Pecometh Notes

Creation Care

There’s a lot of talk these days about our “carbon footprint” but what does that really mean? Your carbon footprint is simply a measure of the impact of human activities on the environment in terms of the amount of greenhouse gases, measured in units of carbon dioxide. Our carbon footprint is made up of two distinct components:

 

• Primary Footprint This is a measure of direct CO₂ emissions      from the burning of fossil fuels. Activities include home energy usage      such as heat and electricity, as well as transportation such as driving or      air travel
• Secondary Footprint This is a measure of indirect CO₂  emissions related to the entire      life-cycle of a product, including its manufacture, transportation and      decomposition

 

According to calculations by BP (a fossil fuel energy company), as cited on FoxNews.com, the average U.S. household generates 19 metric tons or 41,895 pounds of CO₂ each year. Of course, scientists differ on what the long-term effect of greenhouse gases will be, but there is no disagreement that it is happening and does affect our environment.

 

From a stewardship standpoint, the question is what can we do to reduce our carbon footprint? In the next few months, we’ll provide tangible steps you can take, but in the meantime, here are two that make a huge impact, as suggested by a special Energy Report in the Wall Street Journal (November 12, 2007):

 

Compact Fluorescent Light Bulbs Replacing regular incandescent bulbs with CFL’s, as they’re called, is one of the simplest and most effective things you can do. A 25-watt CFL provides the same light as a 100-watt bulb with only a quarter of the energy usage, saving the equivalent of 100 pounds of CO₂ emissions each year, as well as saving money on your electric bill. Better yet, a recent study by Popular Mechanics magazine determined that people prefer the light from a CFL to a regular incandescent bulb. Although CFL’s cost more, their price is coming down significantly and they last much longer than regular bulbs. Two important notes:

1. When installing a CFL, turn it on and let it stay on for six to eight hours. This “burn in” will extend its life to the upper end of its five to six year life.

2. CFL’s contain toxic gases, so its important to dispose of them properly. Most county landfills now have collection centers for CFL’s to avoid a harmful effect on the environment

 

Recycling While CFL’s impact our primary carbon footprint, recycling reduces our secondary imprint. Recycling reduces landfill gas generated by decaying matter, as well as the amount of energy to manufacture new products. For example, recycling an aluminum can cuts the energy needed to make a new can by 95%. A household of four that recycles all its newsprint, aluminum, steel, plastic and gas can reduce its solid waste footprint by 41% from 4,072 pounds to 2,384 pounds of CO₂ emissions per year.

For everything, there is a season

Ecclesiastes reminds us that life has rhythms and that all things must pass. This past summer was a reminder of two major passings: Barb Hall and the "Matrix Tree." Barb came to camp as a child, worked on staff in the 70's, then volunteered as a camp nurse for several summers in the 90's. She was touched by Pecometh and she touched many here. In accordance with Barb's wishes, we spread her ashes at Pecometh this month so that she could remain connected with this sacred place. It was an important way for her family and friends to mark the importance of Pecometh in her life.

The Matrix Tree came down in a storm this August. I believe it received its name because of the way it leaned back, like Keanu Reeves' character, Neo, dodging bullets in the movie. The Matrix Tree was nearly as iconic as the Pavilion. Countless campers and staff have sat under, around and even in (though it was not permitted, ha!) the Matrix Tree. It has certainly been the most photographed tree on camp.

We're thinking about how to appropriately honor Barb's memory, as well as how to replace the Matrix Tree. In reality, nothing can do either justice. But like Pecometh, the importance comes with the impressions made in our hearts, and those remain with us.

Pecometh Partners with Bunk1.com

Starting this summer, Pecometh is partnering with Bunk1.com to provide email service and an online photo gallery for campers and their families. While we’ve been providing the ability to send email to campers for several years now, as well as providing the opportunity to purchase a cabin photo, this partnership takes things to a new level.

When we started processing emails to campers and selling cabin photos, we created a new position: Office Assistant (OA). The Office Assistant’s function was to print out the emails each day, sort and fold them, and then deliver them to campers during dinner. Those emails now number in the hundreds, each day. In addition, the OA would also arrange to take a photo of each cabin, download them to a PC, format and label the photos, then print them for all the campers who purchased them at check-in.

