Campers of the Week, Jobs, Forts, and Field Day!!!

Campers of the Week

As the week of being Intellectually Distinguished comes to a close we honor those campers that have lived up to this ideal: making the right choices because you know how to and standing out for doing so. The honorable mentions are Matthew Garcia, Lemuel Bourne, Sergio Velazquez, and David Bernard. These three campers have had a terrific second week and are on their way to having an even better third week. The camper of the week was awarded to Malik Forrest and Adrian Suriel. Their ability to be intellectually distinguished really showed through this week. Great job!

Jobs

Speaking of great jobs, even though we have been here for two weeks now the place is looking just as good as when the campers first arrived. Each camper has certain jobs that they were hired for the entire summer as well as additional jobs that they could volunteer to do. The sixth graders are sweepers of the Main Hall (supervised by a seventh grader) and the seventh and eighth graders are sanitation workers (with an eighth grade supervisor). Also, campers could volunteer to get hired for hospitality (getting rooms ready for guests and showing them around) or sacristan (cleaning the chapel). If the campers show up to these jobs on time and do them well they are rewarded just like in real life with a paycheck later in the school year.

Campers complete even more jobs throughout the camp to ensure that everything runs smoothly. In the kitchen, Val and Roseanne get help with every meal from three Kitchen Patrol and one Kitchen Assistant staff. Each cabin has a waiter for the day responsible for getting more food from the KP staff and cleaning and sweeping after the meal. Campers clean their cabins every day (sweep, fold their clothes, and make their beds). After hikes, campers do their own laundry.

All-in-all, they do a great job cleaning!

Fort Building Competition

After two amazing weather days we are now back to the unpredictability of the mountain storms. Saturday's weather was like most up here: clear in the morning with rain storms in the afternoon only to clear up right at dinner time. But the fun and team work never stops. With the recycling truck not coming to take our cardboard away for two straight weeks we decided that it should be put to use. Each cabin had two teams that were given the task of constructing a fort from seven pieces of cardboard and one roll of duct tape. The fort was judged on looks, stability, and if it could fit one Mr. Arte comfortably inside. Many forts had additional accessories that made Mr. Arte feel at home, such as a TV set to college basketball. One had a toilet and another even had a missile launcher (but no missiles). The two forts from cabin one, The Pride, tied for first place. Who knows, maybe Mr. Arte will sleep in one some night if the rain lets up.

Field Day

The weather cleared just enough for the boys to participate in the 2009 Camp Monserrate Field Day. This camp wide activity offers the campers a chance to show off their many track and field, basketball, and throwing skills. Everyone had a blast and participated no matter their level of skill. As this blog is being posted they are at the pool getting a much deserved and refreshing swim in before dinner and Sunday camp fire!

Click here to see all the pictures from events in this post, the first ever Monserrate Geography Bee, and the entire camp season!