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Dec. 28, 2007
Finding one's identity
At Hillel, it's like going to camp all year round.
PAT JOHNSON
Near the end of the season last summer, as the staff and campers at Camp Miriam on British Columbia's Gabriola Island were preparing to catch the ferry home, one of the campers told her counsellor that, when she leaves camp, she leaves behind her Judaism.
The counsellor, Gordon Brandt, was saddened, but not surprised. Brandt, a three-year veteran of the Camp Miriam counselling staff, said summer camp is often the only place for some young Jews to experience their traditions.
"For many of the kids, this is their main or only connection to their Judaism," said Brandt, a University of Victoria law student.
Jewish camping provides a vast array of opportunities for connecting to Judaism, with every religious and cultural gradient seemingly having a camp of their own. Camping is an ideal way to convey Jewish traditions and values, said Brandt, because it is a "cultural immersion." But how that culture is defined is open to interpretation.
"Jewish camp is a pretty general term," said Brandt. Camp Miriam, which is affiliated with the socialist-Zionist Habonim Dror movement, is just one of the hundreds of camps worldwide. He said the Habonim movement emphasizes social justice, critical thinking and cultural, rather than religious, Jewishness.
Camp Miriam in particular has had a profound impact on this province's Jewish community – perhaps most noticeably so at Hillel Houses on the three largest campuses in British Columbia. Among Hillel staff and students, a disproportionate number of leading campus activists have a Camp Miriam background.
Eyal Lichtmann, the executive director who oversees Hillel's operations in British Columbia, spent six years as a camper and two as a counsellor at Camp Miriam. He sees direct parallels between the work of the camp and what he does now, engaging mostly unaffiliated young Jews on campuses.
"For some, camp has been the only Jewish education they get," Lichtmann said. "The same holds true for Hillel."
For Lichtmann, the number of his staff and students who work in the summers at Camp Miriam and other Jewish camps is a point of pride and a sign that the system is working.
"There is a strong sense at Camp Miriam, as there is at Hillel, that we need to give back to the community," he said. "The leadership that students learn at camp and at Hillel is passed on from generation to generation."
Bryan Millman, now Hillel's programming assistant, spent six summers camping at Camp Miriam and two summers as a madrich (counsellor). He agreed with his boss.
"It's the same goals, for sure," said Millman, who graduated from McGill University in the spring.
"Jewish camping is beneficial to young Jews because it shows them that Judaism doesn't have to be something that stays in the synagogue or at a Jewish day school. It can be made fun in a summer camp with kids their own age," Millman said. "It really allows them to explore their religious identity, among other things."
Of the things he gained from camp, Millman mentioned a lifelong core group of friends and unforgettable memories.
"It's a really good socializing tool," he said. "It's a very focused time period, where children spend time with each other without adults. You really learn a lot about yourself and other people."
Caroline Hebron, a UVic biology and math student, was a Camp Miriam counsellor for four years, after camping for two summers at the Gulf Island idyll. She believes that the Habonim experience makes better citizens.
"It just makes good people," she said. "The people walking out of Camp Miriam will stick with their morals or values more than those who don't go to camp."
Most of all, she said, she enjoys working with the kids and providing the kind of leadership and mentoring they need.
"Kids have a rough time these days," said Hebron. "They need role models."
Aaron Dewitt, a Torontonian who recently graduated from the University of British Columbia, had his first camping experience last summer, working at Camp Miriam.
"Camp Miriam is a great place for kids to relax and be themselves, to really build meaningful relationships with one another and develop self-confidence and self-respect," he said. "It's also a really good place to learn about their own place and meaning in life."
"Camp Miriam identifies itself as a left-wing camp," said Dewitt. "It's Jewish, but the movement's ideology is that it's culturally Jewish. That said, the campers come from various backgrounds of religiosity but, for the most part, it's quite liberal and quite secular. My experience at Hillel [and] being a counsellor at Camp Miriam, [was that] I had to try to foster and encourage differing perspectives regarding religion, Israel and social outlook. Like camp, Hillel is accepting of all young people."
Sam Heller, a fourth-year political science student at UBC, spent five years camping at Miriam and four years counselling, including running the counsellor-in-training program.
"It's one of the number one ways for kids to connect to their Jewish roots," he said.
Heller also credited camp with building leadership skills, which is one of the core objectives of Hillel.
"Being a leader at your summer camp is definitely an advantage when you come back to the city," said Heller, who is co-president of Hillel's Israel Awareness Club.
Though Hillel has a disproportionate number of Habonimniks, not all the camping experience is from the same place.
Ben Groberman, a third-year sociology student at UBC, was at Camp Hatikvah for six years and worked as a counsellor for three years at Miriam.
"As a camper, it gave me a really fun summer where I got to now people from all over North America," Groberman said. While camping was enjoyable, Groberman thinks counselling was even better. "It is true that counsellors probably have more fun than campers."
Kara Mintzberg, Hillel's alumni relations director, has experienced more Jewish summer camps than most people. She spent a summer at Camp Solomon Schechter in Washington state, two summers at Camp Hatikvah in the Okanagan, one summer at Camp Miriam and she has been a lifeguard, swim instructor and waterfront director at B'nai B'rith Camp in Lincoln City, Ore.
"Camp was my connection to Jewish peers," said Mintzberg, who attended public high school. "This was something I looked forward to as someone who identifies as Jewish and likes being involved."
It was the sense of community she experienced at camp that led her to walk through the doors of Hillel House when she arrived at university. Eventually, she became president of Hillel's Jewish Students' Association and is now in her second year as a Hillel staffer.
Katie Quinn, Hillel's director of programming at UBC, is from Victoria, but she has worked for several summers at B'nai B'rith Beber Camp in Mukwonago, Wisc., as a general counsellor, Pioneer director and leader of the teen connection division.
"When you can't be at camp, Hillel is the closest thing to that sort of environment that I love, that I can't wait to be part of," said Quinn. "I personally came to Hillel because of camp."
She thinks others have had the same experience.
"At the end of the day, when camp is their only Jewish experience, they find Hillel," said Quinn. "They go to Hillel for that kind of year-round fulfilment.
"On the other hand, Hillel can get people into camping as well," she said. Some Hillels, particularly in the United States, host camping fairs that encourage Hillel students to become counsellors.
Such fairs may be unnecessary at Vancouver Hillel, where most of the staff – and a large proportion of the students – have lived the Jewish camping experience.
Pat Johnson is, among other things, director of development and communications for Vancouver Hillel.
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