North Star in Atlanta

Each February we head over to the ACA National Conference. It gives us the opportunity to learn from great speakers, collaborate with others from all over the camp industry and get great ideas for the coming summer. One of the great Keynote Speakers was Richard Louv, author of “Last Child in the Woods”. Richard is a great advocate of getting people into nature, particularly as we become more attached to technology. Check out his blog for some of his writings.

This year’s conference brought us to Atlanta, which isn’t exactly San Diego (our 2011 conference site), but its a great city. We also come down to the conference to catch up with camp friends. Little did we know that we’d be seeing some North Star friends and also have a great small world story to pass along.

Andy and I got to the hotel, headed up to our hotel room and were entertained by the Cheerleader Conference that was taking place at our hotel. As we headed back down to meet up with Leb and Sue, we noticed that there was a group of teenage males streaming out of a room, with BBYO badges. I look over at Andy and say “we could run into…” and I didn’t even finish my sentence before Andy points and says “him?”.

Walking towards us was Jordan Schack, and he was soon followed by his brother Jonathan Schack (counselors from 2011 and former campers). They were there for the BBYO conference and were, needless to say, pretty entertained to see us. Jordan and Jonathan are enjoying their senior years of high school in St. Louis. Jordan is getting ready to head off to University of Pennsylvania in the fall while Jonathan is still in the college search process.

The conference ends tomorrow and we’ll be sure to pass along some details and highlights, but nothing as entertaining as running into the Schacks!