Spring break camp to aid working parents

New program offers
week of activities
for kids out of school

By Claudia M. Williams
Staff Writer
When the children’s ministry director at Windcrest UMC first conceived the idea of a spring break camp, she knew right away that it would need three key volunteers:
> A bus driver.
> An activities director.
> A food director.
Without these individuals, a special program for children out of school for spring break wouldn’t be much different from extended after-school care.
A bus driver could take school-age youngsters on field trips during the day. An activities director would arrange the field trips. The food director would provide snacks during activities.
The volunteers did step forward, and the 1,533-member congregation is signing up youngsters in kindergarten through fifth grade for the March 14-18 spring break camp.
“We’re hoping to fill the needs of single-parent families or families where both parents work and can’t take spring break week off,” said Marcy Williams, children’s ministry director.
The camp is to run from 7:30 a.m to 5:30 p.m. daily and is open to both church families and neighbors in Windcrest and northeast San Antonio, Williams said. The church is trying to keep costs to a minimum so the camp will be affordable, perhaps as little as $10 a day.
“We’re enrolling only 50,” Williams added. “We’re limited by the number of seats on the bus.”
The daylong spring program won’t be like summer Vacation Bible School, Williams said. But the camp will use some VBS materials
Children can expect to try their hand at crafts and showcase their talents in a show scheduled to be the closing activity. Field trips to places ranging from the local fire department to the San Antonio Children’s Museum are possible.
Children are to bring their lunches, and the camp is to provide snacks and drinks, Williams said. Snack donations are already coming in.
Williams has been nurturing the spring break camp idea for more than a year.
The initial challenge was selling the idea and lining up volunteers.
“When I described the camp to the children’s ministry team early in the year (2004), a couple of people jumped on the idea right away,” Williams said. “But others said it’s a whole year away. Do we have to think about this right now?”

Williams encouraged team members not only to think about the camp but to pray about it. Then during the summer, with Vacation Bible School behind them, she started to bring the idea up again.
“I couldn’t explain just how a spring break camp was going to work out,” she said. “I just knew that it would.”
This time, the ministry team was more receptive. Now, could they get enough volunteers?
“I thought the hardest spot to fill would be the bus driver,” Williams said. “There are only a few people who can drive a bus. Not only did we need someone who could drive, but that person would have to be available any time, any day.
“I knew if I could get that covered, as far as lining up the rest, there’d be nothing to it.”
A bus driver was the first person to step forward. He owns his own mechanic shop and sets his own hours.
Next a woman volunteered to arrange activities. She could make phone calls and reservations, she said, from her office even though she had a full-time job.
Shortly thereafter, a food director emerged—a woman who had joined the church only two weeks before.
“When we got them,” Williams said, “I knew we’d be good to go.”
Williams’ next call for volunteers resulted in enough people—from teenagers to senior adults—to make the vision a reality.
“The bus was the big draw,” she said with a laugh. “It’s new, and not many people have ridden on it. I told them if they volunteer, they get to ride on the bus.”
Williams said she has no doubt the camp will grow in 2006, a prediction she made even before registration for the 2005 camp began.
“When the time comes,” she said, “we’ll figure out how to make a larger camp happen. We’re not sure how we’ll do it, but from the way this year’s camp has come together, I know there’s sure to be a way.”