Our two- week Camp Pinnacle counselor training officially begins with lifeguard training on Saturday, May 31. Several of our counselors are already here, helping get the camp facility ready for summer. Our entire staff comes together on June 3, and we are excited for these incredible role models to begin preparing in earnest for our campers’ arrival. You can read the Biographies of our 2014 counselor team here!
This year we will have thirty cabin counselors. They average 20 years in age. Twenty-two of our counselors were former Adventure Treks students and most of them attended our Leadership Summit program. All are trained in Wilderness First Aid. Many of our counselors have musical talent and there will be great music at camp this summer! Our counselors attend or have recently graduated from great schools including Dartmouth, Harvard, Hamilton, Colby, University of Florida, Washington University, Georgia Tech, Clemson, Prescott, James Madison, UNC – Chapel Hill, Tulane and many more. Our counselors have already done incredible things like: Traveled for a semester in Asia; Studied abroad in Ghana, England, Spain, Taiwan, Kenya, or Indonesia; Won the Head of the Charles Regatta in Crew; Taught English in Tibet; Graduated from a National Outdoor Leadership School semester; Completed an extended solo hike on the Appalachian Trail; Have had their music recorded as members of rock bands, acapella groups and as solo artists; Worked as a leader for their college outing club; Raced for a collegiate mountain biking team; Worked as a DJ for public radio station, WTUL; Backpacked in Patagonia; Started a non-profit: Youth United for Darfur and much more.
Getting a job as a new Camp Pinnacle counselor isn’t easy. We have hundreds of applicants for a few positions. Each new hire has at minimum three separate interviews, four reference checks and a thorough background check. We are excited to welcome these new counselors to our Camp Pinnacle community. They are an impressive group and have much to add to our team. We know that this vigor for life, service and adventure will be contagious as these outstanding and committed role models inspire our campers!
We also have several specialty counselors who run activities like rock climbing, mountain biking, tennis, the waterfront, and riflery. All are college graduates and along with our six directors bring years of camp experience and seasoned maturity to our counselor team. Our entire summer camp staff will consist of forty – three folks with an average age of 27. This gives us a counselor to camper ratio of better than 1:3! And to this we add our four wonderful nurses: Star, Jennifer, Kelli and Alisa; Our incredible kitchen team of Mike, Richard, Joseph, Michelle, Seth and Tyler; And our our crack facilities team of Nick, Tom, Alaska, Will, Heather and Parker. We think you would be hard pressed to find a more committed, animated and talented summer camp team anywhere!
There is something about the camaraderie of Camp Pinnacle counselors that makes us friends beyond the summer. Being role models, we know that the energy we invest in building close friendships with each other and the kindness and respect with which we treat each other filters down to our campers. One of the reasons we have a lengthy orientation is so we can build relationships that will help us work well together during the summer. When we watch our campers treat each other with great respect and form close cabin communities, we know we have done a great job modeling.
We are excited for the summer to begin and can’t wait to meet our first campers on June 15! Camp looks great and we love getting it ready for you!
Read our 2014 Counselor Biographies Here
Dock, Jane, Ben, Fayssoux, Stacey, Charlie, and Steve