It feels like the center of a kids’ universe.
Every weekday until mid-August, the spaces surrounding Bedford High School-ballfields, courtyards, parking lots, walkways-are swarming with children.
They’re playing capture-the-flag on Sabourin Field turf, zipping around on electric trikes on the parking lot pavement, shooting arrows into targets near the baseball outfield, slip-n-sliding down the man-made hill next to Liljegren Way, hanging out after lunch on the Jenks Nature Trail.
“Summer Adventures celebrates summer and what a wonderful time in children’s lives it is!” says the Recreation Department’s website.
Recreation Director Amy Hamilton radiates that definition, especially with memories still fresh of last summer’s pandemic-compromised version. “How quickly they got into the groove and were bonding,” she exclaimed about campers and counselors interacting with each other. “It seemed so effortless.”
Longtime Summer Adventures Director Peter Laskaris said managing the six-week program is “like being handed the keys to a Ferrari.”
And he gives all the credit to 47 counselors as well as more than 50 seventh- and eighth-grade counselors-in-training.
There’s a younger component, Junior Adventures, for kids age four through entering kindergarteners. The main program covers campers entering first grade through sixth. There are three consecutive two-week sessions. This is the second week of session one; it is fully subscribed with more than 300 adventurers, Hamilton said.
Parents have been happily supportive, the director reported. “Our hope is that they trust us with their children.”
Summer Adventures 2020 took place amidst uncertainty and caution. “We were together, at least,” Hamilton said. The cohorts were smaller and the restrictions were many, especially concerning surfaces. Staff was constantly sanitizing sports equipment. Springs Brook Park was closed.
This summer there are still limitations. Hamilton said probably 80 percent of everything takes place outside, weather permitting. When indoors at BHS, Summer Adventures is spread throughout the complex, with small groups assigned to individual rooms as their base of operations. “We’re taking up more of the school, and they have been great about that,” said Hamilton, who also lauded the support from other town departments.
The pond at Springs Brook Park is back in business, and Summer Adventures offers morning swim lessons for kids in grades 1-4, followed by free swim that includes fifth and sixth graders.
There are still no indoor field trips-museums, aquarium, even laser tag. “It has been a challenge to find outdoor trips,” Hamilton acknowledged. But she added, “We are just thrilled that we have field trips!” The traditional experience at Canobie Lake Park will have to wait until 2022 because of attendance limits at the Salem, NH amusement park.
The Summer Adventures philosophy transcends individual activities, games, and trips. Laskaris said his goal for the summer is to create an environment where participating kids can “reset” and reconnect with each other, enjoy new experiences, and build relationships with counselors. According to the Recreation Department website, “We are mindful that, most importantly, summer is a time for kids to be kids and play!”
“We have added woodworking and archery and gaga ball, and all that is great to do,” Laskaris continued. “But what it comes down to is that sense of culture and community.”
Masks are still required in the buildings and on the buses to and from Springs Brook. “We learned last summer that children do not have a problem wearing masks,” said Laskaris, who for most of the year teaches second grade at Davis School. He is a 13-year veteran of the Summer Adventures staff.
The Recreation Department worked with school district leaders to dovetail as much of Summer Adventures as possible with morning summer school sessions.
The counselor-in-training program, said Laskaris, was launched in 2019 but expanded more than fourfold this year. He explained, “It’s a way for a kid to go from Junior Adventures to director without having to miss a summer.”
That sounds hyperbolic until you talk to Ben Richter, who directs the program with Maria Linehan. Richter said this is his 14th season on the Summer Adventures staff; “I can’t remember how many years I was a camper,” he added.
There were more than 50 applicants for the counselor-in-training slots, Laskaris said, and he was able to accommodate almost all, dispersed across the three sessions. “We did not want to say no,” he said. And every applicant was an alumnus of Summer Adventures, he stressed.
It has added to the legend, thanks to “the energy and enthusiasm they brought from day one,” the director said. “The number one expectation is to be engaged with kids. Every one of them has lived up to that.”
Mike Rosenberg can be reached at [email protected], or 781-983-1763
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