Summer camp: Mutual learning

MIAMI | At the Mary and the Saints summer camp, the learning is mutual: The campers are learning from their teachers and the teachers � high school teens and young adult volunteers � are learning from the campers.

�It�s a great opportunity to meet kids from other cultures,� said Brittany Samuelson, 23, a teacher at St. Mary�s School in Pontiac, Ill.

Samuelson is a member of the John Paul II Catholic Neumann Center at Illinois State University, which is located in the Archdiocese of Peoria. This is the second year St. Mary Cathedral School hosts the camp, and the second year the center�s members have served there. Last year, the camp lasted only a week.

�The camp was so successful last year that we extended it to a month,� said Sister Michelle Fernandez, principal of the cathedral school.

Sister Michelle and Sister Silvia Tarafa, the Neumann Center�s director, came up with the camp idea. Both are Servants of the Pierced Hearts of Jesus and Mary. Sister Silvia previously worked in campus ministry in Miami.

�Throughout the day the kids participate in math, science, English, crafts, music and sports, all with a focus on religion and on having fun,� said Sister Michelle.

A different group of volunteers led about 70 elementary and middle-school students each week at the camp. Members of the Neumann Center led off, followed by students from Archbishop Curley-Notre Dame Prep in Miami, Peoria Notre Dame High School and Archbishop Edward A. McCarthy High School in Southwest Ranches.

Samuelson enjoyed the camp so much that she and Molly McLowry stayed on to work after their group returned to Illinois.

Father Adam Stimpson, chaplain at Peoria Notre Dame High School, said the camp is a good bonding experience. Teachers at the Illinois school belong to the same order as Sister Michelle and Sister Silvia.

�I think it�s a great opportunity to meet other cultures,� he said. �And bond by faith.