Bundoora SC Year 9 Camp Blog

On the stunning Monday afternoon of 13th May  2024, the Summit welcomed the year nine students and teachers of Bundoora Secondary College. Students were promptly shown their accommodation, where they would stay for the next couple of days! After settling, they were welcomed into the Lodge, where coach Mim introduced them to camp and the coaches! Team leader Spinks informed the students about the Summit’s recipe for the best camp ever and the ingredients that were the Five Keys to camp.

These keys are:

1. Have Fun

2. Play All In

3. Make Lots of Mistakes

4. Get comfortable with being uncomfortable

5. Don’t Go Home Wondering What If

6. 
   

Without further ado, we all headed down to the stage and started with a game of 50 Up run by Luke. Then Odile and Aron taught everyone how to put on a helmet and harness, followed by Mim telling everyone an epic goal-setting strategy called Target, Stretch, and Super Stretch that would help us to grow our comfort zones and conquer challenging activities.

Campers started their first activity with an initiative challenge that involved working together to solve a puzzle. This tested teamwork and leadership, but teams rose to the challenge! Then, we moved on to our first activity rotation. The campers' activities were Laser Skirmish, Abseil, Leap of Faith, Bush Challenge, Flying Fox And Trust Games.  This range of activities challenged people’s bravery, team spirit, support, trust, creativity and problem-solving (to name a few!).

As day one was coming to a close, all tribes got the opportunity to create their very own tribe names, flags and chants; from that moment on, groups 1-6 were known as the Flyers, Peanut Butter, Traffic Cones, Pink Fluffy Unicorns, Sprinkles, and Deutschland. Before the students had free time, Spinks introduced the students to a camp tradition called GMICs, which stands for “Great Moments in Camp” - this is all about writing down and acknowledging some of the incredible moments we’ve seen.

Day two started with an epic talk about setting a morning intention with Spinks, learning how important it is to focus on the things we can control, mainly weather and People.  Ask the students to think about who they want to be and how they want to show up for themselves, others, and the activities. They played a Jockeys game before getting into the park and beginning the three activity rotations.

After lunch, students completed their tribe games to get the maximum number of points: Gaga Ball, Shoe Bowling, and volleyball. After some afternoon tea and dancing to warm up, it was time to do the famous Monster Course. This was a feat of teamwork, strength and resilience.  As students completed the course, the groups were unaware they were running two laps of the monster course, so they got themselves together and then got the second lap done! The run's winner was the team with the most significant improvement time from their first lap. All teams improved their times; well done.

As the last day rolled around, heaps of GMICs were read out. Then Spinks took the kids through a gratitude session, where the students were asked to think about who they are grateful for and what they are thankful for, not to go home wondering ‘what if’ and to ‘check back in’ for the last two rotations of activities to go—heading down to the stage to do a game called Crane Tigar Egg to warm the students up. As the final two rotations ended, the students were asked to vote for someone in their tribe who represented/embodied the Five Keys the most throughout camp. As a reward for the Values winners, they got to spin at The Summit's army tank while their peers watched and cheered them on. (These are listed below, along with the results).

Thanks again for coming to camp and joining us in having all the fun; all the best for the rest of the year.

Spinks, Mim, Aron, Sara, Luke, Odile