Director Jud's Blog

My name is Chris Applegate A.K.A. "Crapplegate" and I was a counselor at SMA

Summer Camp in the glorious summer of 2012.   The Summer that I spent at on the farm at camp permanently altered the direction of my life.  After spending 7 glorious (and crazy) weeks doing awesome activities everyday and and living the "SMA Camp Lifestyle" I decided I wanted to find a way to make a difference in kids lives everyday.  That decision lead me to go back to college and become a high school physics teach at Moore Traditional High School in Louisville, Kentucky!

Being a high school physics teacher is not like being at Stone Mountain Adventures, but it has it's rewarding moments for sure. There was this one weekend last spring when I helped lead the Senior Camping Trip. We too our students to Camp Piomingo in Otter Creek Sate Park out here in KY. Everything was going okay, however there was an conflict between 2 male students that turned physical and needed to be resolved.

There were four teachers on the trio and one was just visiting for a short while (luckily) and all four of us were talking to the kids individually. Well in total it took about 4-5 hours to get things situated and in that time our other teacher had to leave and I had all the other campers - about 32.

At around 9:00 I took them back to camp, to get ready for this night hike that they were all really pumped for. Of course we couldn't go until the other business was taken care of. We got the fire going and after about a half hour I look around and about every other person is on their cell phone. Energy was really starting to go down.

This really bummed me out, but I figured, "hey they're bored." So I started off by telling some "Stupid Crapplegate" stories from SMA Teen Camp (as in setting the lake on fire and almost sinking the boat). After a few stories I I started to lose them again, the cell phones started coming out and I remembered... camp games!

So I said to them "WHO WANTS TO PLAY SOME CAMP GAMES!" So we spent the next hour or so playing Evolution and Poses (mostly poses). We took a break, the rest of the situation was handled and they were ready for the night hike. 3 hours later than it was originally planned. I think if I hadn't gotten them up and moving, and laughing they would have started going to sleep. It was also very fun to see a bunch of 17-19 year old kids really getting into the games. 

So Stone Mountain Adventures Teen Summer Camp stories and camp games saved the Moore Traditional School Senior Camping Trip! 

Teen Summer Camps

Teen Camp

Teen Summer Camp