Co-Op Camp Sierra Week One June 24, 2006

Since its founding in 1938, Co-op Camp Sierra has become a vacation Mecca for members of different types of cooperatives throughout California. In part, camp?s longevity can be attributed to the amazing setting--nearly a mile high in the Sierra National Forest, about 50 miles southeast of Yosemite?but it?s really the people and the program that make it such a unique, enduring experience.
Co-op Camp has something for everyone. Families, single parent families, extended families, and singles of all ages join together to create a new community. One recent year there were 8 different families at camp who had brought along 3 generations of family members!



For both affordability and adventure, housing options range from ?bring your own tent,? to dormitories, rustic cabins, lodges, and relatively plush duplex cabins. Family-style meals are served three times a day in the camp dining hall, where vegetarian options are always available.

Networking connections abound here, providing a fertile ground for brainstorming such cooperative institutions as Associated Cooperatives and the National Co-op Bank. And friendships are forged among campers that keep them and their families coming back year after year.

Co-op Camp Sierra has longstanding ties to the University Students Cooperative Association in Berkeley (USCA). For the first years of camp, the students of the USCA provided the food and cooked the meals for their fellow campers. In 1989, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Co-op Camp, the USCA was once again asked to provide their cooking services. They dazzled the campers with natural, organic meals, and were asked to return the following year. Those first meals are still enthused about almost 15 years later!

The camp was originally created to educate people about all forms of cooperation. The primary educational focus is a morning discussion program that explores environmental and social concerns as well as teaching basic skills and tools for organizing and running a co-op. Also in the spirit of cooperation (freeing up the adults to participate in these inspiring sessions), camp provides a morning activity program for children that keeps them engaged in such activities as preschool, crafts, drama, and sports.







A few examples of recent morning discussion topics: The Rochdale Principles of Cooperation, fundraising and financial planning, developing an effective board, success stories from cooperatives worldwide, parent participation preschool cooperatives, environmental recycling, using the internet for community organizing, Expressive Arts as a means to set personal and group goals, and ?How to Promote the Hellouta your Co-op.?
Typically afternoons are either for napping, communing with nature, or participating in a variety of camper-led activities such as crafts, sports, horseback riding, boat rides, and hikes. ?The Potholes? are an amazing natural water slide and several swimming holes--an experience not to be missed. Evenings are equally engaging, featuring such institutions as volleyball, folk dancing, campfire singing, outdoor barbeques (with tofu steaks or soy burgers for the vegans), a bingo evening, an auction (benefitting the campership fund), a carnival, camper presentations (examples: a slideshow about a caravan to Cuba; a video about cohousing communities), star walks, a late-night crew compiling the daily camp newspaper, and the ever-popular closing-night talent show.

A testimonial from an enthusiastic repeat camper: ?When I saw a couple of the best-looking young guys in camp escorting one of their grandmothers to the dining hall, I knew that I wanted my son to be a teenager in this camp."

Whether you?re a worker for the co-op, a manager, or a loyal member/consumer, Co-op Camp Sierra offers an exciting and affordable setting for a great family get-away. We hope you?ll join us up the mountain, ?Where Potholes are a good thing!?

Official Website: http://www.coopcamp.com/