Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Summer camps for kiddo - age cutoff issue

Hi All, with my daughter settelling in 9th grade, we are looking into summer camps now (residential, since our hometown have little to non opportunities we are looking for). We found a few we are interested in and came across the problem due to her age. Since she is two grades skipped she qualifies per her grade level and not per her age. Today we had a conversation with a nice guy over the phone, who is in charge of the camp we are interested in, but he said they are very firm on age cutoff. Everywhere we looked, seems like this is a common theme. This leaves our daughters in very unfortunate situation where she cannot get into programs based on her grade and it doesn’t make any sense to send her to a “kiddy” camps where she will be with her age peers. Did anyone had any luck with situations like that? How did you go about it?

http://www.wolfcollege.com/youth/summer-overnight-camps/

My son had a great experience with this organization. There is a wide mix of ages.

You might look into JHU-CTY's three week Intensive Studies camps. My twice skipped daughter did camps after 9th, 10th, and 11th grades and absolutely loved them. CTY takes kids by grade, not age.

I'm pretty sure there is an upper age limit, but this should not affect your daughter.

Best of luck,
--S.F.

Our DD loves the CTY Intensive Studies programs and I can confirm that CTY do take based on grade as our DD is grade skipped.

Thank you all! I know we have some choices out there with CTY but that camp was the one kiddo was so excited. I was trying to see if there is a way around the age limit. However, they called us back and said they can accommodate her. She is really excited!

Just another second re CTY Intensive Studies program summer camp experiences - that was where my ds met "his people" - honestly where he had the happiest moments of his teens. Although the actual programs were based on grade rather than age, if I recall, the living arrangements in the dorms were somewhat grouped by age and program interest, so a student who is a 13 year old 9th grader, for instance, wouldn't be rooming with a 15 year old 9th grader but would instead be rooming with another 13 year old who might be enrolled in the same course. My experience is a few years old, however, so things might be different now or might vary by campus.

I'll also add that I was a bit concerned when we first considered CTY summer camps because I googled online and found a ton of reviews from students who attended and had many of their first non-academic teen social experiences there (I'll spare you the details, but it was when my ds was still relatively young and I wasn't sure as a parent I was ready for him to experience all of what I read lol!)... but in reality, the social piece of camp was probably worth much much more than the academics for our ds.. even though the Intensive Studies really are that - a lot of intensive academics.

Best wishes,

polarbear

I'll just add another strong recommendation for CTY's summer program. It was the first time my DD14 met kids "like her".

But there are published age limits, and they've removed the uppr grade limit - just grade 7 "and above" - revised in July.

All courses in the Intensive Studies program require Advanced CTY-level scores on designated standardized tests. In addition, students must:
- Have completed at least grade 7 by the time the program begins.
- Be at least 12 years old by June 30 of the program year.
- Not turn 17 years old before September 1 of the program year.

https://cty.jhu.edu/talent/eligibility/summer.html

(the fact that a program year is July 1 - June 30 and the summer programs run from mid-June to late July makes these new guidelines much more confusing.)