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Slate News

A Summer Without Camp

Slate News

Slate Podcasts

News, News Commentary, Politics

4.56K Ratings

🗓️ 21 May 2020

⏱️ 20 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In a normal year, the next couple of weeks would be when excited campers returned to summer camp. Now, because of the coronavirus, summer camps are having to make tough calls about how and if they’ll open this year.

Guest: Lisa Handelman, camp director at Capital Camps

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Transcript

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0:00.0

Around this time of year, usually, Lisa Handelman is getting ready to relocate for the summer.

0:10.8

We'd be packing our bags, packing the bags, packing the car, packing the office, starting to move up to camp.

0:17.4

Lisa runs a Jewish summer camp in rural Pennsylvania, she's worked there for over a decade.

0:23.1

She's so familiar with her annual trip north that she can close her eyes and recreate it in her head.

0:30.0

First, the highway, then a little field of corn. And then there's a certain point where you round a corner and there are hills in the background.

0:40.2

And for me, that's the first, I'm almost there.

0:47.8

As you're getting there, a little library is our landmark, a little sort of small town library that you turn right at.

0:57.0

I'm not one of these people that sings publicly, can't carry a tune,

1:01.0

but I do often find myself kind of like singing one of our camp songs,

1:06.0

and it just feels, I don't know, it just feels like you're home.

1:19.5

I'm not a camp person, but Lisa, she makes me want to be one.

1:21.7

Yep. I'm camp.

1:23.8

Your camp. So how many kids usually go to your capital camps each year?

1:33.5

So we have 800 plus kids.

1:37.7

We've got up to 1,000 kids.

1:39.2

Depends on the year.

1:40.1

This summer we were expecting a little bit over 800.

1:43.4

What do you think that's going to be now?

1:45.0

For camp, it's really hard to say, because we're right at a point right now where we're trying to decide open, not open.

1:54.0

So you hear good news and then you hear not so good news and then you hear more not so good news.

2:01.6

And you're trying to figure out how we can possibly make this happen.

2:06.6

But at the end of the day, it has to be safe.

...

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