ACA Home Forums Worst Staff Stories

Since Smudge brought it up... what are your worst stories about staff you've worked with?

We had a Junior counselor my first year who was a complete exhibitionist... it started during staff training when she would parade around the cabins naked. She even went so far as to get naked and then walk to the shower house with no clothes and her towel just hanging over her arm... she returned with her hair wrapped in the towel and again nothing covering the rest of her.

She did this the first week when campers were there, and was told she was on thin ice... THEN, she repeatedly did it and we found out she had asked a camper to take pictures of her posing in the cabin nude!!

She was fired

WOW... thats all i gotta say.. Wow.

Yeah, she should have been fired the first time she did that with kids around... if not during staff training.

I posted this one before. It was so bad I thought I'd post it again.
We had a guy we called Edward. The stupid director hired him in the mid summer without doing background checks. The guy was from some African country and claimed to be here to go into the ministry. He claimed to be religious and led a Bible study/devotion with the staff before the campers came (it was a church camp). Then the next day, he grabbed the chest of a female staff member. The director failed to do much until he did it again! (That director was fired a couple of years later.) Edward was fired. One of the guys drove him to another city where he claimed to have friends. While in the car, Edward showed him his loaded sawed-off shotgun in his camp bag along with several thousand in cash!!! I'm glad he left camp without causing any more problems.

Two years ago I was Unit Leader for a Day Camp group. It was girls 3-4 grade and we had 24 (full load) that week. It was time for the Creek walk and the Nature Lady was in charge of it. First she was 10 minutes late meeting us. Now normally this wouldn't be a problem but the girls had just gone to the bathroom and were drinking more water (heat wave)..which anyone can see is going to be a problem. Now I couldn't go down to the creek because I had damaged my knee earlier that summer so I had to trust her with 24 girls, 5 program aides (7-8 graders) and one was a Down Syndrome program aide, and 2 other counselors. Down in the creek bed there is no radio contact...so again I'm trusting the Nature Lady.
When they came back they were missing the Nature Lady. She had LEFT them behind because she was walking so fast. Now if you understand Girl Scouts you understand ratio. Not only did she leave them behind but because she was walking so fast the one DS program aide couldn't keep up. So her and one other program aide were left down there.
Luckily nothing happened everyone was safe and sound. The Nature Lady was fired that day.

Twizzler

Last summer we had a staff member who would wander off randomly, when it wasn't her me time. Usually it was to talk on her phone or visit w/ other staff members. We woould always laugh when the unit staff came over the CB saying, "Break 0-1 to Camp Cedarledge... Has anyone seen Cheddar?" It was crazy.

Yes, we get those people from time to time... and then they're always like "But we had ratio!"

Years ago there was a staff member who claimed that she was a model. Before camp started she sent everyone her pictures of modeling. When she got to camp, she was a different person than from the pictures she sent. Even though the pictures were different, she still told us that she was a model and that she had to be treated that way. She always had her cell phone on her and would take extra time in the bathroom and so on. She said that all of the "extras" (cell phone and "primping") was all apart of her summer contract and that her agent required her to do all of these things.

She was eventually fired because she just wasn't doing her job. She would wander off to find a better cell phone signal and she would take care of herself before the campers. I'm not totally sure of the exact reason she was fired, but she made quite a scene when she left. She was very dramatic and yelled and screamed. Aparently she was an actress, too.

- Teenster

My first summer, i was in a unit and me and another counsellor were "In" the unit that night while the others had the night off. Anyway I feel asleep cos I hadn't been feeling well, and the next thing I know the other counsellor had was being yelled at for leaving the unit while she was duty and while I was asleep to go and check her emails. That summer we each got 15 mins a week to check our emails and she used to hog more than her fair share of the slots (ie 2 slots everyday not 1 a week).

Later in the summer half the staff had a huge party on camp with loads of alcohol and smoking (on a session break) but when they got caught they decided to allow the hole staff to be punished rather than own up to being involved.

In 2003 we had several staff who were very lazy. The worst one was the one I worked with was the second session of the summer. I was working with this russian girl and another girl, anyway this girl tended to sit back and do nothing (we all co-lead the unit rather than having a unit) anyway being the kind of person who has to do what needs to be done if no one else is I ended up running the unit cos the other girl had a flare up of glandular fever so was sick all session. This russian girl constantly moaned that I took over and never let her do anything so i started making an effort to let her lead and she didn't but all her breaks were longer than anyone elses. The final straw was on out going day, on that we didnt have time off but we could if we had enough cover go for a shower (no more than 30 mins - away from the unit) , well I had a headache so had decided to sleep instead of shower. Wells she came back from her shower which had taken an hour, lay down on the bed and said the list for closing the unit was in the binder put her walkman on and went to sleep. Meaning I had to help the girls clean the unit cos the other counsellor had no arms so couldn't spray the cleaning fluid cos the camp had a shoes on at all time rule (unless on the beach or showering obviously). I kinds lost my rag!

Wait -- the girl had no arms???

bump

Okay, WOW- this might be the most random sentence I have EVER heard!?!?!! What the heck?!?

Bump

Again, there must be more stories from this summer.

We had a unit leader who really didnt do her job, one day I was teaching archery to her unit, and she basically just sat there making friendship bracelets while I had to keep control of her girls. Which isn't the best situation cos the girls who weren't shooting at all were behind me and off to one side so they could be in the shade, so to see what they were doing I had to stop watching the archers. Then in the last week, loads of us were put in programs we didn't want to do for various reasons including her and instead of just sucking it up she kicked off and ended up being taken off the programming and spent the week "helping" in the office.

i've had some counselors that i didn't really care to work with but we've never had any comparable to the stories here. we run a tight ship and almost everyone just does what they need to do. if you were to take a break when you weren't off you wouldn't be placed in a cabin anymore, and if you were found to just be not doing your job at all consistently you would be fired!

Don't get me started!!! Might say something I regret!

I had people misinterperat the day off policy and decide to take my day off without telling me until I was going to leave for my day off. I also had a lifeguard who was living in my cabin have the guts to tell me that I am not allowed to take my break during the day or afternoon ( it wasnt like it was opening or closing day) but yet he managed to take several long breaks that day

I had a situation kind of like that - I was in program and "co-counsellor" in the loosest sense of the word was the life guard assigned to that program - she used take time off whenever she felt like it, feel asleep in the staff room and was an hour late collecting the girls for the 2 hour block (my time off) and the would go off camp, and then claim that they hadn't had TO so complain to the Ad staff that I was late back from TO - which 9-11pm that night - claiming that she had TO that day (yet she had managed to go to McD's - of that isn't TO then what is it?) - then cos she complained I got spoken to about it - yet the week before when I was having an asthma attack she didn't show up when she was supposed to so I couln't go to the nurse, yet nothing was said to her about that!

Funny stuff!!!

Very Interesting I dont really have any horror story yet

How many years have you been a counselor? Give it some time!

I dont think it is possible to go many years without at least one horror story!

I have a few horror stories to tell. I had staff member who had the nerves to tell me that I am not allowed to have any breaks at all during the whole week of camp. When I complained about that she lied about it and stuff happened like her speaking russian all the time around me and they complained to my supervisor saying that I couldnt understand her or folllow her directions. Lets say I was successful in being able to get transfered to another cabin.

I also had staff members in my cabin trying to take my day off away from me and not discussing that with me

Like I said...it will happen, just a matter of time!