Camps

Are your campers (and staff) thriving?

Camp can be a beautiful place for adventures, discoveries, new friendships, and personal growth. But it can also be a place where underlying issues can break through the surface, and conflict can quickly intensify.

I'm Kathleen, founder of Third Way.

Having spent ten years as a camp counsellor, in Quebec, Ontario and in places as far away as Switzerland, I noticed that most camp staff and students didn’t have the skills they needed to handle conflict confidently and kindly.

That’s why Third Way now offers conflict management and anti-bullying training, support, and certifications for camp staff, senior staff and directors — to help make camp a safe and special place.

TRAINING, SUPPORT, CERTIFICATIONS

Training for camp staff

Live, Virtual, or Pre-Recorded

Third Way has six courses for camp staff. The goal of this summer's programming helps camp staff to meet our camper's increased behaviours and prepares staff to manage their own mental health throughout the summer. These courses are based on my signature methodology, is backed by research, and is tailored specifically for camp settings.

These methods have been crafted and refined after years of tertiary study, a decade of experience in the Ontario educational system, and over a decade spent as a camp counsellor, program director, and director.

Your staff will leave the course with the tools and techniques they need to meet the mental health needs of our campers, help solve complex conflicts, and know how to infuse these techniques right into your camp programming so that all campers can learn these crucial life skills.

Main topics:

Increased behaviours and emotions

Solving complex conflicts

Resolving bullying

Mental health plans for staff

Handling Caregivers

Want to learn more about each course?

Support for camp staff

Summer support that extends beyond the training.

With the significant uptick in camper behaviours and mental health challenges, Third Way is offering support throughout the summer to help out with the trickiest of challenging summer situations.

Live Q&A: Want Kathleen to have some unstructured time with your staff? Book her for an hour live Q&A to answer all your staff's burning questions. You can book her after some of her training during your training sessions, OR throughout the summer to help them apply the learning once campers have arrived.
Membership: You can buy camp-wide access to Kathleen's membership Strong & Kind Monthly once you have completed at least 1 hour of her trainings. You and your staff will have access to her videos that will go over many of the concepts in her trainings. They can get a re-fresh on tools they might want to use once camp has started. There will be 2 live Q&A sessions for all membership holders throughout the summer to ask her questions in real-time.
Support Call Packages: Your senior staff team could have access to Support-Call Packages to use for Kathleen's guidance throughout the summer. You will get 1-on-1 help for your trickiest situations, and guidance on how to handle even the toughest of camper or staff challenges.

Contact Kathleen!

"[Kathleen] was well read, loved what she teaches and a really strong communicator.”

"Thank you Kathleen! That was a really easy way to bring an expert into camp training and teach my staff the information they need to keep our campers safe. I love that we can call you in the summer if we need any extra support if bullying arises."

— Christy

"This really was top notch training for our staff. I think it truly helped establish the understanding that there are many other ways to approach challenging behavioural situations, and it does not have to be as scary or overwhelming as we might have previously thought it was."

— Kristen Hyodo

Certifications

For camp staff, senior staff & full camps

Want to ensure that your whole camp community is prepared and ready to face our present challenges?

Strong & Kind Camp Staff Trained: To get your staff fully certified, you will need to complete Third Way's 5 trainings called Strong & Kind Staff Training. Staff will have the knowledge necessary to meet the emotional and behavioural needs of campers - and - have created a comprehensive mental health toolkit for themselves. Staff will receive a certificate for completing all 5 trainings.

Cooperative Conflict Coaching: This 2-day training program (and 1 hour post-training zoom session) will fully prepare senior staff or mental health staff to deal with even the trickiest bullying and harassment situations. This is Kathleen's signature process to resolve bullying using the problem solving skills of the camper or staff who is targeted in bullying. Staff will be receive a certificate signifying that they are CCC Trained .

Strong & Kind Certified Camp: Camps who fulfill the requirements to become certified will ensure that their full camp community is prepared to handle the increased behaviours and conflicts coming their way. Training involves senior staff sessions, camp staff training, includes at least 2 staff becoming CCC trained, programming for campers, and additional support throughout the summer. All staff will have access to Kathleen's Strong & Kind Monthly Membership, and 1-on-1 support calls for tricky situations. All staff will receive Strong & Kind Certified Staff certificates, the camp will receive a plaque.

Want to see if any of these fit into your camp structure?

I loved the session that you led today! Easily the best session that I watched over the two days.

- Adam Opdahl - CCTC

"Thank you for providing strategies, hope, and inspiration today."

— Jer - CCTC

"Gave me tools to use in my life and at camp that feel doable."

"Camp Pringle invested in Kathleen Hilchey’s “Third Way” virtual training seminars and they became key components of our staff training program during the 2020 and 2021 camp seasons. Each year 15-20 of our seasonal staff took part in the training course and having access to Kathleen’s guidance and expertise on a virtual platform was such an asset to our team! Kathleen’s comprehensive and engaging program helped prepare our staff for dealing with bullying relationships in all areas of camp. The videos were interactive and informative and they equipped our staff with concrete tools they could use in their work with children and youth. Our seasonal staff team shares communal housing for the summer season and our staff reflected that The Third Way techniques were also helpful for them to resolve any issues that arose within their peer group during the camping season. Staff training weeks can be onerous for camp directors and I was thrilled to have the opportunity to bring in an expert guest speaker for my staff in an affordable and accessible way. We highly recommend this program!"