Application : Interview #1

Once my application was sent over to America, I thought I had to just sit and wait.

So I did.

Seventeen long days went by without a word, then suddenly...

An email arrived! A camp got in touch and invited me to have a Skype interview with them. I emailed back within 2 hours (it went to my junk mail so I didn't see it right away - watch out for that!), and by the time I went to bed, we'd arranged a time...

...For the very next day!

Wow, they were keen! This was great! 8pm the next day I dressed up into a nice top (bright, fun, but smart-ish), put in some pretty earrings, did my hair etc, and sat down for my interview.

The camp director was a lovely man, very nice and cheerful. It felt like an overall positive interview. He praised my application, said it was very enthusiastic, I had a lot of experience working with kids, and it was great that I was a fencer. He said any camp would snap my hand off, since that's quite a difficult skill to find.

Part way through the interview though, he told me that I was able to apply to camps directly, and encouraged me to do so. He said I could search for camps on the American Camp Association website and contact them myself. I could send an email over, explain I was with CCUSA and ask if they would be interested.

This confused me a lot...was he politely trying to let me know I should be looking elsewhere? He said he and the other directors would be discussing the latest batch of applicants the next day, and I'd hear by the end of the week. He did warn me that they were almost full, as they'd had a lot of early applicants that year. Again...letting me down gently...?

A couple of days later he got back in touch, to let me know I was unsuccessful. I'll admit, I was pretty gutted. I had picked up signs in the interview, so it wasn't a huge surprise, but still...no-one likes being rejected! I did ask for feedback though, and got this reply, which others might find useful too -

Hi,

I thought your interview was fine and I don't have any specific feedback. Because we interview so many people, often it is a mixture of many different factors that go into our final decisions. Something to keep in mind when interviewing is that camps want counselors who have both a big, enthusiastic personality and good judgment and decision making. Other traits to play up include a positive attitude, the ability to adapt to changing situations, and a focus on kids, kids, kids!

Good luck, I'm sure you will find a great camp for the summer.

So, rejection does happen, and it can hurt! But it was a useful experience.

It was my first ever Skype interview, so now I know what that's like.

I got feedback which I can bear in mind (when asked "Why do you want to work at camp?" should I have focussed more on my love of working with kids, than my enthusiasm for learning new thing?).

Most importantly - I learned that I can apply to camps myself. I didn't know that before! I thought I had to sit and wait for camps to contact me.

Also, remember that no matter how positive and keen a camp seems, until you have that offer...don't take anything for granted.

I know it's hard to think it might fall through, God knows I'm a very optimistic person! But if we weren't optimistic, if we were pessimistic and all "Oh this will never happen for me...", then we probably shouldn't be applying for Summer Camp :)

So it's ok to be researching costs and be looking at the local area, it's good to be excited about the idea and to know what you'd be getting yourself in for if you DID get accepted...just don't start booking flights just yet :)