"A Camp for All Ages"
by Jennifer Rich

One of the first Hispanic judges in the United States, Ray Cardenas; one of the first African-American judges in Los Angeles, Sherill Luke; the former presiding judge of the Los Angeles Superior Court, Richard “Skip” Byrne; the CEO of one of the largest real estate investment companies in the country, Kenneth Roath; the late advisor to President Nixon, John Ehrlichmann. All of these seemingly unrelated people have had something in common: they have each credited an organization called “UniCamp” with having a profound impact on their lives.

UniCamp is the oldest and most successful volunteer college student-operated summer camp for underprivileged children. Originally called, “University Camp,” UniCamp was founded in the early 1930s by the dynamic and idealistic director of the University Religious Conference (URC) at UCLA, Adeline “Gramma” Guenther (“I told you not to get involved with that Haldeman fellow,” Geunther is reputed to have told Ehrlichmann). UniCamp was among the first college-based organizations to undertake the mission of bringing a better perspective on life to children caught in the throes of poverty, abuse, racism, and gang violence.

The idea for UniCamp grew out of a 1934 Christmastime canned-food drive in the Sawtelle District of Los Angeles, California, by UCLA students under the direction of “Gramma” Guenther. The drive was so successful that it inspired the students to take many of the needy children on a camping trip to the mountains to escape the confines of their impoverished neighborhoods. This experience was so rewarding for the students as well as the children that the students decided to make it a permanent program of the URC.

In 1935, UniCamp became the official charity of UCLA. Despite the Depression, World War II, and the Korean and Vietnam Wars, UniCamp has continuously been able to offer camping programs to disadvantaged children in Los Angeles every summer since then. In the early 1950s, the URC acquired two campsites for UniCamp in the San Bernardino Mountains . Volunteer students not only served as counselors and maintenance personnel for UniCamp, but even constructed the main lodge, arts and crafts building, A-frame cabins, and swimming pool at each of the two sites. In the 1990s, the URC was forced to give up these two original sites because of the prohibitive cost of meeting U.S. Forest Service mandates. UniCamp was able to lease another campsite for several years, until 1998, when a new campsite in the San Bernardino Mountains was donated to UniCamp by the Wildlands Conservancy.

Every summer, approximately 1000 children are recommended by social welfare agencies and schools to become UniCampers. To be eligible for the program, children must be living at or below the poverty level, must be considered to be “at risk,” and must want the opportunity. During the summer, those chosen travel up to the San Bernardino Mountains for one-week sessions to participate in the usual summer camp activities -- arts and crafts, hiking, swimming, sports, and campfires -- that most have never had the opportunity to experience.

Meanwhile, about 350 UCLA student counselors are chosen from a pool of applicants, and undergo a rigorous training program. UniCamp is not just well known to UCLA students; it is as embedded in the school tradition as the UCLA Bruins' nationally known sports teams. Every year UniCamp receives hundreds of counselor applicants, and every year most of them are turned down. Wally Wirick, the Director of Camping for UniCamp, who is also in charge of student volunteer recruitment, says there are two basic criteria for being considered as a counselor: excellent academic standing, and the mindset and social capabilities to handle the position. When choosing counselors, Wirick says, half-jokingly, that he asks himself, “Can they walk and chew gum at the same time, and do they have a great personality? If so, we've got ourselves a counselor.” While most non-profit charitable organizations would jump at the chance for so many volunteers, Wirick says that UniCamp has to be very selective because of the nature of the program. At UniCamp, student volunteers are not just applying to be counselors, but to be role models and mentors as well.

Karen Trattner, a UCLA student, applied for the first time to be a volunteer in December 1999. After twelve weeks of intensive training, Karen finally began her role as counselor. UniCamp's two-hour sessions, four days a week, had opened her eyes to what she was about to undertake. These were not the usual counselor training sessions utilized by most commercial camps, during which the staff intones the rules and regulations, schedules and procedure to the bored faces of young people interested in the accumulation of paychecks at the end of the summer. Instead, Karen was required to participate in role-playing games that forced her to consider situations she might encounter. Additionally, there were strict rules counselors that were expected to follow. One of the most poignant experiences Karen recalls during training was when she was informed that counselors were never allowed to be with a camper alone. If that meant waking up another camper or counselor at three in the morning because someone had to take a trip to the BIFFY(a euphemism jokingly said to stand for “Bathroom In the Forest For You”), then that is what you have to do. The reason is to prevent campers from falsely claiming sexual harassment on the counselors.

