The thinking of overseas summer camp from an American high school student

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The Asiana plane crash in San Francisco Airport on July 6th led to the deaths of three Chinese middle school students. This tragedy touches my heart deeply. Although the crash was caused by an inexperienced pilot, and it was an incidental event, it does make us ponder upon Chinese parents’ enthusiasm on sending their children aboard for summer vacation.

Normally in early July, when summer vacation just starts, the parents in China are eager to check around all sorts of overseas summer camps for their children. Take the summer camp to USA as an example, according to the Wall Street Journal’s report: in order to attract Chinese children to join summer camps in the States, many universities organized various summer projects. Johns Hopkins University sets up a project specially designed for high IQ students, which attracts many Chinese parents. A suburban Philadelphia summer camp operator said every summer, there will be a large number of Chinese students to participate in their summer camp, accounts for about three-quarters of the total number of the summer camp. Besides these projects, many summer camps are simply just tours in the States. Children to other European countries encountered the same situation.

As a senior high school student, I would say it is time to think rationally on aboard summer camps organized by the schools or many other organization.

I myself once joined a summer camp to London arranged by our school in my sixth grade. To tell the truth, there were not too many memories left for this two weeks of summer camp, which was in fact just a tour for me. In a strange place, I was scared more than curious. It is quite impossible to expect kids at our age to deeply understand the local customs and the meaning of each view spots, not to say to learn a lot and improve English level in two weeks. This summer camp surely did not put on any wonderful influence in my growth. Actually I found all my classmates who ever participated summer camps of this kind have the same feeling now.

Currently overseas summer camp is turning more and more commercialized. However the high cost does not stop parents’ eagerness of sending their children to overseas summer camp. What attract them to do so? Mainly the wrong thoughts put on parents by the schools and the public opinion. They consider the overseas summer camp as the experience of going abroad. They want their children to improve their English proficiency and learn more knowledge quickly. But can these expectations been really achieved?

Most of parents end up with disappointment and no choice but the only thought of “at least my child feels the outside world”, while they are fully aware that there is not much benefit provided to their children by the camp.

In the wrecked plane of San Francisco, those Chinese students were arranged by Jiang Shan Middle School to participate in a summer camp in U.S.A. In this school website, the schedule for this summer camp is still there, and we found it is a very tight schedule. Children were arranged to visit many colleges and scenic spots in California. Following this schedule, children would have to glance over things hurriedly, left with no time or opportunity to obtain serious and real study. I would say this is not a camp, but only a “summer tour”. Nowadays many commercialized summer camps seem to have the same problem.

We certainly cannot say all summer camp are useless. From my point of view, a good summer camp is actually to motivate kids’ potential, develop their interests, or to strengthen their mind and health. Therefore we should ask ourselves, “ Is it a wise choice, or the only choice for children to spend their summer holidays on attending overseas summer camps?”

Obviously, the summer camp is not the only thing to do. There are a lot of activities which are more useful, beneficial, and helpful for kids’ growth. For instance, joining community activities as a volunteer, getting some jobs experience, or even reading a good book.

It is time for parents, schools and the public to introspect what is the best for children’s education.

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