Why I Send My Kids to Camp Ondessonk Every Summer

By Tammy Underwood, Camper Mom

I still remember the morning I dropped my son, Eli, off for his first week at Camp Ondessonk. He was nine years old, clutching a duffel bag nearly as big as he was, his eyes wide with a mixture of excitement and nerves. I drove home, telling myself I was fine. Then I cried for twenty minutes in the parking lot of a gas station somewhere outside of Mount Vernon, Illinois.

That was four summers ago.

This past June, I watched that same boy jog confidently toward the cabins of the Amantacha without so much as a glance back. His younger sister, Nora, was chattering away to a counselor she had already decided was her new best friend. And me? I smiled the whole drive home.

Something remarkable happens to children at Camp Ondessonk. Something you cannot manufacture with a screen, a scheduled playdate, or even the most intentional parenting. I have seen it with my own eyes, in my own children, and I am here to tell you exactly what it is.

What Is Camp Ondessonk?

Nestled in the breathtaking Shawnee National Forest in Southern Illinois, Camp Ondessonk is a Catholic residential youth camp owned and operated by the Diocese of Belleville. Since 1959, it has welcomed campers ages 8 to 16 for traditional summer programs featuring horseback riding, archery, canoeing, rock climbing, treehouse camping, swimming, campfire cooking, and nature exploration across nearly 1,000 scenic acres.

Critically for a parent like me, Camp Ondessonk is fully accredited by the American Camp Association (ACA), meeting more than 300 rigorous standards in site safety, staffing practices, and operating procedures. The ACA exists specifically to ensure that camps provide safe, developmentally sound experiences for children, and Ondessonk meets that bar year after year. That accreditation is not a checkbox. It is a promise.

But safety is just the foundation. What happens inside those 983 acres is where the real story begins.

The Gift of Independence: Learning to Stand on Their Own

The first building block of personal development that Camp Ondessonk gives my children is independence, and it starts the moment I pull out of the driveway.

For one or two weeks, Eli and Nora have no mom to text, no dad to troubleshoot their problems, and no Wi-Fi to fall back on. They make their own decisions. They wake themselves up. They navigate friendships, manage their belongings, and figure out how to ask for help from a counselor instead of a parent.

According to the American Camp Association, research shows that Camp helps children develop self-confidence and independence in ways that the school year simply cannot replicate. Away from the familiar rhythms of home, children discover they are more capable than they believed. They climb walls they thought were too high. They paddle canoes that they thought were too heavy. They sleep under stars they thought were too dark.

Child psychologist Dr. Michael Thompson, co-author of Homesick and Happy, argues that the single greatest thing parents can do for their children’s development is to give them protected time away from home. Healthy separation, he writes, is how children develop an internal sense of self. Camp Ondessonk does not just allow this separation. It makes it joyful.

When Eli came home after his second summer, he made his own lunch without being asked. He did not even think it was a big deal. To me, it was everything.

Responsibility in Action: Doing Your Part for Something Bigger

My daughter Nora is twelve. At home, getting her to clean her room requires a small act of Congress. At Camp Ondessonk, she helps maintain her cabin, cares for the horses she rides, and looks out for the younger campers in her unit. She does it without complaint, and she comes home proud of herself.

This is the second building block: responsibility, and Camp is uniquely positioned to teach it.

A landmark study published in the Journal of Youth Development found that residential camp experiences significantly increase children’s sense of personal responsibility, particularly when they are part of a community with shared goals and shared duties. At Camp Ondessonk, every camper is part of a unit, a team, and ultimately, a legacy that stretches back more than six decades.

The ACA notes that the residential camp environment creates natural, low-stakes opportunities for children to experience the consequences of their choices. Forgot your rain jacket? You get wet, and you remember next time. Miss the wake-up call? Your cabin-mates notice. These are not punishments. They are lessons with kindness built around them.

There is something deeply powerful about watching a child learn that her choices affect the people she cares about. Nora learned that at Camp Ondessonk. She brought it home with her, tucked right next to her friendship bracelets and her muddy hiking boots.

The Social Foundation: Friendships That Actually Last

We live in an era of curated connections. My kids have hundreds of “friends” on various apps and platforms, many of whom they have never met. What they do not always have are the gritty, unfiltered, sleep-in-the-same-cabin-and-work-it-out kinds of friendships that shape who you truly become.

Camp Ondessonk builds those friendships. That is the third and perhaps most lasting building block: genuine social development.

Research from the American Psychological Association confirms that children who spend meaningful time in collaborative, face-to-face social environments develop stronger empathy, better conflict-resolution skills, and higher emotional intelligence than those who socialize primarily through digital means. Camp strips away the filters and the performance anxiety of social media, replacing them with campfire songs, midnight ghost stories, and the kind of laughter that echoes off canyon walls.

At Camp Ondessonk, children are intentionally grouped with peers they may not already know, encouraged to try activities outside their comfort zones, and supported by counselors who model genuine kindness. The Loyal Lodge of Ondessonk and Tekakwitha, an honor society within the camp, recognizes campers who demonstrate loyalty, service, and dedication to their community. Eli was inducted last summer. I am not going to pretend I did not cry.

Social psychologist Dr. Brene Brown has written extensively about the fact that belonging, true belonging, requires vulnerability and showing up as your full, imperfect self. Camp Ondessonk gives children the space and safety to do exactly that. By the end of each session, strangers have become friends. Friends have become family.

More Than a Summer. A Foundation for Life.

I am a mom. My job is to raise humans who can love, lead, struggle, adapt, and thrive. I read the parenting books, I drive to practices, I pack lunches, and I stay up too late worrying that I am not doing enough.

Camp Ondessonk does something I genuinely cannot do for my children on my own: it gets out of the way and lets them grow.

In the heart of one of the most beautiful forests in the country, guided by staff who are passionate about young people, and anchored in over sixty years of tradition, Eli and Nora learn independence, responsibility, and the deep social bonds that carry a person through a lifetime. They come home taller, somehow. Not in inches, but in character.

If you are a parent wondering whether summer camp is worth it, whether the cost, the logistics, and the two weeks of separation are worth it, I am here to tell you, with every ounce of conviction I have: yes. Absolutely yes.

Give your child Camp Ondessonk. Watch who they become.

And maybe keep a box of tissues in the car for the drive home.

Click here to learn more about Camp Ondessonk Summer Camp Programs.