Rapid return to normal activities at a residential summer camp during the COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

Aim Infection prevention and control (IPC) within residential settings is a central focus of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Youth residential summer camps are an excellent model for such environments and have thus far had mixed results. The aim of this report was to describe the successful implementation of a seven-week overnight summer camp with rapid return to normal activities from June to August 2020. Subjects and methods This retrospective study included 427 individuals who traveled from 24 US states. All staff and campers were tested by serial nasopharyngeal PCR tests in the context of strict infection prevention and control (IPC) measures, including cohorts and masking. The entire camp population was isolated from non-camp personnel with special measures for food, supply, and mail delivery. Results During the two-week staff session, one staff member tested positive for SARS-CoV-2, was isolated, and sent safely off premises. All other campers and staff had three negative PCR tests: 1–8 days before arrival, upon arrival, and 5–6 days after arrival. After these three negative tests, 6 days into camp, most IPCs, including masking, were successfully lifted and a normal camp experience was possible. Conclusions These findings indicate that serial PCR-based testing and strict adherence to IPC measures among cohorts can allow for successful assumption of near normal group activities in a residential setting during the COVID-19 pandemic. This result at an overnight summer camp has broad implications for similar residential communities such as boarding schools, other youth education and development programs, as well as nursing homes and military installations.

Service quality, satisfaction and behavioural intentions in sport child camps: participants and parents' perspectives

“…From a managerial point of view, this result suggests that sport camp managers must continue to prevent service failures and work on service recovery immediately when such circumstances occur. Likewise, Food and Safety influence participants' satisfaction, providing empirical support to previous studies on sport child camps (Klunk et al, 2021). On one hand, Food is a complementary service that adds value to the core service (Mart ın et al, 2011), playing special attention in sport child camps (Kennedy et al, 2017).…”

“…Considering that parents often value event organization (Lehto et al, 2020), the inclusion of related attributes when measuring SQ in sport child camps should be considered. Similarly, previous literature highlights the importance of IJSMS 25,1 attributes such as opportunities to have fun (Barlas et al, 2011;Baker et al, 2019), quality and variety of food (Costa et al, 2004;Lehto et al, 2020), Rules (Chavez et al, 2014), communication of the events (Costa et al, 2004;Lehto et al, 2020) and the sense of safety (Klunk et al, 2021;Omelan et al, 2018) as important features of the overall SQ in sport child camps.…”

“…Considering that parents often value event organization (Lehto et al, 2020), the inclusion of related attributes when measuring SQ in sport child camps should be considered. Similarly, previous literature highlights the importance of Consumer perspectives of sport child camps attributes such as opportunities to have fun (Barlas et al, 2011;Baker et al, 2019), quality and variety of food (Costa et al, 2004;Lehto et al, 2020), Rules (Chavez et al, 2014), communication of the events (Costa et al, 2004;Lehto et al, 2020) and the sense of safety (Klunk et al, 2021;Omelan et al, 2018) as important features of the overall SQ in sport child camps. Despite the general agreement that multi-dimensional models are crucial for measuring SQ (Biscaia et al, 2021), there is a dearth of research on the dimensionality of SQ in sport child camps, particularly when considering the perceptions of both parents and participants and its effects on subsequent responses among these two groups.…”

“…Additionally, items to measure fun (three), food (five), rules (three), and safety (seven) were designed based on previous literature highlighting these aspects in sport child camps (e.g. Lehto et al, 2020;Klunk et al, 2021) and an open questionnaire to understand which camp features that were missing from the initial scale (details below).…”

“…, 2020), Rules (Chavez et al ., 2014), communication of the events (Costa et al ., 2004; Lehto et al. , 2020) and the sense of safety (Klunk et al ., 2021; Omelan et al ., 2018) as important features of the overall SQ in sport child camps.…”