I hope your new year is off to a great start! My name is Erika Lilienfeld and I work with our 6-12th grade students as TBE’s Youth Engagement Specialist. During the summer, I had the pleasure to visit many of our regional camps with my colleague and our Assistant Director of Havayah, Ali Klein.

We went to Camp Bauercrest, Camp Pembroke, URJ SciTech, Camp Young Judaea, URJ Eisner & URJ Crane Lake Camp, Camp Tevya.
At each camp, we had the opportunity to tour campus and visit with TBE campers, witnessing first hand connections and friendships (and stacks of friendship bracelets on wrists!) growing beautifully. Learning about each camp’s mission, goals, and dreams with each camps’ flagship administrative and director teams, and chatting with our students about their summers, favorite chugim and day trips, and more, gave us a sneak peak into the exciting, daily life of Jewish camp.

These visits have given us incredible insight into the values of living in joyful, Jewish time through developing compassionate and intentional connections to campers, staff, and the greater Jewish community through sports training and skill building, Jewish life and learning, the arts and performing, and much more. We are excited that many of our families have chosen Jewish camping as part of their Jewish journey and we look forward to continuing our partnership with camps to engage our Jewish youth.

Don’t see your camp on the list above? Over a two-year cycle, we visit all of the regional Jewish overnight camps where we have campers. If we were not able to visit your camp this summer, we hope to catch you next summer! Contact me to complete our camp survey so that we can best plan for camp visits next year and to inform where our TBE campers spend their summers.