Camping, unplugged
Camp Nominingue in the northern Laurentians has been around since 1925, when the closest thing to a cellphone was two empty tomato soup cans connected by a string. Founded by F.M Van Wagner, it is still a familyrun camp that values the outdoor experience for boys ranging in age from 7 to 15. “It’s a rustic environment,” said Elisa Van Wagner, Camp Nominingue’s business manager. “We want kids to appreciate the sounds of nature. Be in the here and now. They wouldn’t be able to do that, plugged into some electronic device or distracted by a cellphone.”
William and Patrick Greiss have been Nominingue regulars for the past four years. Now 13 and 12, respectively, they buy into the no-electronic-device policy without reservation. Karen Greiss, their mother, buys into it as well. “They know they’re going to the great outdoors (when they go to Nominingue),” she said of her sons. “That’s what camp is about. My sons are as connected as any of their friends, but it’s not a huge crutch that they can’t do without at camp.” William has had his own cellphone for more than a year, but has no trouble with the idea of leaving it behind when he begins his three-week session this summer at Nominingue. “There’s always lots of activities and plenty to do,” he said. “I’m not complaining. I can always catch up on emails and texting when I get back.”
Van Wagner and other camp directors agree that for some kids there is actually some form of withdrawal involved when they come to camp for two weeks or more, completely unattached to any electronic device and without Internet access. No wonder, given that a U.S. study by the Kaiser Family Foundation showed that young people 8 to 18 years old spend an average of 7½ hours per day watching TV, using a cellphone or logged in to various forms of social media, music and video games. “We have seen some campers going through a kind of withdrawal at first before they settle in,” Van Wagner said.
Gabrielle Raill, director of Camp Ouareau, a bilingual camp near St. Donat in the Laurentians for girls 6 to 15 years old, has noticed some campers have a kind of glazed look in their eyes during their first few unplugged days at camp. “I get the sense that, for some, there is a kind of detox involved in not having access to an electronic device,” she said. “Their cellphone is like a kind of security blanket. Even the parents have some anxiety over not being able to get in touch with their children.”
Girls, Raill said, tend to be more social than boys, so Camp Ouareau makes sure its programs promote a healthy kind of communication: the good old face-to-face variety. “(Not allowing electronic devices) works for us,” Raill added. “Not being distracted means the girls learn how to deal with their problems on their own.”