Our Summer Experiential Education and Development (SEED) Program is our signature program, the fulcrum of all of our programming and the point of entry for all girls who join Girls Quest. Each year, over 300 girls attend this two-week program at our bucolic summer site, Camp Oh-Neh-Tah, in East Windham, NY. This goal-oriented summer camp program helps to lessen the Summer Learning Gap by providing activities that stimulate girls' learning and emotional development in an environment that is safe and nurturing while challenging girls to strive to their best potentials.

Summer enrichment programs are a proven way of bridging the Summer Learning Gap, which is thought to be due largely to the reduced opportunities for positive stimulation and activities in many communities. SEED therefore uses a variety of learning opportunities-all interwoven with literacy themes, concepts, and activities-to reduce the Summer Learning Gap. Thus literacy-reading, writing, comprehension-is incorporated into arts and ecology work, drama and crafts, in addition to being promoted through classroom exercises, daily journal writing, and leisure reading.

At our program, girls are given the space as well as the structure to play, learn, and grow under the supervision of carefully selected and trained adults and peer counselors in a caring, nurturing, "girl-centered" environment. Our girls live in groups of ten with two counselors, with an overall ratio of three children to each adult. Time is spent constructively and creatively:

Program activities include swimming, boating, hiking, ceramics, archery, low and high ropes course, and outdoor education. In line with our non-competitive philosophy, our program seeks to build self-esteem, promote acceptance of others, and encourage teamwork. Most importantly, SEED is the first step in a year-round multi-year continuum of engagement: a majority of the girls come for at least two summers; at age 15 former SEED program participants have the opportunity to apply for our Teen Leadership Program.

SEED is immensely popular, and each year over 50% of our girls return for another summer, and many girls move on to our year-round programs after participating in the SEED program.

By leaving home and encountering new experiences, environments, and people in a positive, safe way our girls learn to step beyond the familiar with confidence. This, combined with their sharpened intellectual tools, gives them the motivational boost to meet challenges and face their future with optimism and the skills necessary to excel.

SEED Program 2005 Accomplishments

In 2004-05, the educational component of our summer program continued to develop significantly, both in terms of traditional academics as well as through expanded innovations in experiential learning opportunities. This enhanced our ability to continue to help decrease the Summer Learning Gap for our participants.

During the summer of 2005, Girls Quest served a total of 318 girls in our SEED program over the course of three two-week sessions of academic and social skills enrichment. These girls came from all five boroughs of New York City, as well as a number from Long Island, Westchester, and the Catskills region. They were racially diverse: 65% were African American, 17% were Latina, 9% were Caucasian, and 1% were Asian American. Some 61% percent of the girls we served live at or below the Federal poverty standard; 80% of the girls we served live in one-parent households; another 8% live with grandparents. Almost one half were returning participants. Half were “tweens” (ages 10-12), and over a quarter were in early adolescence (13-14).

Some of the classes offered included: History of American Pioneers & Literacy; Literacy & Social Justice; Women in History; Children Around the World; Legends, Lore & Literacy; and Discovery Hut Writing Workshop.

Last year, our teachers continued to use and develop experiential methods to help children learn literacy and communications concepts by doing as well as by sitting behind a desk. This is a critical part of SEED’s success: In addition to reading and writing in classes and in free time, we take literacy out of the schoolroom and the library and show our girls how the building blocks of strong literacy (vocabulary, diction and grammar, narrative structure, logic, reader empathy, communicative clarity, cultural comparison, perseverance, risk-taking) are relevant and useful, if not critical, to life outside. For example:

• Older campers had expanded time on the High Ropes & Low Ropes Program, while younger girls focused more on cooperative games and initiatives designed specifically for their capabilities.

• Our girls learned a wide array of new concepts and skills related to communication, and gained new understanding of the need for intercultural and interpersonal communication, and appreciated the great variety that exists in modes of communication.

• New interest in reading and writing was achieved in part because girls were able to see how the building blocks of reading and writing—words, narratives, relationships (including grammar), culture (including word history)—translate into other aspects of their lives and other activities such as music, dance, drama, adventure games, and sports.

• Our girls gained new insight into how to “read”—and express—their own selves, their communities, and the world in all its ecological and cultural diversity.

• More focus on emotional and cognitive processing of all experiences at camp, from High Ropes to Polar Swim, from class sessions to diaries, from writing home to Talent Night and Awards Night, helped markedly change our girls’ attitudes in a short time. Our girls quickly connected the risk-taking, trust, teamwork, and positive challenges of outdoor and intercultural experiences with the attitudes needed to learn, grow, self-actualize, and succeed at school and at home.

• Peer leaders and staff all agreed that all girls increased their understanding of and appreciation for the value of learning and literacy and became much more positive about learning both in and out of the classroom.

• There was also agreement that enhancements in counselor training and support helped to keep everyone focused on all opportunities for learning and growth, especially creative ways to leverage experiences on the animals and in the woods, in the garden and the kitchen, and living and sharing with persons of different cultures to teach important lessons about ecology, biology, history, and social psychology.

• Particular successes noted were: the Pioneers Class use of diaries to make the history live for our girls, as they reimagined and rewrote that history in creative ways; a cabin’s use of stamped “passports” to teach geography, history, and culture; girls’ empowerment through poetry writing and examining the role of mass media in girls’ self esteem; mask-making as a way to examine the self/other and learn different traditions of narrative and connection to the environment and religion.

1. Our girls in SEED increased their reading, writing, communication, and thinking skills as evidenced by:

• 100% read at least one age-appropriate book during leisure time in the two-week session.

• 100% read one age-appropriate book during classroom enrichment periods in the two-week session.

• 100% visited our updated library at least once, and most visited several times; many came daily. All consulted with teachers to help choose books; popular books were replenished often.

• 100% attended literacy-based class sessions six days a week in small groups (10 children) led by qualified teachers with documented lesson plans.

• 100% participated in additional daily reading sessions during rest hour and evening cabin activities.

• 100% kept a daily writing journal detailing classroom assignments.

2. Our girls also had their attitudes changed about learning and reading as we created a culture of reading/writing:

• We provided 3 hours total of literacy sessions/experience daily for all girls.

• We celebrated literacy accomplishments through drama performances and poetry readings, posting of work at camp and in the end-of-session newsletters, and presenting awards at our closing ceremony.

• We trained counselors to value, encourage, and promote literacy and learning within cabin groups.

• We published a girl-created newsletter at the end of each session.

• We exposed girls to reading for fun through leisure time activities that included reading a comic book or graphical novel, reading a newspaper or magazine, or playing a word game like Scrabble or Pictionary or a cross-word.

About Camp Oh-Neh-Tah
Camp Oh-Neh-Tah, which means "Silver Hemlock," is located 150 miles northwest of New York City and accommodates over 100 girls per session. The site covers 464 acres of wilderness in the Catskill Mountains, surrounded by 10,000 acres of state forest, and includes trails for hiking, Silver Lake for swimming and boating, as well as sports fields, classrooms, a library/learning center, the Windmill (our arts and ceramics studio), health center, staff lodge, animal barn, garden, theatre, and a high & low ropes course.

For more information on our SEED Program, please download our brochure.