Abstract
Camping is generally believed to be a context for positive youth development. The 4-H Camp environments presumably focus on the development of life skills including managing and thinking; relating and caring; giving and working and; living and being. However, the effectiveness of the Missouri 4-H Camp environments in developing life skills among campers had never been evaluated in a consistent manner across the multiple camping programs. In order to evaluate the efficacy of these camp programs, resident campers within the 10-13 year age range were surveyed about their camping experience during the summer of 2005 and a similar group was surveyed in 2006. Parents of campers were also surveyed both years to gather their perceptions of 4-H Camp’s impact on their children in developing the life skill areas identified above. Parents and youth agreed strongly that the 4-H Camp experience was substantially valuable in developing the life skills identified in the Targeting Life Skills Model (Hendricks, 1998).
Highlights
The University of Missouri Extension 4-H field faculty conduct several 4-H resident camps throughout the state each summer
The Missouri 4-H Camp environments presumably focus on the development of life skills relating to Head, Heart, Hands, and Health (Hendricks, 1998)
The effectiveness of the camp environments in developing life skills among campers has seldom been evaluated in a consistent manner across statewide camping programs
Summary
The University of Missouri Extension 4-H field faculty conduct several 4-H resident camps throughout the state each summer. Ed.D., (as cited by Garst, & Bruce, 2003), points out that, “the majority of evaluations conducted in camp settings have been internal process evaluations aimed at program improvement and identifying levels of participant satisfaction.”. This has been the case in Missouri as well. Given the investment of faculty time, resources and facilities to produce a residential camp experience, this study was undertaken to systematically measure the development of life skills in youth attending 4-H resident camps in Missouri
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