The song for summer 2023 is called “This is Where the Adventure Begins” and we can’t wait for our Session 2 campers to arrive and start on an amazing camp adventure. Summer 2023 will include a combination of new adventures, camp-wide hallmark programs and the return of some old camp traditions.

As we celebrate 36 summers at camp, we will be bringing back some former camp songs and traditions. Our CITs have created a Seudah shlishit program based on an “old camp” tradition. On Shabbat, after our Shabboptions (a chance for everyone to pick among several creative Shabbat electives) and a music-filled T’fila (services), we have an afternoon of free time, swimming, playing sports or exploring elements at the ropes course. At the end of the Chofesh (free time) block, we gather for a special Shabbat treat. We learned from talking to former Capital Camp leaders that there used to be creative programming to accompany this special afternoon snack. We have named the new version of this program Seudah shlishit since it comes at the time of day when traditionally families gather for a third meal. Our CITs now do a short creative presentation of the week’s Parsha followed by some intriguing questions and yummy cupcakes.  

We added some new adventures and brought back some fan favorites. We have two new lake toys for campers to explore and we have added pickleball to our sports program. Our Kaufmann campers will once again have the opportunity to go on an out-of-camp adventure which will include white water rafting. Our Macks campers will be traveling to ACE and our Benjamin and Reich campers are planning on having a campout at the lake. Our Benjamin campers will once again have the chance to make challah for Shabbat dinner and Benjamin, Reich, and Kaufmann Village will each have an opportunity to contribute to Shabbat services. 

Of course, we have all our camp-wide hallmark programs planned such as SING, carnival, and Maccabiah. We have a great staff who are looking forward to welcoming all our Second Session campers. Our sports, arts, aquatic, and outdoor adventure team have fun daily activities planned. Our cabin counselors have created both silly and meaningful village and evening programs. We are ready for a session full of fun and friendship. Let the adventure begin!

Shabbat Shalom,

Lisa Handelman

Camp Director

Every summer we rely on a deep partnership with you as parents and guardians. Before camp, you filled out forms, labeled clothes, and helped prepare your child for the transition to camp. Thank you for trusting us to care for your children. This session our campers had tons of fun, learned new skills, made new friends, strengthened existing relationships, and grew as individuals and as a community. Now that the session is coming to an end, we look again to partner with you as your camper adjusts to home life and routines. This can be emotionally and/or physically challenging; some campers will show signs of a post-camp phenomenon aptly named ‘camp sickness’. Campers may express a range of conflicting emotions, happy to be home but missing camp. 

Here are some suggestions to help ease the transition back to home life:

• Listen to your children and ask them open-ended questions about their time at camp. Encourage your child to relive the experiences through storytelling. This can provide an entry into learning all about their summer. Help your camper ease back into the world of technology. Racing back to screens instead of taking the time to readjust can be a shock to the system after spending the past few weeks unplugged. 
• Don’t take it personally if your campers may prefer to be holed up in their rooms, on social media, connecting with their camp friends, and want very little to do with you for a few days. Hang in there and don’t feel rejected. They’ll come around!
• Learn to connect with the “new” child in front of you and accept/recognize the changes that they have gone through. Your camper may look taller, tanner, or just more grown up than when they left for camp. It’s amazing what a few weeks can do. Aside from the physical changes, you may see that your child has developed emotionally as well. They have probably gained some confidence and independence while at camp. They’re made new friends, tried new activities, and figured it all out themselves—that’s a good thing!
• Ease into enforcing home rules and routines. At camp, your child was far more independent. Transitioning back to the “real world” will require time and patience. 
• Don’t jump to conclusions. Many of our campers like to stay up later on the last night of camp in an attempt to make the magic of camp last a little bit longer. They may arrive home in need of a good shower, a nap, and a good meal. Also, your child may share some negative experiences from camp or even view the whole experience as just “good” or “ok”. Listen to your child, ask questions, and with time, a more accurate and actionable perspective will likely emerge. 
• Encourage your child to connect with friends from both home and camp. When campers return home, they are often thinking about how much they already miss camp friends. Encourage your camper to stay connected and consider creating opportunities to get together, but remind your camper that there are great friends at home, too. 
• Luggage and clothing require parental attention. Just like returning from a vacation, it is best to unpack luggage in a garage or mudroom. Wash all clothing including items that were not worn. 
• As always, thank you for partnering with the CCRC team. Your collaboration with us is invaluable in making these pre and post-camp transitions as seamless as possible!

Adina, Caryn, Lauren, & Michelle

Session 1 Yoetzot

Today, we want to take a moment to celebrate the incredible impact camp is making on the larger Jewish community. Beyond providing a fun-filled environment for our youth, Capital Camps & Retreat Center proves to be an invaluable pipeline for cultivating the leaders of tomorrow.