Now, jump forward to 2007. The Bunk1.com “Bunk Notes” system bundles and sorts the messages for us each day, allowing the OA to simply print them out and distribute them. This makes the daily email load much more manageable. And, even though “Bunk Note” credits are required to send email, Pecometh has paid to provide three (3) Bunk Note credits for each camper. That means that each camper family can send up to three basic emails free of charge. Additional Bunk Note credits can be purchased, if desired for $1 each. These can be used to send additional emails from other family members, send emails to other campers or add extras to emails such as puzzles and border art.

Even more exciting is the new Photo Gallery section of the Pecometh Bunk1.com site. As mentioned, we used to sell cabin photos for as much as $5 for an 8 x 10 photo. The Photo Gallery eliminates all that and makes cabin photos, as well as candid photos, available online to camper families at no charge. An access code is provided to the family at check-in so that they can access the password protected Photo Gallery. Photos can be viewed, and wallet-size images can be downloaded and printed at no cost. Favorite photos can be tagged and friends and family can be invited via email to view them. Photos can even be inserted in a Bunk Notes email and sent to a camper.

If desired, high-quality prints can be purchased for about the same price as Pecometh was charging for a cabin photo. In addition, specialty items such as coffee mugs and t-shirts can be purchased with a favorite photo imprint. We think this is truly a win-win for Pecometh and our camper families. No more wasted photo paper, more photos to choose from and families only pay for something they really want.

Now…full disclosure time. Pecometh paid a significant fee so these services would be available to our camper families without necessarily having to incur any additional cost. However, if additional Bunk Notes credits, prints or photo gifts are purchased, Pecometh will receive a commission. This will help us recover the cost of providing these services, but is borne only by those who want to purchase products or services. We’re giving it a try and are hoping that it will be a great thing for our camper families.

Looking for Stories

In my travels , I constantly meet people who have had God-inspired, life-changing experiences at Pecometh or Drayton Retreat Center (now closed). Yet, we haven't done a very good job of sharing those as an inspiration to others. So, we're asking for your help. If you've had an experience at Pecometh or Drayton that has truly impacted your life, we'd love to hear about it.  If you'll post it here, we know it will be a blessing to others. Thanks and God bless!

Jack Shitama
Director

No Soda

Well...the time has come. We've finally made to decision to eliminate soda from the list of available canteen items for campers this coming summer. It probably doesn't surprise many people, since there's not of a lot of good one can say (health-wise) about soda. Of course, it tastes great and a lot of kids love it, but camp is also a place where kids have an opportunity to see things differently. They often get a deeper appreciation of creation, a sense of Christian community and the idea that the two are connected. Hopefully, just as we are helping them to see that we are called to care for the world in which we live, we can help them see that we are also called to care for our bodies.

Without making value judgments about what they do at home, we can help them learn to live for a week without soda, just as they live without their PC's, cell phones, ipods, video games, telephones and even air conditioning. Campers will still have options like fruit juice, sports drinks and bottled water. So this is a big step for camp, but one we feel is worth taking.

What do you think?

Elevators

I was talking with a woman in bible study last night. A week ago she had a sinus infection and we were commenting on how we rarely realize how good it feels to be well until after recovering from an illness. The same is true with accessibility. If you've ever had an injury or even an unusually heavy load (e.g. suitcases in an airport) restrict your movement, then you know what I mean. I can't even imagine how it might feel if to have a handicapping condition that is permanent.

This has become a real issue of stewardship and justice for us at Pecometh. We have two retreat houses, each that sleep 36 persons. And, while, most of each facility is laid out at ground level, each has a basement meeting room that is only accessible by an elevator. The problem is, the elevators have been out of commission since before I came to Pecometh in 2000. It turns out that they had broken so many times that repeatedly repairing them was essentially throwing money away. In the meantime, even the parts had become unavailable.

In a lot of cases, the lack of accessibility was not an issue, because groups didn't use the basement meeting room or they didn't have persons with handicapping conditions. Even so, one has to believe that a faith-based operation must consider part of its faithfulness to God to include making sure that all persons feel welcomed and accomodated. To be sure, this is our belief. Yet, financial realities always present a challenge for non-profit operations like Pecometh. When we looked into replacing the elevators, we discovered that it would cost nearly $14,000 apiece to replace the elevators with reliable (and working) units.

