ACA Home Forums Worst Staff Stories

Yeah it is a matter of time.... I never went though a summer without a horror story at camp or some good old fashion drama.... I have a horror story about a time I voluntered at a 1 week camp but it is inappropiate for this board

You know my pet peeve at camp in internations speaking in a language other then English infront of the campers! It is soooo rude and the campers think they are being talked about.

We have very few international staff that speak a different language, actually. Most of them are Aussie, NZ, English, etc... Never really run into that problem...but I wouldn't like it if I did see it.

We had people from 17 countries at camp last summer - the worst though were the ones from Isreal and the Russian block countries!

17 countries!!! That's amazing. We didn't even have that many international staff.

wow - half our staff are international! But was counting scotland england and ireland as seperate countries. we had staff from about 5 CA type organisations!

Okay... I'm fairly new to this site.

I want to start off by saying that I love this staff member dearly, and she is one of my closest pals from last summer. However, I had a hard time in the begining.

The staff member was international and really didn't like "the way American children are raised". She found campers to be disrespectful and sometimes down-right rude according to the standards and values she was raised by.

This wouldn't have been a problem, but she said such things in front of campers. Even went as far as to tell a camper that her mother was a bad parent. She also got into arguments with the American staff. After a few weeks, some of us had to really sit down with her and explain what was wrong with what she was doing.

Oh my goodness - I have never had any one who was like that!

I wasn't on night duty but went to check on my girls anyway because they'd been misbehaving that day. I went to their room to find them missing, I knew exactally where they'd be so went to one of the other rooms and banged on the door. I gave them the riot act and sent them back to their room and when everything had quietened down the councellor that was on night duty popped her head around the corner. She'd been sat on the floor reading a book and a) didn't know they were in there and b) only came to see what was happening after I'd sorted it out. The room they were in belonged to her group which made it even worse in my opinion.
She was pretty much useless all summer.

I just remembered a situation that happened back in 2005 - I had started to work a private american style summer camp in sussex. I was in charge of the boys house and had 4 male counsellors! Half the kids couldn't understand much english and 3 had grown up in a culture that had very different roles for men and women

Wow.

It gets worse! I didnt realise I hadnt finished the story. On the first night I was grabbing 30 mins to have a shower cos I hadn't had time to have one for a few days - cos the lads were skiving and leaving me to do all the setting up (trying to make the place look less like a girls dorms). Anyway while I am in the shower the male counsellors managed to allow half the campers to wander off.

Two days later they sacked me cos I wasn't coping! I had no support from my campers or ad staff!

Say whatt?? That's crazy!

That is crazy.

Funny stuff!!!!

I have some amazing and crazy staff stories. If you would like to know, then please PM me. They are not appropraite (in my mind) to post.

I'm with you...not many appropriate for the board!

Also, I think there is a line between what happens at camp with staff and whatnot that can be told and what cannot be told. Almost, what happens at camp stays at camp. That goes beyond the just not being appropriate. Also, all of the people at my camp, I feel to be my friends. I just think we all make mistakes and posting those goes against our friendship. That is just my prespective.

I agree!!! Though some of those people are not, and were not my friends ever...soooooooooooooo....I still won't go there!

The thing is we only have 15 people or so that work at the camp. 15 only. Therefore, you get to become better friends with people. Additionally, you make good friendships with everyone there. You somewhat do not have an option, especially if you are a counselor. There are not set co-counselor positions. Every week, your co-counselor and unit switches. It helps build staff unity in my mind so much more. Of course, you like people more than others. But, you really feel "we are all in this togehter."

that's awful!
i don't know if i could ever work at an all-boys camp...seeing that i've been at all girls' camps forever...that and my slight tendency to be a feminist? haha

CIL - it was a co-ed camp - they just thought that for some reason I would be the best person in charge of a group of boys. I dont regret going even if it did only last 1 1/2 weeks cos I learnt loads.

haha. sometimes decisions other people make for you leave you a better person, but absolutely puzzled! i wonder what that reason was?

I worked at camps for 7 summers. I have found that the worst staff to deal with are the ones who will constantly try to get away with doing as little as possible.
One summer we had one staff who would constantly try to to work. Apparently it was always either too wet, too hot etc etc to teach tennis and instead send the kids to another activity so that she could hang out on the patio.
I was admin staff that year and I got so frustrated when she refused to go down to the dining hall for supper one evening (we were required to go if you were not on time off)
These type of staff are the worst and take up SO much work

I know. People need to go beyond what is required, otherwise it will not work out well.