In recent years, Jewish summer camps have emerged as powerful incubators for personal growth, Jewish identity development, and leadership skills. By blending Jewish values, culture, and traditions with engaging activities and a supportive environment, Capital Camps fosters a unique sense of belonging and pride in our campers and staff.

So, what is it about the Jewish summer camp experience that fuels this leadership pipeline? Here are a few key factors:

1. Nurturing Jewish Identity: Jewish summer camps offer a space where young campers can explore and strengthen their Jewish identity. Through meaningful rituals, Shabbat celebrations, Jewish learning, and engaging discussions, campers and staff develop a deep connection to our heritage and traditions. This foundation serves as a bedrock for future Jewish leaders who can carry our values and principles into the wider world.
2. Strong Community Bonds: Campers forge lasting friendships and develop a strong sense of community at CCRC. The bonds created in our inclusive and supportive community empower campers to collaborate, communicate, and engage in collective decision-making. These interpersonal skills are vital for effective leadership, and the connections made at camp extend well beyond the summer, forming a network of future leaders.
3. Experiential Learning: The immersive nature of Camp provides campers and staff with opportunities for experiential learning. They engage in hands-on activities, outdoor adventures, and team-building exercises that promote problem-solving, critical thinking, and decision-making. These experiences cultivate leadership qualities such as resilience, adaptability, and a willingness to take initiative.
4. Mentorship and Role Models: Capital Camps is fortunate to include a dedicated team of counselors, educators, and staff members who serve as role models and mentors for our young campers and teens. These individuals exemplify leadership qualities through their guidance, encouragement, and support. By witnessing these role models in action, campers and staff learn valuable lessons about leadership and develop a vision of what they can aspire to become.

The impact of the Capital Camps’ experience on our local communities is undeniable. Many of today’s Jewish leaders, including professionals, philanthropists, and communal activists, trace their journey back to their transformative camp experiences. As we invest in the success of Camp, we invest in the future leaders who will shape and guide our community.

At Capital Camps & Retreat Center, we are proud to collaborate with our local community partners that recognize the profound role in creating a pipeline to tomorrow’s leaders through the Capital Camps experience. I encourage you to help us explain the power of our work together to your friends, family, and the broader community, by spreading awareness about the invaluable impact Camp has on our youth and specifically your own children.  

Let us celebrate and cherish Capital Camps as a catalyst for developing passionate, empathetic, and resilient leaders who will steer our community toward a vibrant and meaningful future.

Wishing you a joyous summer and looking forward to witnessing the continued growth of our remarkable young leaders.



Warm regards,

Havi Goldscher

CEO, Capital Camps & Retreat Center

As everyone gathers in the amphitheater at Capital Camps for Maccabiah, the energy is palpable. Maccabiah brings everyone in the camp community together for 2 days of spirited, friendly competition. From sports and aquatics to skits and banners, there is something for everyone to do to contribute to their team. The value and meaning of Maccabiah goes far beyond the fun and games. The camaraderie built and leadership opportunities for campers and counselors cannot be underestimated. Maccabiah offers the chance to campers and counselors to be with people outside their normal cabin or village group and make new friends.

For each cabin, the counselors choose one spirit leader, resulting in 2 spirit leaders from each village per team during Maccabiah. This is an incredible honor for the campers and a role that counselors choose carefully. They look to recognize one of their campers and help their cabinmates cheer them on in this role as well. For many campers, it is the first leadership role they may have at camp or in their lives! 

Outside of Maccabiah, our staff makes campers feel special every day. The bond between campers and staff is special and meaningful, and our counselors take their duty as role models for campers seriously. I love to hear from counselors about their campers—who makes them laugh, who they’ve seen grow over the course of the summer, who they’ve seen help out their friends. The sparkle in a counselor’s eye when they tell me about the camper who mastered a new card trick tells me everything I need to know—they are proud of their campers, they are cheering them on, and they want to see them succeed.

The end of Session 1 is already approaching, and as your campers’ time winds down, please consider making a contribution to our staff appreciation campaign. Your gift to Capital Camps will support our staff engagement and training efforts that are vital to providing an incredible experience for your camper. You also have the opportunity to share a message with the staff to tell them what impact they’ve had on your child. 

As you follow along with Maccabiah and the last few days of camp, I hope you’ll see what is behind those smiling faces: growth, leadership, friendships, and new experiences. Our staff facilitates these adventures for our campers, and we’re so appreciative of their hard work and dedication.

Samantha Sisisky

Development Director 

The final stretch of camp is full of excitement! Every day is a new adventure, and the best part is that most of this time is spent together as a full camp community. 

