ACU Leadership Camps will employ about 90 students from all majors and classes this summer as camp counselors and staff.
These students have been preparing since December for this summer’s Leadership Camps, which consist of four different camps, each for a different age group. Most of the staff and leadership team are divided in half by those working with the younger or older age groups.
In addition to the 82 counselors and the eight leadership team members, other students serve on the first aid team and the media team who are responsible for taking pictures and videos throughout the week.
The new staff participated in a retreat last weekend and has training sessions every Tuesday night through March and April.
Hillary Rousselot, senior speech pathology major from Midland, has been a counselor at three different camps and prefers the ACU Leadership Camps training.
“ACU Leadership Camps was the first camp that I worked with that really invested in training counselors and allowed plenty of time to let the counselors get to know each other with weekly meetings and a retreat,” Rousselot said. “The purpose of these meetings were to not only present different obstacles that a counselor could encounter with campers, but also to allow the counselors to get to know who they would be spending the summer with.”
David Moses, director of Leadership Camps, was a youth minister for 19 years before joining the Leadership Camps team. For 16 of those 19 years, he brought his youth group to Leadership Camps.
“In my opinion, it’s one of the most spiritually impacting camps I’ve ever attended as a youth minister,” Moses said. “Once I found them, we didn’t go anywhere else.”
Staff members get the month of May off but hit the ground running the first week of June for their preparation week. Camps begin the next week and run through July 3. They have Fourth of July weekend off but return for teardown on July 6 and 7.
Moses said that what happens at Leadership Camps is not only beneficial for the camper but also for the counselors.
“I met some of my best friends by working with them at camp and have mentored to kids that are going to grow up and be amazing stewards to the kingdom of God,” Rousselot said. “Working at a camp is always crazy, and you never really know what to expect, but it’s awesome to see God working in the lives of others.”
Jake Hall, returning assistant director and senior English education major from Springtown, said ACU Leadership Camps has been the greatest part of his time at ACU.
“It has given me a way to channel my talents in a way that directly affects the Kingdom and placed people in my life that I will hold dear forever,” Hall said.
