Our Village | Transitional House | Outreach | New Hope House | Camp | Quilters of Hope

NHCC's Camp Lotus

Piloted in July 2009, NHCC’s New Hope Summer Camp, Camp Lotus, will host Outreach Program participants at ‘Our Village’ for a one-week educational summer camp.

 

 

Many of Outreach’s 867 children often reside with their extended families, and have little knowledge of their disease and the precautions they must take in their future lives. For this reason, participants in NHCC’s ‘New Hope Summer Camp’ program spend one week with trained counsellors, learning about the nature of their disease and deconstructing social stereotypes, as well as learning how to maintain their health and become advocates for other HIV-positive children within their rural communities.

 

 

Additionally, the children participate in traditional ‘summer camp’ team-building and creative activities such as arts, craft and drama exercises, a final dramatic performance, and sport and recreation activities, in order to give them an opportunity to express themselves socially, and allow them to return to their rural homes with newfound confidence, and a better understanding of their disease. In doing so, the program aims to build strong support networks among children living with HIV/AIDS, as well as providing these children, who may be somewhat socially ostracized in their local schools, with a chance to have fun in a safe and secure environment.

 

 

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NHCC plans to conduct four camp sessions per year during the July-August public school holidays, with approximately 160 children attending annually. The pilot group of 80 children,who completed their first session in July 2009, reported having a great deal of fun.