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What is with camps and their crazy interview process?

I'm a teacher and I can't remember interviewing more than once with a principal, but I am consistently getting camps that want you to interview with 3 or more people. The staffing person, the owner, the camp director, or someone from your area. I'm not working for the CIA, its camp its a 2 month summer position and a few thousand dollars.
Add to that, applications that are forever. Why do I need to put all the 1,2,3 on a page long interest inventory if you're hiring me for the camp health center? Why all the questions about what I think i would bring to camp, or how would I best effect the lives of campers? I've been a teacher for 10 years what do they think, I do the other 10 months out of the year?

I've only ever had 1 interview in 8 summers, for 4 different camps. However, I've worked Girl Scouts and Camp Fire and 1 of the camps I grew up at. I've never heard that any of them do second interviews. Granted, I don't know how many other people apply for the positions.

I've seen on here that some camps basically just give contracts to returners in the fall and say welcome back! Out of the camps I've worked at some required a returner application and 1 reference. My current camp and some other camps I know require the returner application and 3 references. Granted, unless something crazy comes up in this, they'll likely hire you if they planned on it based on what they know from previous summers, but gotta have the paperwork to back it up. Plus, 10 months is a long time in college (or any time in life) to have gotten up to some trouble or just change.

Applications are meant to be as streamlined as they can for the ones doing the hiring. I heard once for teaching jobs that there are "hoops" to jump through to weed out those who might not be determined, hard working, etc enough to do what needs to be done even if they don't agree with the process or don't want to do all the paperwork. Granted, I'm sure this isn't technically the reason this is all in place, but just gives a silly thought over it. If the directors have 10 different applications it gets tricky. Plus I could apply for arts and crafts, counselor, and challenge course as my 3 choices for jobs. Well, do we need to complete 3 different applications then?

Side note- I don't actually want to be the art or challenge course person... I like my counselor and unit coordinator positions! :)

Yeah, sometimes the questions are silly. My favorite, besides the "describe your experience with youth, camping, ..." I wanted to be snarky and put "look at my work history." Same goes for the similarly phrased question on all new camp applications "camp requires you to live in tight quarters with limited privacy and personal space. How do you think you will handle this?" when I applied to my first new camp I had been a counselor for 3 summers and a CIT for 2 summers. :) But they don't ask those questions on the returners app!

I was a camp director and have hired staff. (Have also worked for a school in the past.) You have to be more careful with staff at a camp than a school.

There are more chances for something bad to happen at camp. More chances to get alone with kids. Heck you even sleep in the same room with them. At schools you are in a tighter space that allows easier supervision. (Yes it can still happen at schools just harder.)

With that said it sounds like that camp needs to adjust its applications for each job. I understand trying asking that for a staff member but not someone looking for your job.

I do agree 2 staff members max should interview someone. When I see places having a massive number of people that I have to talk with leaves me wondering if there is a clear leader at the camp. I have worked at places where it was not clear who was in charge and don't want to do that again.

I know that campminder has a generic application that a lot of camps use. That application requires applicants to fill out their interests and in a sense has them apply for three different jobs at camp. I had to fill out this generic application three times for three different camps back in 2008. It was a pain in the butt, but I did it. I agree that it is lengthy, but I understand that camps have to be a little more careful when it comes to hiring staff, I agree with LukeBK 100%.

I have been applying for new teaching jobs, and I just applied for a job in which the application was very similar to the generic campminder application. I even thought that as I was filling it out. After I filled in all of the required fields about my references, GPA, and experience, it then required me to download my resume and other documents. So, basically they have the information twice.

I think the long applications themselves might "weed out" staff who might not be interested in the first place and who are just applying to camp just "for fun."

- Teenster

Teenster- exactly with the weeding out people who don't want to put in the hard and sometimes tedious/monotonous/annoying tasks that come along with the job. That's what I heard about teaching apps. I too have had to fill in teaching apps that ask for the work history and then the resume... cross checking for lies? hoops jumping? who knows, but I'll do it to work with kids!

I don't mind it at all because I think its a better way to get productive staff. Maybe I've just been in too many tough situations but way too often have I been surrounded by incompetent staff and I wish there was a way to recruit better and weed out weaker links. There are some people every summer I just wonder how in the hell did this person get hired....so I don't mind it. I actually like it if I'm really interested in the camp because I have a better feeling about the people working with me.

When I recruit students to work at camp, I usually tell them to plan out an hour or so to fill out the application.

We also have multiple interviews with multiple people. I think it's because all of these people want to be part of the interview, but cannot all do it at the same time. I remember talking to the Staff Director, Division Head, and Camp Director before I was officially hired. It wasn't too bad because most of the calls were made to fit my schedule.

- Teenster

The reason that camp applications are so stern is that it is a job where you are working with children. Every job where you are around children is a very serious job. I mean just think about it, you are basically caring for another persons child, I wouldn't want some random person off the street caring for my child. I feel that the application process should be as extensive as it is because camp directors or supervisors usually ave so much going on that they don't have enough time to get to know camp staff, this is why the process is so extensive. When you think about it, it really does make sense, I mean, parents are paying a couple thousand dollars to drop their child off at a random place in the middle of the woods, or wherever, with a bunch of random people.

When I applied for camp positions in the past, I usually spent at least 1 hour doing the application, if not more. When I had interviews, I had spent at least 45 mins to 1 hour 30 mins for the interview. One time when I submitted an online application, a camp turned me off saying that their interview process was lengthy, lasting almost 4 hours, and sometimes they call people for a second interview, lasting 6 hours and their reason was they wanted to weed out people who should not be working at camp for various reasons.

Wow four to six hours for a phone interview is a little intense. I've had a few phone and Skype interviews for camps and also for schools, and I think the longest one was an hour and 15 minutes.

Not being able to stay on the phone for that long shouldn't be a reason not to be hired to work at a camp. Just my opinion.

- Teenster

You are right-- the time for an interview is intense considering most the people who interview for that camp were college-aged. One of the reason why I did not even apply was because I dont think I would have the time for that long of an interview. Most of the camps I worked at, made up their minds that they wanted to hire me withing a half hour.