mostly for LITs (Leaders-in-Training). It was raining off and on all day. We had a very experienced examiner come up from Toronto to do the exam, and two interesting things happened. The examiner, who has been to many many camps in Ontario, said to me before he left that Arowhon is apparently unique. I asked what he meant and he said: “Your campers and staff are all so outdoorsy.”

I probed and he said he was shocked that none of the kids doing the swim exams seemed to notice the rain…. And nor did the staff doing lifeguard duty for the exams. He asked the staff if they minded guarding in the rain and were they having to do it just because he was here doing the exams. They were, according to him, surprised to be asked that question and they told him they’d be guarding in the rain whenever it rains – business as usual.

I told him that not too much stops our campers from doing activities and he said that at other camps they stop doing activities at the hint that it might rain….Was I proud?

Then he told me he’d had to fail most of the boys who took the Bronze Cross exam. They just hadn’t taken it seriously, he said. I was sad for them but mostly grateful to him for ensuring that our counsellors of 2016 – LITs of 2015 – are getting a lesson in “taking it seriously” so that when they guard swims docks next summer (if we hire them and if they work to pass Bronze Cross in the city) they’ll have learned to take lifeguarding VERY seriously.

Because at the deepest level, our goal in the LIT program is to motivate and inspire adolescents to take responsibility for themselves and others.