recreation and leisure management from Florida State Univer-sity in Tallahassee and will complete the JCCA’s Merrin Fellow Leadership Program in May 2016.

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GILMOUR DAY CAMPS34001 Cedar RoadGates Mills, OH 44040gilmour.org

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MANDEL JCC DAY CAMPS 26001 S. Woodland RoadBeachwood, OH [email protected]/daycamps

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CAMP GUIDE32 | CLEVELAND JEWISH NEWS | CJN.ORG February 26, 2016

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FALCON CAMP

camp guide 2016 (february)

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