This guest post is from Dr. Christopher Thurber. Dr. Thurber is a board-certified clinical psychologist, father and author of The Summer Camp Handbook, now available online for free at SummerCampHandbook.com. He is the co-creator of ExpertOnlineTraining.com, a set of Internet-based-video training modules for camp counselors, nurses and doctors. He can be reached via e-mail at chris AT campspirit.com. This was originally posted here and has been re-posted on the Bunk1 Buzz with Dr. Thurber’s permission.
Dear Mr. or Mrs. Camp Director,
Does your camp subscribe to a one-way e-mail service, whereby parents can write to their kids via the Internet?
Well, don’t get me started expounding on the virtues of a carefully handwritten letter.
For more on that, listen to my podcast on the topic here: http://www.campspirit.com/mp3/Letters_Home_10.mp3
For those of you who embrace e-mail services in lieu of handwritten letters, we can still be friends.
But for goodness sake, please coach your camp parents on the best way to write an e-mail. Remind them that their son or daughter is not a work colleague, sitting in the cubicle next to them.
A loving e-mail from home should not read like an inter-office memo about the air conditioner requisition form that you botched.
It should be thoughtful, grammatical and–most of all–personal.
I’ve attached a handout I hope you’ll share with your camp parents this summer. It’s a turnkey solution for 21st century brevity and the blight of acronyms.
Please distribute it widely, in the hopes that 2012 will bring more carefully written e-mails from moms and dads everywhere.
Dr. Christopher Thurber is a board-certified clinical psychologist, father and author of The Summer Camp Handbook, now available online for free at SummerCampHandbook.com. He is the co-creator of ExpertOnlineTraining.com, a set of Internet-based-video training modules for camp counselors, nurses and doctors. He can be reached via e-mail at chris AT campspirit.com.
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