Connectedness as a Predictor of Academic and Youth Development Outcomes at a Summer Day Camp for Low-Income Youth
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.18666/JPRA-2020-10749Keywords:
connectedness, day camp, low-income youth, youth developmentAbstract
Organized camp programs impacted over 10 million youth in the United States in 2019 (American Camp Association, 2019). While residential camp programs have shown ample evidence of their potential to produce opportunities for growth and learning (Garst et al., 2011; Wilson et al., 2019), less is known about the benefits of summer day camp programs. Day camp programs have the potential to serve a more diverse group of campers than residential camps (Kimmelman, 2011), and have become popular formats for summer programs designed to enhance academic skills and prevent summer learning loss. This study sought to understand the factors that influenced self-perceptions of academic attitudes and positive youth development at a summer day camp program offering academic and recreational activities for economically vulnerable fourth to ninth graders (n=240). Specifically, the study was interested in the role that camp connectedness played in influencing perceptions of outcomes (Sibthorp et al., 2011). The study found that campers who participated in a summer day camp program reported that their interest in academic subjects increased over the course of the camp. Campers who had higher levels of connectedness to camp reported significantly stronger academic and youth development outcomes than those who had lower levels of connectedness. The study also found no significant differences in connectedness based on camper characteristics such as gender, age, race, ethnicity, school attended, or language spoken at home, suggesting that these variables were not salient in whether a camper felt connected to camp. These findings provide implications for the design and delivery of academically focused day camp programs to enhance feelings of connectedness, including the importance of using an intentional curriculum, offering a variety of academic and recreational activities, employing trained educators and youth development specialists, and being mindful of class and group sizes.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Sagamore Publishing LLC (hereinafter the “Copyright Owner”)
Journal Publishing Copyright Agreement for Authors
PLEASE REVIEW OUR POLICIES AND THE PUBLISHING AGREEMENT, AND INDICATE YOUR ACCEPTANCE OF THE TERMS BY CHECKING THE ‘AGREE TO THE TERMS OF THIS COPYRIGHT NOTICE’ CHECKBOX BELOW.
I understand that by submitting an article to Journal of Park and Recreation Administration, I am granting the copyright to the article submitted for consideration for publication in Journal of Park and Recreation Administration to the Copyright Owner. If after consideration of the Editor of the Journal of Park and Recreation Administration, the article is not accepted for publication, all copyright covered under this agreement will be automatically returned to the Author(s).
THE PUBLISHING AGREEMENT
Assignment of Copyright
I hereby assign to the Copyright Owner the copyright in the manuscript I am submitting in this online procedure and any tables, illustrations or other material submitted for publication as part of the manuscript in all forms and media (whether now known or later developed), throughout the world, in all languages, for the full term of copyright, effective when the article is accepted for publication.
Reversion of Rights
Articles may sometimes be accepted for publication but later be rejected in the publication process, even in some cases after public posting in “Articles in Press” form, in which case all rights will revert to the Author.
Retention of Rights for Scholarly Purposes
I understand that I retain or am hereby granted the Retained Rights. The Retained Rights include the right to use the Preprint, Accepted Manuscript, and the Published Journal Article for Personal Use and Internal Institutional Use.
All journal material is under a 12 month embargo. Authors who would like to have their articles available as open access should contact gbates@sagamorepub.com for further information.
In the case of the Accepted Manuscript and the Published Journal Article, the Retained Rights exclude Commercial Use, other than use by the author in a subsequent compilation of the author’s works or to extend the Article to book length form or re-use by the author of portions or excerpts in other works.
Published Journal Article: the author may share a link to the formal publication through the relevant DOI.
Author Representations
- The Article I have submitted to the journal for review is original, has been written by the stated author(s) and has not been published elsewhere.
- The Article was not submitted for review to another journal while under review by this journal and will not be submitted to any other journal.
- The Article contains no libelous or other unlawful statements and does not contain any materials that violate any personal or proprietary rights of any other person or entity.
- I have obtained written permission from copyright owners for any excerpts from copyrighted works that are included and have credited the sources in the Article.
- If the Article was prepared jointly with other authors, I have informed the co-author(s) of the terms of this Journal Publishing Agreement and that I am signing on their behalf as their agent, and I am authorized to do so.