This past week, on Thursday evening, all of camp was a buzz preparing and coordinating outfits for the most lyrically Ludacris night of camp, SING. For days, campers of all ages worked hard to rewrite songs with camp-specific lyrics and practiced their songs to perform in front of camp. Each year, campers and staff reminisce about their favorite SING songs from past years and how they can create a memorable performance. While Session 1 provided great performances and tough competition, the CITs emerged as the victors and they got to add their name to the plaque noting each winner of SING. And if you are wondering how the CITs intend to celebrate their success, I can assure you these 7-week campers have their sights set on hoisting the plaque again for Session 2 SING.

Right at this very second at camp, it’s Avengers-accabiah! The CITs/Summer 2023 Session 1 SING Champions announced to all of camp the start of our Maccabiah/Color War competition today! Throughout today and tomorrow, each camper will compete in a variety of competitions to earn points for their team and after all the competition is completed, the plaques created by campers for this year’s theme will hang in Habima with all the other Maccabiah plaques from prior years, officially becoming part of Capital Camps history.  

Tuesday evening, Maccabiah will come to a conclusion and a winner will be announced. By Wednesday morning, camp will return to normal but with a different energy. We will get to enjoy watching this summer’s Camp Show and the special dinner of Banquet planned by our 9th graders in Kaufmann Village.

Each summer and each session we get to enjoy these special all-camp events. What I enjoy the most is the ruach, or energy, campers bring to these competitions. Whether they are cheering for their village during SING, their team for Maccabiah, or cabin-mates for the Camp Show, when all of camp comes together for these special programs, a special energy comes along.

For the campers and staff that have been coming to camp for many years, these special events always bring back the memories and joy from past summers. And for campers at CCRC for their first summer, they get the best experience of all – the excitement, surprise, and ruach all for the very first time.

Austin Theis

Assistant Camp Director

At camp, we explore creativity through a number of avenues. Sing, programming, Chug, village times. All of the different activities are what makes going back to camp so exciting and fresh every summer! 

Allowing counselors the freedom to create age-appropriate Chugim and evening programs, is what makes camp so unique. The creativity that comes from counselors in this regard is really something special. From crocheting to improv, and even a Mystery Chug where the activity is different each and every day, our counselors come up with it all. I am equally impressed by the work put into seemingly “typical” activities like soccer or basketball. Our Sports Specialists work incredibly hard to make each day of these Chugs unique through a wide variety of sports drills and games. 

Creativity extends beyond the core of our programming initiatives. Our staff members craft a variety of activities ranging from exciting and energetic scavenger hunts to memorable and meaningful activities exploring identity and community. For these to happen, we ask our staff to be creative. How can we extend our activities to the next level? How can we maximize engagement? How can we ensure all campers are included? For these questions to be answered, our staff think outside the box. Benjamin Village hosted its own game show this past week. Rather than just execute a simple program, our staff constructed decorations, created puzzling challenges for the campers, incorporated a theme, and developed a more advanced structure for the activity. Finding ways to heighten camp through creativity allows us a space to not just care for children, but to also engage them throughout their session at camp.

Creativity is one of our most treasured traits at camp as not only does it allow for each summer to be individually special, but it is what creates some of the core memories our campers take with them throughout their lives. Having our counselors express their own identities and personalities through all different activities and programs is what allows our campers to feel safe and secure in the knowledge that camp is one of the places they can be 100% their true selves. It creates a safe space for campers to get silly and have the most fun!

Jen Humphreys

Staff Engagement Coordinator

This week’s Torah portion is a double parasha, Matot-Masei. Matot means “tribes, and Masei means “journeys.” The reading mentions 42 different stages in the journey of the new Jewish nation from Egypt to the land of Israel. As Rabbi Jonathan Sacks wrote “They set out from X and camped at Y. They set out from Y and camped at Z” – 42 stages in a journey of forty years.” In any journey, setting out, encamping, walking, and resting are all important. 

As we head into our final Shabbat of Session 1, we will reflect on the countless adventures we shared together. The days are full of activities from the farm and the lake to the sports courts and drama, singing, rikkud (Israeli dancing) and so much more. Camp is also filled with quiet moments. As two Reich campers share a story while walking up the hill or Benjamin campers watch the sunset together from the beach at the lake after an evening program, unforgettable memories are made. We need these quiet still moments, these “encampments” to refuel and recharge.

Each village’s “Sing Songs” included moments where campers sang out loud while dancing or clapping and more quiet reflective verses sung while sitting with arms around a peer. The winning song created and performed by our CITs beautifully described both this year’s journey while also reflecting on the group’s multi-year journey from Benjamin to Reich, Kaufmann, Macks, LIT, and now CIT. They sang about their trip to Richmond and a competitive game of Capture the Flag against Macks Village. They sang about growing up at camp “from the Macks tents to the Reich hill” and moving from the Yurts to the Leadership Center. They sang about this being “the summer of our lives”.

