FAQ for French Camp Closure

It is with deep sadness that we tell you that Canoe Island French Camp will not open for the summer of 2020.

Camp is about connection and bringing people together. This summer, the local health department as well as CIFC’s concern for public health and our community’s health prevents us from coming together. While that is heartbreaking to say, we feel that this is the best decision to protect campers, staff, the San Juan Island community, and the broader communities to which we all belong.

We expect you may have some questions CIFC’s closure for the summer of 2020. We have tried to anticipate your questions and to provide answers to here.

Will you refund my camper’s tuition?
What about registration for next summer?
What about campers who are aging out of French Camp?
What about financial aid awards from this summer?
Will you have sessions later in the summer?
Do you plan to offer some sort of virtual camp experience?
What will the year-round staff be working on this summer?
Could I speak with one of the directors on the phone?
What steps is CIFC taking to minimize the financial impact of this closure?
As a donor to Canoe Island French Camp, how can I help?

Will you refund my camper’s tuition?
We will refund the full amount you have paid toward your camper’s tuition for summer 2020.You should have received an email from Margaret asking you to confirm your mailing address for the refund check. Our bookkeeper will be sending you a refund within the next month.

Because 89% of our income derives from event fees and tuition, camp’s closure has significant financial consequences for the future of CIFC. We have already incurred operating expenses for the year and this closure will affect our ability to function financially for 2020 and beyond. If you are in a position to do so, we hope you will consider converting all or a part of your French Camp tuition into a donation to CIFC’s unrestricted fund. Your donation will help sustain CIFC through this challenging situation.

What about registration for next summer?
Registration for summer of 2021 will begin in October. Anyone who was enrolled in French Camp for 2020 is guaranteed enrollment in 2021; as a consolation and a courtesy, we will pre-enroll your child for the session in which they are currently enrolled. I will be reaching out to all registered families to ask you to confirm or cancel your 2021 registration this fall. There will be no need to queue up on October 1st to secure a spot. For those families who would like to retain their registration for the summer of 2021, you will need to submit your deposit via check by the end of October to confirm your registration.

We will offer enrollment only in the session for which your child is currently registered; after we determine how many remaining spots we have in each session, we can move your registrations to your preferred session.

What about campers who are aging out of French Camp?
If your child would have been 16 and would be aging out this year, please know that we would very happily welcome him or her back to camp at 17. We know that many campers look forward to their time as oldest campers on the island, and we are eager like to extend this opportunity to 2021.

What about financial aid awards from this summer?
If you had already completed an application for financial aid for 2020, we will automatically transfer that award to 2021. There will be no need to re-apply for 2021, unless you would like to submit a request for a reward of a different amount.

Will you have sessions later in the summer?
We have spent a great deal of time considering creative solutions that would make it possible to hold camp this summer, including offering sessions later in the year or shortened sessions.  However, these changes would still require protocols and significant alterations in the daily routines on the island to protect campers and staff. These would include precautions such as testing every camper before he or she boards the boat, implementing methods to detect symptoms such as daily temperature checks, developing a method to isolate symptomatic campers, and more.

Everything we considered ultimately led us to the same truth: we cannot give the best of Canoe Island French Camp this summer without introducing heightened anxiety, increasing the strain on staff, and disrupting the peaceful and safe atmosphere that allows children and their parents to fully trust CIFC. Even if we take extreme measures, we still could not guarantee a virus-free community.

We are wary of making promises when the future still feels very uncertain, but we’d like you to know that we will pursue any creative, safe solutions that would allow us to have campers assemble on the island later in the summer. If we reach or seem to be about to reach Phase 4 of Governor Inslee’s reopening of Washington State, we will set in motion the necessary measures to hold camp, including hiring and training staff and preparing the facility. We will keep all French Camp families abreast of any possibilities that arise.

Do you plan to offer some sort of virtual camp experience?
We know that the aspects of CIFC that you cherish are not ones that can be easily reproduced through a screen. The best gifts of camp are connecting face-to-face with friends, being present in the moment, exploring nature, and eschewing screens. That said, we are eager to stay connected this summer and are working on several projects to engage our community in a myriad of ways. We will be coordinating online French classes, virtual Inspiration Point/Jacques Martin, craft projects via snail mail, and some other initiatives to help keep our community engaged, inspired, and connected. All these programs will be free and open to all members of our community. We will announce these programs on our social media sites (Instagram and Facebook) as well as via email to parents.

What will the year-round staff be working on this summer?
Although we will be mourning the loss of our season and the company of staff and campers, the four of us living and working full-time on Canoe Island will stay productive and busy in the upcoming months. Ben, Will, and Alena will be working on facility projects to make camp better than ever in 2021. Upcoming projects include replacing a deck, replacing roofs, expanding the garden and adding a greenhouse, and working on permitting for the Atelier. We are holding a fundraiser bake sale every Friday on Orcas Island and Shaw Island, making use of Alena’s phenomenal skills and incorporating our fresh eggs and yields from the garden. Margaret will be working on development efforts, coordinating virtual programming, and backlogged administrative work. Last but not least, Margaret and Ben will be welcoming a baby into their family in early summer!

Could I speak with one of the directors on the phone?
Yes, Ben and Margaret are always available to speak on the phone to anyone in the community, be it a parent, camper, staff member, or alumni. Our office number and home number are the same telephone line: 360.468.2329. Please reach out for any reason, whether you have a question we haven’t addressed here, would like to commiserate or offer support, or just want to chat. Though we are not running programs currently, we are still hard at work and would be happy to take your call at any time.

What steps is CIFC taking to minimize the financial impact of this closure?
CIFC is a small and lean organization by nature, which makes us well positioned to weather this storm. Ben and Margaret, in collaboration with our board of directors, are hard at work to find solutions and aid that will shepherd CIFC to the other side of this crisis. We have recently secured a loan from the Paycheck Protection Program and we continue to seek and apply for grants both for small businesses and for organizations that focus on youth education and the humanities. We also rely on community support in the form of charitable giving; we thank the many recent donors who generously funded the purchase of the material for our underwater sea cable. We’ve cut all unnecessary expenses for the facility and programming, including but not limited to shuttering buildings, reducing boat use, and prioritizing labor-based projects instead of materials-based projects. We also run a weekly bake sale on Orcas and Shaw Island, which supports CIFC’s unrestricted fund.