My horrible experience at Camp Birchwood for Boys. From the director treating me horribly and firing me for something I haven\’t done to the horrible effects it has had on my life since.

More information: http://horriblebirchwoodforboysexperience.blog.com/2014/03/03/my-horrible-experience-of-camp-birchwood-for-boys/

I was a counselor at Camp Birchwood for Boys in the summer 2013, at the end of my time there the director treated me appallingly and I ended up getting let go for something I didn’t do, There is so much that proves that I hadn’t done anything wrong but on top of that there is so much that most likely shows that the director had known I didn’t do anything wrong and had purposely fired me for something I didn’t do.

I’ll start with how the director told me how I’m a favourite counselor of the campers and that I was doing a great job and from my previous experience of coaching and working with children I could tell I was doing a good job. However my last couple of weeks there the director seemed to have something against me such as being extremely unhappy at me borrowing things such as an adapter for my charger and asking asking for a stamp to send a birthday card home to my sister. He reacted really badly to both.

As for the reason I was let go, the director accused me of shouting, swearing and threatening a camper. The director told me that another camp ‘Wilderness Canoe Base’ had called him up and made these complaints. When in fact no camp had ever made a complaint to the director. The first thing the director said to me on the matter was a LIE!

Also another counselor came up to me and my fellow trip counselor and told us that the homesick camper on the trip was out to get us because we wouldn’t let him go back to camp. This trip was a one-way round canoeing trip with the only way back to camp to keep going forward as my fellow counselor on the trip informed me.

I can fully understand why the homesick camper was unhappy, the camper unhappy his whole time at camp and to be allowed to go on a overnight trip with only one way back to camp I feel was unfair on the camper, especially with the severe thunderstorms during the trip. If I was in charge I would have had the camper sent home as he was miserable during his time at camp.

So there was proof that the homesick camper had lied but that also he accused the other trip counselor of the same thing and yet I was fired while the other counselor kept his job. Also the homesick camper was in the other counselor’s group on the trip and was always in the other counselor’s canoe and tent, so the lies here actually implicate my fellow trip counselor and not myself.

One of the problems on the trip came from a senior leader (CIT camper). We were warned that the senior leader was lazy and liked to cause trouble, yet the director seemed fine with making him a senior leader. This camper was lazy, wouldn’t stop swearing and wouldn’t do as he was told and didn’t like it when we got him to do something and regularly threatened to go to the director when trying to get him to do something. the other counselor on the trip would be able to back this up however after I was fired I found out that the director accused me of something the other counselor did, so whether this would be the case I don’t know.

More proof against this was that as I have mentioned above there was another thing that I was accused of that wasn’t mentioned to me at all before I left and yet was put in the report to CCUSA (the organisation that hired me), and I could guarantee that my fellow trip/cabin counselor could confirm this didn’t happen as well, as it was in fact him who had done this.

The main thing the director accused me of in person was never mentioned in the report to CCUSA and the main thing in the report to CCUSA was never mentioned to me at all and I would have never found out had CCUSA not sent me the report afterwards. In the report the director accused me of forcing a camper to do push-ups and I know for a fact that it was the other counselor who had done this because I witnessed it, after it happened I made sure it never happened again, which it never did.

So the director accused me of one thing and told CCUSA a complete different thing for firing me. Yet even more proof against the director.

Also other proof is that as I’ve previously said the director seemed to have a bit of a problem against me in the end and also my fellow counselor who got blamed for largely the same things as me is STILL working there to this day.

I got sent away with roughly half the wage that I worked up to that day and about a third of the wage I was owed for the my contracted dates.

My life has been severely messed with here, I have been put in debt because of what the director did to me. I have struggled with University. I have basically lost all my motivation and enthusiasm and I have lost all the trust that I had. I don’t trust anyone anymore.

I have received next to no help on this matter. CCUSA would not help me and the most likely reason because they got part of my wage and would have to pay me it pack had they helped me. I cannot take legal action against Camp Birchwood for Boys because I cannot afford to as I am from and live in Scotland so would cost me so much more money than I have to take legal action against them. Although if I was ever able to take legal action against them I believe my name would be cleared as there is so much that proves the director to be in the wrong here.

I have been told that the main reasons that the director could have done this was to use me as a scapegoat for the counselor that had actually forced the camper to do push-ups as this was a returning counselor and that wouldn’t look good on the director.

Also that it could have been because I wouldn’t turn a blind eye to the camp’s infractions. An example being on the regular trips that happened I found myself in a tent with a busted zipper, so the tent wouldn’t close. I put in a complaint about this tent and yet I got the exact same tent 2 weeks later with the same problem, so complained about it again. But on a hiking trip dated July 17 to July 19 that tent was given out again to a fellow counselor and there was severe thunderstorms throughout the whole trip and he told me himself that he had to stay up the whole night to try and keep the door shut, getting himself and his gear soaked in the process. The worst thing of all is that the campers have to sleep in this tent. So therefore I believe this to be proof that the campers health and safety is at risk with the current director in charge as he will not replace broken equipment.

To campers/parents/future counselors, I didn’t expect the director to be the way he was but I felt it was something I could work with and in no way did I expect him to stoop as low as he did in the end. I was in complete shock.

To summarise, With the current director in place, I believe that the campers here will not be safe as the director seems to care way more about himself than he does about the children. I believe that this is definitely not a camp that is guaranteed to keep the campers safe and also most others camps out there will make sure the campers are safe and having more fun as well.

With my experience of the camp and the director of this camp, I believe the staff are not safe here either as what happened to me was horrible and could happen to someone again.