Operation summer camp: children of national guardsmen experience camp tuition-free

Camping Magazine, March-April, 2005 by Ellen F. Warren

On a perfect summer day in July 2004, nine-year-old Ryan Mowers was practicing archery with his bunk at Camp Kweebec in Schwenksville, Pennsylvania. As he squinted down the arrow, he looked like any other fourth grader enjoying his first summer at camp. At the pool, his brother, twelve-year-old Brandyn Mowers, was just drying off. Older, and maybe a little wiser, Brandyn was quieter than the other boys in his bunk. Though he didn't talk about it, Brandyn knew that his mother was about to be deployed for combat training in the Pennsylvania Air National Guard. He didn't know how long she'd be away. But he knew that she might get sent to Iraq. And he was old enough to remember how scared he felt when his father, also an Airman, had been sent overseas after September 11, 2001.

On that same perfect day, Staff Sgt. Patti Findley of the PA Air National Guard's 111th Fighter Wing was visiting Camp Kweebec with a reporter from the Philadelphia Inquirer. Off-duty, Sgt. Findley was a professional photographer. On duty, in uniform, she was taking pictures for The Sandy Hog Gazette, the 111th's news bulletin, while the Inquirer reporter researched a story about "Operation Summer Camp"--a tuition-free "campership" program offered to the children of the 111th by American Camp Association (ACA)-accredited camps from ACA, Keystone Regional. With Sgt. Findley was a special surprise for the Mowers boys--their mother, Tech. Sgt. Maureen Mowers, thirty-two, who was taking advantage of the press tour to say one last goodbye to her boys. She was leaving the next day for training.

Looking up from his arrow, Ryan Mowers saw some adults walking toward him. Then he saw the camouflage uniform of Sgt. Findley, who was leading the group. When a child with a parent serving in the military sees a stranger in uniform, his heart skips a beat. Ryan's sunny face went dark, fear setting in, until--in the blink of an eye--an enormous smile lit up his face as he saw his mom and ran into her arms.

In January/February 2003, Camping Magazine featured stories about the different ways in which the organized camp community responded to help children who had lost a parent on September 11, 2001. Thoughtful and generous, these programs all helped children grieve in a safe place and get back to the business of being a child. But in the aftermath of 9/11, as America mobilized to fight terrorism, the ripples of those horrific attacks created a new group of children with unique emotional needs -- the children of deployed parents; children living with the daily fear that comes with having a parent off fighting a war.

Reaching Families in Need

Stephen Taylor, director of Camp Neumann, learned about the hardships families endured when a parent was suddenly deployed from one of his camp counselors, who was also serving in the 111th Fighter Wing at the Willow Grove Air Reserve Station. As a National Guardsman, Patrick Trauger was a crew chief in the 111th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron. He told Taylor about the families of the men and women he served with in the 111th--families whose lives were turned upside down when a parent's income plummeted from a good-paying job to military pay. Faced with less money to pay the bills, the spouse at home was often forced to take extra work, which then created child care problems and transportation problems and even more financial burdens. Compounding their worry for the welfare of their soldiers, families left behind coped with the stress of "holding the fort" at home.

Taylor immediately decided to provide tuition-free "camperships" to the children of the 111th Fighter Wing, but he wanted to do more. He took the idea to Bob Miner, ACA Keystone Regional president, and Michael Chauveau, executive director of ACA, Keystone Regional. Both jumped on board and agreed to help promote the idea throughout the ACA, Keystone local office. That was the easy part.

Challenges

The challenge was in figuring out how to create a manageable program. Who would be eligible for the camperships? How would ACA Keystone connect camps with families in need? Trauger introduced Taylor to Nicholas Monatesti, a former airman who now serves as the family readiness coordinator for the 111th Air Wing. The Family Readiness Group (FRG) is the Air Force's one-stop family assistance services office, which is established in times of contingency call-up, mobilization, and large-scale deployment to provide support and assistance to Service members and their families. Family readiness coordinators help military families access needed services and cut through "red tape" when a parent is called to active duty for an extended period of time. Monatesti says the primary mission of any FRG is to inform and emotionally support families so the military member can perform his or her mission. On any day, his job might include providing youth development and counseling information to parents, preventing a bank from foreclosing on a military family's home while a parent is on active duty, finding child care, or helping in emergency situations.