Shabbat is a time of pause before heading into a whirlwind of activities for our final week of Session 1. Just as God told Moses to mark down all of the places along the path from Egypt to the land of Israel, so should we contemplate our shared journey and encampments. It has been, and continues to be a terrific summer. 

Shabbat Shalom,

Lisa Handelman

Camp Director

The CCRC Board had the opportunity to hold its annual summer meeting up at camp this past weekend. What a truly wonderful reminder of how special and impactful this Agency is on all of the communities we serve! Our board focuses on long-range strategic planning and high-level initiatives to support our year-round camping and retreating work. Everyone who volunteers their time to the CCRC Board and Committee service does so out of recognition of the meaningful impact that camping and immersive Jewish activities have on individuals – both campers and staff. But being on campus brings it home in ways that a description of what is happening can never do. 

The energy, the palpable joy, the happy noise, the smiling faces – all of your senses are stimulated, and your internal batteries are filled to overflowing. To see and feel the immediate and direct connection between the work of the CCRC Board that day and all of the activities going on around us was incredibly special. 

A personal highlight was the meaningful discussions we held with the CITs. These future leaders of CCRC and all of the communities they come from were truly inspiring. They had just received their cabin and specialty assignments and were excited about the weeks ahead. These 49 young women and men, many of whom have grown up at camp, shared their personal “mission statements”. These statements drove home the fact that they see CCRC as their second home and the place where they can most be their true selves. Walking away from that visit, my Board colleagues and I could not help but feel our work is holy and impactful. The future is incredibly bright.  

Brad Stillman

Capital Camps & Retreat Center, Board Chair

Our radically integrated approach to Jewish life and learning at Capital Camps allows us to weave Judaism into everything we do here. One of our new programmatic initiatives this year is creating moments of intentional Jewish engagement called “Pop-ups.” They exist as a way for us as the J-life team to have quick experiences for campers and staff to engage directly with their identity, Jewish history, and Middot, the values that ground all of our work this summer and beyond. All of this happens on the walk from the plaza to the Chader Ohel (Dining Hall) Over the past two weeks, we have already had 100’s of folks interact with these Pop-Up programs. During these short interactions, we have seen moments of pure happiness and engaged in meaningful conversations about Judaism. Earlier this week, our community was asked, “Which Middah are you working on this summer?” Campers & staff alike took a moment to reflect on their summer so far and chose a specific intention to complete an already incredible session. As the last camper entered lunch, we were left with a beautiful tapestry that took just a moment of people’s time but represented the thoroughness of Jewish Life at Capital Camps and the power of shining a spotlight on the little things in life.  This is just one example of the everyday moments entrenched in Judaism this summer. Earlier in the session, Benjamin Campers worked on a “Chesed (Kindness) Siddur.” Each camper created a prayer, picture, or poem that will help our youngest campers to help strive for kindness and acceptance. The campers learned what it means to have a blessing and what it looks like to create their own. The hope is that beyond this Siddur and our Pop-ups, our community will benefit from an increase in joy and kindness, as we continue these meaningful moments and conversations.  Larry Ginsburg Senior Jewish Educator

As the summer sun illuminates our campus, we find ourselves immersed in the joy and adventure of the camp season. At Capital Camps, we not only focus on creating unforgettable memories but also on fostering the holistic well-being of our campers. Transitions are an inherent part of life, and for our young campers, they can be exciting yet challenging. Whether it’s transitioning from home to camp, moving between activities, or adapting to new friendships, these moments shape their camp experience. At Capital Camps, we strive to provide a nurturing environment that helps our campers navigate these transitions with confidence and resilience. We are especially thinking about these moments of transition as we say lehitraot (see you soon) to our Rookie Bet campers and welcome in our Mini B campers.

Camp is an ideal setting for fostering emotional resilience in our campers. Through a variety of activities and experiences, they learn to embrace change, manage their emotions, and develop the skills necessary to adapt to new situations. Our caring staff members are trained to support campers in their transition process, offering guidance, encouragement, and a safe space to express their feelings.

Transitions can sometimes bring about feelings of uncertainty and isolation. To counteract this, we prioritize building a strong sense of community at camp. We encourage campers to forge connections with their peers, participate in team-building exercises, and engage in group activities that promote inclusivity and cooperation. By fostering a supportive and inclusive environment, we ensure that no camper feels alone during their transition to or from camp.

At CCRC, we believe that transitions are transformative moments that shape the lives of our campers. By nurturing their emotional resilience, fostering a sense of belonging, and promoting mental wellness, we guide them through the transitions they face at camp and beyond. Together, let us empower our campers to embrace change, grow in confidence, and create lasting memories.

Adina Golob, LMSW

Community Care Coordinator