Every January, the same thing happens. Camps everywhere post their counselor and specialist openings within the same week, job boards fill up overnight, and suddenly every camp is fishing in the same small pond at the same time.
It feels like a fact of camp life, something that just happens every year. It isn’t. It’s a habit camps keep recreating, and it’s one you can step out of.
Recruitment doesn’t actually start in January. For most camps, it started back in the summer, with an informal ask to your strongest counselors before they packed up, or a check-in sometime in the fall. Fall isn’t about starting from zero. It’s about tightening up the loose ends from that head start before the market gets crowded and everyone’s attention gets split fifty ways.
Here’s what’s actually worth doing this fall.
1. Capture last summer’s training gaps while they’re still fresh
September’s staff evaluations and exit conversations are where camps learn what really fell short in training: which module missed the mark, where a specialist role needed something the training never covered, what a returning counselor wishes they’d known in week one.
That feedback has a short shelf life. Wait until March, when training curriculum work actually happens, and you’re reconstructing it from memory instead of working from real notes. Write it down now, while it’s fresh, so the person building next season’s training has something honest to build from.
2. Lock in compensation and offer terms before you keep asking
If your budget conversations happen in the fall, and for most camps they do, get pay and offer terms settled before you make more asks. Nothing stalls a soft yes faster than “I’ll get back to you on the number,” especially once a candidate’s other options start showing up with a figure attached.
This isn’t about racing to be the highest bidder. It’s about not asking someone to commit to a decision you haven’t actually finished making.
3. Use your referral network to fill what’s still open, not to start from scratch
For camps that get ahead of it, most of the roster is usually set by November. What’s usually left are a handful of specific gaps: a specialist role nobody’s filled yet, a cabin that needs one more counselor. Asking alumni to help with recruitment, and paying current staff for referrals, works especially well here because you’re not casting a wide net, you’re asking people who already know your camp to think of one specific person for one specific opening. That’s a much easier ask to make, and a much easier one to say yes to.
Small now, easier later
The camps that feel calm heading into the new year usually aren’t doing less work, they’re just doing it earlier, while there’s still room to do it without a deadline breathing down their neck. Pick whichever of these is furthest behind and get it done before the holidays take over your calendar. Future January you will be glad you did.
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