What we believe:
We believe that too many young people, especially those between the ages of 8 to 18 who are economically disadvantaged, fall between the cracks in Chicago's educational system. These students can benefit enormously from the same types of educational, cultural, and community-building opportunities that are more readily afforded to young people from more privileged situations.
We also believe in the power of consistency and continuity. We therefore offer a summer camp and regularly scheduled school-year activities. This combination allows us to provide a sustained synthesis of academic, cultural, environmental, civic, and recreational experiences. In short, our year-round operation helps to nurture well-rounded, complete individuals, capable of dealing with the curves life is sure to throw their way.
What we do:
During the school-year, Camp of Dreams operates Community Days, which take place two Saturdays a month from 1:00-4:00 pm, at LEARN Charter School, 1132 S. Homan, in North Lawndale. Community Days give Dreamers the opportunity to participate in educational, artistic, and recreational activities with old friends and new friends. Camp of Dreams also runs leadership retreats for smaller groups of participants.
Over the summer, Camp of Dreams runs a three-week overnight camp in Oregon, Illinois, at the Lutheran Outdoor Ministries Center. The LOMC is a beautiful, heavily wooded, 650 acre campus equipped with cabins, platform tents, lake, challenge courses, and trails—perfect for providing Dreamers with a safe and challenging home for three weeks in July.
If you have any questions about attending or volunteering with any of these programs, please contact us at 312.649.5551 or info@campofdreams.org.
What we aim for:
Camp of Dreams aims at three related but distinct sets of outcomes. The first has tangible and measurable targets: improved grades, improved behavior, increased extra-curricular participation, high school graduation, and enrollment in college. The second includes less tangible, deeper accomplishments: the development of a robust and healthy sense of accountability to oneself and one's community. Our third objective is to constitute a challenging, reliable and supportive community of participants, staff and volunteers, participants' families, partner organizations, and funders. We believe that reaching this third objective is essential in the pursuit of the first two objectives, in that the positive development of the individuals in the Camp of Dreams depends to a large degree on the strength of the community Camp of Dreams builds and maintains.
Personnel:
The Camp of Dreams staff brings a range of qualifications and perspectives to its programs: the summer staff includes a diverse mix of teachers, artists, professionals and college students, and the school-year staff adds university and high school student volunteers to this combination. The administrative staff of Camp of Dreams includes an individual who has been with the project since its inception, as a pilot, in February of 2003, and much of the original staff remains involved.
The Camp of Dreams explicitly strives—in its hiring and board selection practices—to assemble ethnically and socio-economically diverse leadership teams.
Program Director: Jacquita Smith joined the Camp of Dreams staff in April 2010. From her positions as a mentoring program founder, college admissions advisor, Upward Bound camp counselor, and substitute teacher, Jacquita has over 10 years of experience working with youth in non-profit and educational settings. She also gained extensive camping and outdoor survival skills during her 9 years in the U.S. Army Reserves. Having lived in the South her entire life, Jacquita moved from Atlanta, GA, to pursue her life-long dream of living in Chicago. She earned a B.A. in Journalism and a B.A. in Geography/Urban Planning from The University of Alabama before pursuing graduate studies in Urban Policy Studies/Non-profit Management from the Andrew Young School of Public Policy at Georgia State University. In her spare time, she still runs a mentoring program in her native Mississippi, volunteers at various organizations, and tries to adjust to people saying “you guys” instead of “y’all”.
Director of Operations: Lori Coomes joined Camp of Dreams for the 2004 summer camp, where she directed the Athletics Program and helped campers and staff out with everything else as well. Throughout the 2004-2005 school-year, Lori taught math and writing, and during the 2005 summer program, she led workshops in Mythology, Basketball, and Entrepreneurship, and she filled in wherever help was needed. Before becoming the Director of Operations at Camp of Dreams, Lori taught for four years in the Chicago Public Schools at Dvorak Specialty Academy and Ella Flagg Young Elementary School. She also served as the assistant program coordinator for the Metro Achievement Center and coached soccer and basketball at the middle school level. Lori received her B.S. in Elementary Education from the University of New England.
Program Assistant: Kira Fielding joined Camp of Dreams in August of 2009 after graduating from the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota. Kira is participating in the Amate House year-long service program, which incorporates full-time direct service, living in a community setting with 13 other volunteers, and spiritual formation. Kira has experience working with youth, including volunteering at an afterschool program for underserved youth in Minneapolis, working for many years at summer camps, providing child care for a wide range of children, and volunteering as a Young Life leader in an inner-city high school in Fort Worth, Texas. She excels as an innovative communicator and facilitator. Kira is passionate about learning further about social justice issues and how she can play an effective role in serving the community, and develop into a stronger woman.
History
Camp of Dreams was first conceived in February of 2003. That summer and during the summer of 2004, Camp of Dreams ran a residential camp at the Wild Rose Program Center, in St. Charles, IL. Camp of Dreams followed both summer sessions with twice-monthly gatherings at LEARN Charter School in North Lawndale. Since starting its school-year program, Camp of Dreams has offered classes in academics, arts, and mind and body; provided after-school tutoring; and engaged participants in a community service program.
From February of 2003 through August of 2004, Camp of Dreams operated as a pilot project of a parent organization. By the fall of 2004, it was clear—both because of the program's merits and because of relationships with and commitments to participants and their families—that the program should continue as its own, independent non-profit organization. In late October of 2004, Camp of Dreams received 501(c)(3) status, and it has been improving and increasing it services ever since.