The counselors travel to camp early and prepare everything before the campers arrive. Karen remembers watching the campers' bus pull onto the dirt access road on that first day. Black, Hispanic, Asian, and Caucasion boys and girls leaned out of the bus windows, some smiling, many scared and watching apprehensively.

The idea of organized camping first originated with Frederick Gunn, who took twenty-five boys to camp in the woods for a month in order to “return to simplicity.” The premise, Gunn believed, was a basic environment that shed creature comforts – anything that creates status. By taking away the visual, materialistic aspects of life, people are merely judged by their own character, and can focus on improving that character without distractions or false illusions of superiority.

Part of the process of influencing both the campers and the counselors is to integrate them to the extent that they no longer feel the burdens of their prior identities. “When things become simpler, the kids are able to focus on what they truly want and want to be in life, which is the aspect that really matters, but is consistently drowned out by peer pressure, low self-esteem, and the degradation of poverty,” says Wally Wirick, Director of Camping at UniCamp.

In keeping with this idea, all campers upon arrival have to choose names for themselves and their counselors that have something to do with nature, and that they will keep throughout the week. “The names made the whole experience surreal. I wasn't Karen to them; I was “Dragonfly,” counselor of Cabin Five, who could run fast and liked mayonnaise on everything.”

However, nicknames are not enough to remove all traces of the children's harsh life at home. Karen says that many of the kids in her session were on medication and some were abused. One situation stands out particularly in Karen's mind. One of her charges was known as Pink Flower, a troubled tiny five-year old black girl with braided pigtails and a baby-tooth smile. One day, Pink Flower waved her arm and accidentally hit another girl. Though the other girl forgave her immediately, Pink Flower could not accept that she had hurt someone. She kept crying “Sorry” and then, suddenly, took off towards the river that runs along the perimeter of the campsite. Karen had to leap up and chase her, prompting another girl to remark later, “Wow, Karen you can run fast.” It was Karen's speed that saved Pink Flower from flinging herself into the river. Karen grabbed Pink Flower who, struggling, cried, “I want to kill myself; I'm going to kill myself,” until she ran out of the energy to fight. Many parents or foster parents lie to get their kids in over the age limit. Some of the older staff came to help Karen bring Pink Flower back. They asked her if she knew what it would mean to kill herself. She replied, “You just jump in the river.” “We explained to her that to kill yourself meant that you would never see your friends again, or your family, or anything. She didn't want to kill herself after that,” Karen said.

“There was not one counselor, guy or girl, who didn't break down when he or she was alone for at least fifteen minutes during the week and cry.” Karen says; “and most of us cried many times.” Despite the difficult moments, Karen knows her time at UniCamp has matured her: “It made me a lot more aware of the type of life these kids lead. But it also helped me to be better at dealing with kids my own age because you gain confidence in yourself by helping the kids to gain confidence in themselves.”

UniCamp's goal is not just to enable inner-city kids to escape the confines of their environment in order to glimpse another life that might inspire them, but equally to instill a sense of responsibility and awareness in the UCLA students. “We want to counter the prevailing view that today's college students tend to be selfish and self-centered,” explains the current President of the UniCamp Board of Trustees, Peter Rich, a successful lawyer who was himself a UniCamp counselor and head counselor during the early 1970s.

Rich credits the camp with maturing him. “In [the 1970s], we would go for nine-day sessions. I invariably lost five pounds each session. There was barely time to eat. I got four to five hours of sleep per night. It was incredibly hard work, but nothing I did at UCLA was as inspiring,” he says. “The camp teaches students to work extremely hard – perhaps the hardest they will ever work in their lives.”

UniCamp's facilities are quite rustic summer camp standards. In the summer camp world, there is an axiom known to all camp directors: “You can have a great facility and crummy counselors, and have a crummy camp; but you can have a crummy facility and great counselors, and have a great camp.” Wirick believes this wholeheartedly, and adds, “Camp is the relationship between the counselor and the camper.” One of his favorite moments as a camp director was noticing that all the kids in a cabin run by two left-handed counselors, had, by the end of the week, begun using their left hands to eat as well. “It wasn't noticed by the counselors. It was almost subconscious. That, above all else, said to me, ‘I want to do everything this guy is doing cause I want to be like him,” says Wirick of the campers.

One of the most exciting changes that came over the campers was that they came to adore and admire the UCLA students. Most of the campers, because they reflect the changing demographics of Los Angeles , are primarily made up of blacks and Hispanics. Not only are tensions strained between those two races in their neighborhoods, but also, says Rich, “many of them are wary at first and stand-offish because they have never met a white person who was not a police officer or store owner; but those barriers are broken down very quickly because of the close interaction throughout the week. In the end most campers are in tears over having to part from one another and the counselors.”