Maine Summer Camps Consider How They Can — And If They Should — Open Their Doors

Slovenski Camps is a co-ed camp perched on the shores of Panther Pond in Raymond. (Slovenski Camps)

For more than 100 years, kids have flocked to summer camps in Maine to play in the woods, swim in a lake, forge new friendships and find a bit of freedom from their lives back home. But the new coronavirus is casting a cloud of uncertainty over how sleepaway camps might operate this summer — if at all.

As camp directors plan for possible scenarios, some parents are holding out hope that this formative experience for kids can be preserved — even during a pandemic.

We’ve all had to adapt to changes prompted by the new coronavirus — wearing masks, quarantines, physical distancing — but how might these changes apply to summer camps?

That is something that is cycling through many camp director’s minds, including Peter Slovenski, as he walks on a wooded path on the grounds of Slovenski Camps. It is a co-ed camp perched on the shores of Panther Pond in Raymond. The trail ends at a grassy athletic field.

“This is our field, and we play a lot of great games out here, but social distancing would be really tough in the field games. We have capture the flag where we run and tag kids, and I guess if you get within six feet of a kid you’re tagged?”

How to run field games while maintaining social distancing is one of the countless questions that Slovenski asks himself as he considers Gov. Janet Mills’ four-stage plan to reopen the economy.

Read the rest of this story at Maine Public’s website.