Enter Delmarva Walk to Emmaus (WTE). Walk to Emmaus is an intense 3-day spiritual experience. Delmarva WTE hosts these weekends five or six times a year in our retreat houses. Many important weekend experiences take place during chapel services, which occur throughout the weekend in the basement of Grace House, one of the two retreat houses. It became clear that some persons were not able to attend a Walk to Emmaus weekend because the chapel was inaccessible to them.

Earlier this year, the Delmarva WTE Board took a step of faith and voted to ask the WTE community to fund the replacement of the retreat house elevators. The community responded. To date, they have raised nearly $9000--enough that we feel comfortable in committing to replace the Grace House elevator. With a working elevator, chapel services on WTE weekends will be accessible to all, not to mention all the other activities that other retreat groups might hold in the basement.

We signed the contract last Thursday and expect the elevator to be installed within a month. Will many people notice? Many will; many won't. More importantly, those who will be able to experience God-inspired life-changing experiences because they can participate fully in a Walk to Emmaus weekend or a church retreat are the ones who will really notice. I'm grateful to Delmarva WTE for their willingness to partner with us. I know they don't need our thanks because I know they did what they did for the same reason Pecometh exists, to serve others. So instead of saying thanks, I'll say "Praise God!" for their faithfulness.

Grace and Peace,

Jack

Next Summer Already?

It's the first day of Fall 2006 and already we're planning for Summer 2007. In fact, we're already coming up against an October 1 deadline to get our brochure information together. It's funny because people often wonder what we do after summer camp is over, but one year literally does run into another.

As we look to 2007, here are some of the major changes we're planning:

• Moving Mini-Camp to week 2, which is the week before July 4th week. We're doing this because Mini-Camp is very labor intensive. Because we are caring for very young children (1-3 grade), we cut the camper/staff ratio in half, from 8-1 to 4-1 for the Mini-Camp program. This means it takes twice as many counselors to run this program for 96 campers. We had to balance this against the fact that the weeks after July 4th week are the busiest weeks for the summer. That is, more families want to send their children to camp during July and August. Ultimately, we decided that since Mini-Camp is really a "starter" program, we could ask those campers to come earlier in the summer, so that we could serve more of our week-long campers during the heart of the summer. We'll see if it works out.
• Increasing the number of Splashdown spaces by 88 over the course of the summer. This is really a no-brainer. Splashdown is, by far, our most popular program. It's always hard to have to tell a parent that it's filled and their child has to choose another program. This will allow more campers to avoid that disappointment.
• Minimizing retreat house use. We've actually reduced the number of programs, overall, so that we can limit the number of times we use the retreat houses. These facilities are just too far away from the rest of camp. In addition, the layout of the buildings makes good supervision of campers too difficult.

How will all this work? We'll find out next summer. The important thing is that keep doing everything possible to improve our programs and accommodate as many campers as possible in their first choice. We're always trying.

Summer Staff

We've completed another summer and we know that besides all the fun that our campers had, there were countless life-changing experiences. We know that even though having great facilities and exciting programs are essential, the camper experience is most influenced by the quality of the summer staff.

We were really pleased with the staff we had this summer. Time and time again, I witnessed staffers really ENGAGED with campers. Whether this was paying attention to a need, teaching a skill, sharing a laugh or singing a silly song, I realized these little moments are what make the Pecometh experience memorable for campers and staff alike.

Even more impressive was the attitude I witnessed the last few weeks of the summer. In years past, it was not unusual for a large percentage of the staff to lose their enthusiasm near the end of the summer. This is especially disappointing because it doesn't matter when a camper comes, she or he is still expecting to have a great time and expects staff members who are really excited to be there. This year was the best year ever. Even in the last week, our staffers were just as dialed in, just as engaged as they were in week one.

I believe this is because so many of our staff were here because of the ministry opportunity. While we don't pay a lot of money, there are times when a staffer is here for the wrong reasons...to get out of the house for the summer, to be with friends and even for the money. Yet, when a young adult is here for the right reasons, it makes all the difference. That's when a counselor can manage a smile or a laugh even when she's dead-tired. Or when a support staff person takes a moment from his assigned task to help a camper.

I'm grateful for the team we had here this summer. I know there were times when a staff person here or there did not meet this high standard. However, I think there were so many people "in ministry" on our summer staff, that our campers really had the opportunity for God-inspired life-changing experiences.