Spotlight on Bogrim

David Minkus (Rosh Bogrim): This is my sixth summer on staff. I have been a counselor for Shoafim, Bogrim, Machon, and Nivonim. I wanted to come back to camp because it keeps me young. One of my goals at camp has been to be a Rosh Aidah, which I wanted to do to help have a great impact on a larger group of campers. I wanted to work with Bogrim because it was one of my favorite ages to be a counselor for. High school was a really formative time in my life and Bogrim is entering into that time and I would like to help my staff prepare these campers for that experience.

Bogrim campers are at an age where you can really have a relationship with them on a mature level. You can still have fun with them the way you do with younger campers, but they're also able to have sustained conversations on serious issues. Plus there's a lot of tension and nervousness about going to high school and I felt that when I was a counselor I was able to help relieve that stress, so I wanted to use my experience to be able to do it again.

To help address these issues about going to high school, this summer we had a Yom Meyuchad called "Yom High School." We had different stations for the campers-there was homeroom, classes, and after school activities like sports and clubs. In the morning, each class dealt with a different issue that kids confront in high school, especially during their freshman year, such as social pressure, academic issues, maintaining a Jewish identity in a public school, etc. The campers responded to the program really well. As campers started opening up, the whole group began to feel comfortable and it really opened up discussions about things that were on everyone's minds that they weren't able to give a voice to before.

Bogrim is the first summer where campers daven three times a day. They take on the new halachic responsibility, but they also take on new privileges that they see as more fun. They get to stay up later, they get a more serious play, they're no longer on an activity rotation and get to choose their activities.

One of my favorite things that we did this summer was the homecoming football game and prom that we had as part of Yom High School. It was a lot of fun to see how everyone got into it, both the girls and the guys. And it was a lot of fun to see them get all dressed up.

I'm looking forward to our play. As a counselor, that was always my most prideful moment and I was always kvelling over how much work they put into it and how great of an experience it was. I'm really looking forward to seeing it through an even bigger lens this year as a Rosh Aidah.

Jessica Reiser (SC, Bogrim): This is my second year on staff. Last year I was on Solelim staff. I was interested in working with Bogrim this year because it's a really fun year. It's a big transition year from cabin to aidah and it's really fun to help the campers make that transition. In my Bogrim summer I didn't branch out much from my cabin until we started doing programs as banim (boys) and banot (girls) and then I felt a lot closer with a lot of the girls in my aidah. It was the next step to becoming the great aidah that we became. Now it's fun to give back to these campers and help them have similar experiences to what I had, if not better.

My favorite thing that we've done this summer was after the Zimriyah when we had a dance party in our cabin-spontaneous, half an hour of non-stop dancing. It was a lot of fun.

Hayley Schwartzman (JC, Bogrim): This is my first summer on staff. I always knew that I wanted to work with older campers, and I felt like Bogrim would be a really fun age to work with. It's also awesome to know that you're going to help them transition from middle school to high school. A lot of the campers are worried about cliques in high school. Some are going to private school. Some are transitioning from private to public school. So, this summer we are really working on helping them to branch out and make new friends, which will hopefully help them with that transition.

My favorite thing this summer was a Yom Meyuchad we had where we did special activities with just banot and banim. The girls got really into it. We all gave ourselves special nicknames and made headbands and made a special banot chant in Hebrew. It was really fun to watch them get into it and become a sisterhood.

Irene Skupsky (SC, Bogrim): This is my second year on staff. I was a Bogrim counselor last year as well. From working with this age group last year, I realized that they can really get into a wide range of activities. It's really cool to see them get into all these different programs. They know how to be mature, but they also know how to have fun. It's a great spectrum.

My favorite thing this summer was the Zimriyah when we just got up and sang our song and it was the first time in the summer that I really felt the aidah unity. I think the aidah unity is really important, especially because in Bogrim is when you start becoming really unified as an aidah-not just as individuals or as a cabin. It's when everything starts to come together.