Camp provides social, physical development

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This article was published 24/07/2021 (1608 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Summer camp can be crucial for a child’s development, and Neta Aviv knows that well.

Every day at the Rady JCC day camp, her kids Ethan and Alma look forward to playing with their friends and participation in activities such as sports in the gym, art and crafts, and most of all, swimming.

Ethan and Alma both have autism, which for Aviv means it’s even more necessary that they stay active and remain among their friends from school, especially this summer when other services have closed because of the pandemic.

Being able to go to a camp where the kids know their peers and are comfortable with the facility provides them with a needed sense of stability and familiarity.

Aviv knew that being able to send her kids somewhere they could be active and social was a priority.

“There’s not a lot of services during COVID,” she said, “so those things, interacting with real children in real activities, those things were missing from their lives during COVID, even more so than a typical child.”

After searching since March for funds or grants to help send her kids to camp this summer, Aviv finally found the Sunshine Fund, a subsidy that works to help offset the costs of camp for families who need financial assistance.

“They made it easy on me,” says the single mother.

One of the biggest reliefs for Aviv is now that the camp costs are covered, she is able to pay for the individual aids both Ethan and Alma need. She can also make sure that they have private swimming instructors to help them enjoy their favourite part of camp.

The Sunshine Fund also helped her find the perfect day camp for her kids.

Ethan and Alma go to a public school with both Hebrew and English programs during the school year; Sunshine Fund was able to connect Aviv with a Jewish camp so that her kids could stay connected to their friends from school, to their neighbourhood and to the Jewish community.

It’s hard to get the kids to interact with new people, she said.

Thanks to the Sunshine Fund, Ethan will even get to celebrate his sixth birthday in August at camp with his friends.

“It does mean a lot to me to be able to go to a good facility with people they know from their own community,” Aviv says.

Going to summer camp at the Rady JCC helps the kids have fun and develop not only socially, but physically as well. Ethan and Alma both have physical disabilities, so being able to go swimming and to the gym is “like therapy to them,” said Aviv.

Without the help of the Sunshine Fund, Aviv would not have been able to send both Ethan and Alma to camp.

“It’s almost unreachable if you’re a single parent,” she said.

“To give parents like me and their children the ability to enjoy camp life during the summer break is a huge thing.”

gillian.brown@freepress.mb.ca