More than just a week: Camp Kesem reunites campers and counselors at fall reunion

Even though Camp Kesem only lasts one week, it has a year-round impact.

Camp Kesem is a nonprofit, week-long summer camp for children whose parents were diagnosed with cancer. At Saturday’s carnival-themed reunion, campers and counselors hula-hooped, did arts and crafts and bonded as if camp hadended just the day before.

Wharton freshmen Yonah Mann and Kolade Lawal were a part of the Management 100 team that planned the reunion. The team was in charge of planning the venue, activities and logistics for the event. Located in Platt Student Performing Arts Center on Saturday morning, the reunion featured a brunch spread, a snow cone station, a gingerbread house station and other fun activities.

Mann and Lawal discussed how it was important for the team to plan the best event possible.

“It is such a privilege to work with them specifically because we all care so much about what Camp Kesem is doing,” Lawal said.

Camp Kesem is a national organization focused on allowing children with ill parents to come together and have fun, Nursing junior and co-director of Camp Kesem’s Penn chapter Kelly Mannion said.

“It’s basically a week for kids to be kids,” Mannion said. “A lot of times when the children have a parent who has been affected by cancer, they are forced to grow up more quickly.”

The campers, from 10-year-olds to 16-year-olds, enjoy all of the normal summer camp activities free of charge. The camp raises money by requiring each counselor to do fundraising through its annual fundraising event Make the Magic and applying for grants.

Camp Kesem was able to invite over 100 children last summer. Mannion expressed hope that it would be able to host 120 children this coming summer.

Camp Kesem is a year-long commitment to these children, she said. In addition to sending the campers birthday cards, there are two reunions — fall and spring — to which both the campers and counselors look forward.

“How excited they are to come to this event and how close they are with the other campers when they see them shows me that what we do for them is more than just that week,” Mannion said.

Linda Barila, mother of the campers whose counselors call them “G-man and Mr. Swish,” discussed how this network of friends has made her sons open up more after her own diagnosis. Diagnosed with breast cancer in 2007, Barila is now cancer-free. However, her sons are still affected, she said.

“They still have to deal with surgeries. There are always scares,” she said. “They are able to talk about it now and still have fun. I couldn’t be happier.”

Barila discussed how her sons keep in touch with their friends from Camp Kesem and love the reunions in between. They are always ecstatic to see their friends and counselors again, she said. Camp Kesem’s greatest contribution, in her opinion, is promoting her sons’ happiness.

“It is not just that week. It is all year long,” Barila said.