Can camp be camp?

HUDSON - Julia Wilkinson described the past few months, since schools closed because of the coronavirus, as awful.

“I don't think there's a good way to put it,” she said with a laugh. “It's been terrible.”

Wilkinson, of Hudson, has two sons who are 9 and 7 years old. Like other parents nationwide, she’s had to work full time from home while trying to keep her children stimulated.

She’s tried her best. In the absence of clear guidance from her children’s school, Wilkinson said she searched for lessons online and encouraged the boys to ride bikes and engage in Nerf gun battles in the yard. But her efforts just haven’t replicated the structure of a real school day.

“Both of my kids thrive on having structure to their day,” Wilkinson said, adding that her older son has attention deficit disorder. “Despite having some schoolwork and some things that they're supposed to be doing, there's still no real schedule and no real order to their day. That's been a huge challenge that has not worked well for my kids in particular.”

For the past few weeks, as parts of the state begin to reopen, Wilkinson has obsessively checked the Facebook page of Pompositticut Farm Day Camp. Both of her sons attended last summer, and she called it “the best thing they’ve ever done.”

The frazzled mother was looking for any sign that Pompositticut would open.

Every time she saw the camp’s owner and founder, Jackie Kane, post an update, she had reason to hope.

“She was posting a little video almost every day,” Wilkinson recalled. “The videos were like, ‘The horses say good morning and miss the campers,’ or ‘Checking out the duck ponds,’ or ‘Getting this area ready.’ Every time she posted something, I was like, ‘Yes, they're still opening, yes, they're still opening.’”

Pompositticut Farm Day Camp will open on July 6, but hundreds of camps nationwide will not.

Bette Bussel, executive director of American Camp Association New England, told the Daily News that roughly 50% of day camps and 90% of overnight camps in the region will not open this summer.

“It is very sad,” Bussel said. “Really, it is just unbelievable. Most people who run camps work year round for that camp season to be able to happen, and so they're very disappointed (to) not to be able to provide the service for families, especially now when these poor kids have been locked up at home without socializing as much with other kids.”

Bussel said a primary reason so many camps aren’t opening is belated guidance from state governments, including Massachusetts.

“In Massachusetts, day camps are allowed to operate now and overnight camps are supposed to be able to open in phase three, but camps have been given no information about what they can do in phase three,” Bussel said. “So how can camps operate when they don't have the guidance? It's impossible.”

The American Camp Association is still calculating the scale of the financial impact on camps of a season off, but Bussel said it is likely some camps won’t be able to recover, and could close.

Camps opening for the summer have had to reinvent themselves in many ways. In Maine, Bussel said, the state won’t allow campers to sing, one of the oldest camp traditions, to avoid spreading infected droplets.

Because of regulations like those, some camp directors have decided not to open because “camp wouldn’t be camp,” Bussel said.

Kane has done all she can to keep the spirit of Pompositticut alive while complying with state rules.

A Pompositticut buff/face mask around her neck, Kane sat at a table outside the camp’s horse barn on Thursday. In front of her was a binder filled with highlighted pages of regulations.

“We just keep reading and reading to make sure that we've got everything down,” Kane said as she flipped through the pages.

She’s confident the camp, which will celebrate its 40th anniversary this year, will be able to keep campers safe from the virus.

Kane worked with a local plumbing company to build and install six handwashing stations. She’s printed slips that parents will bring to camp each day verifying their children don’t have a fever. She has lowered the number of children who will participate in each session. She’s put social distancing markers around the pool.

In addition to meeting new, often changing, regulations, camp directors like Kane have had to scramble to fill staffing holes caused by the suspension of international travel.

“Camps usually bring in some international staff through what's called the J1 visa program, and that program is now in limbo through December,” Bussel said. “That’s huge.”

Kane usually welcomes horseback riding instructors from the United Kingdom through a program called Camp America.

“We just kept waiting and waiting and waiting to see if the travel ban would lift and they would be able to come and be quarantined to start camp, and last week, I all of a sudden realized that I needed to stop being hopeful for this and I had to act on assembling a riding staff,” Kane said, adding that, with the help of friends on Facebook, she was able to fill the positions.

As the clock ticks closer to opening day, Kane has also fielded dozens of calls from parents. Some have asked what steps Pompositticut is taking to keep their children safe. Others have said that, no matter the precautions, they aren’t comfortable sending their kids this year.

“I get so many comments saying, ‘I can't imagine my summer without Pompositticut,’” Kane said. “But some of our families that have attended here for years, they also make that comment but they've withdrawn. They can't and their children can't imagine life without Pomp but yet they're choosing not to return.”

Usually, parents explain that they live with an immunocompromised relative, Kane said, but some have said they just don’t feel comfortable sending their children outside the home to a place where they could theoretically contract the virus. Like owners of most camps, Kane has asked participating families to sign a COVID-19-specific liability waiver.

Wilkinson said each family needs to make a decision about the amount of risk they’re willing to take.

“I don't want to make any judgment based upon what somebody else feels is right for their family,” she said. “And I do respect people having caution about what they do with themselves, because I'd rather see you be cautious and take measures to try to keep you and your family safe than to pretend that this isn't a thing. Coronavirus is real, it is a problem. It is something we need to be cautious about.”

But Wilkinson said she has no hesitation about sending her children to Pompositticut, especially after receiving a call from Kane explaining how the camp will operate this year.

“She didn't just bother to email back,” Wilkinson said. “She called me back, and she said, ‘I want to have a conversation and make sure I am addressing the concerns that you have.’ And she took the time to make sure that I was comfortable as a parent with my kids being there. That's what we get at Pompositticut. It is worth every penny for my children to be there as long as they can this summer because I know they're going to be well taken care of.”

And after months of staying at home, Wilkinson said her family needs the camp.

“For me and my kids, this is critical,” she said. “It's critical for them to be doing something outside of my house in a safe way, and it's critical for them to get into a situation where they are back having some routine to their day and they're able to interact with other people and be moving. I need them to have that for their social and emotional health. I can't sacrifice that out of fear when we are not in a particularly high risk situation.”

Kane said her goal for camp this year is the same as it has been since she opened the place in 1980.

“To put every child back in their parents' car safe and sound and with a smile on their face - even behind the mask.”

Jeannette Hinkle is a reporter for the MetroWest Daily News. Reach her at jhinkle@wickedlocal.com.