Creator CampReviews of creatorcamp.org

My son did like this camp- but I can’t say that much learning happened. After he “filmed” his movie I don’t think any else productive happened. I also think he was able to get on you tube for majority of the time. His counselors were very kind and sweet - Ms. T and Mr. Dahra .

I want to start by positively mentioning Lucy. She was wonderful to the kids. Nicole was extremely responsive and helpful and I don’t believe the shortcomings of the last camp were on her. Positives. Nice counselors, minus one who my kid said was mean. But I’m not harping on that. Lucy was great. Kids come home saying they had fun and loved it. My son did learn a few new things Constructive criticism: I’d like to see more structure. My son learned a few cool things, but it seemed that they had unorganized video plans. They didn’t story board or plan out the videos, he was just told to go film. I’d like to see them work on something useful from beginning to end. He went in to YouTube gamers wanting to broadcast his FC mobile game. He was told that the game is too long. So the idea was completely scrapped. Why not teach him to film it and edit the good parts into a great usable video? He practices sports broadcasting skills doing this which is way more useful than what he ended up doing. He ended up doing a rate the TV show video which caused a reaction of boos from the campers for his rating choices. So his last impression of the camp was that everyone hated him and his video and he refused to show it to us. He previously attended YouTube creators camp, we chose gamers for the last. He was combined with creators and made to watch the same videos he’d already seen. We specifically signed him up for a different camp for that reason. It seemed that the Chinese theater location was thrown together last minute and it showed. And I believed it was more expensive. My son didn’t get to use his creator bucks he had saved (though we warned him that could happen moving to a different camp location). The parking was convenient but not cleared by security who constantly told us we couldn’t park there for pick up, I found it odd that they showed a camp full of kids ranging from age 5-15, which most being in the 8-11 range the last half of the new Spider-Man movie, as it is rated PG-13, but also some parents may have been planning to take their kids to see it. His certificate was beautiful from the other locations, he was visibly disappointed in his black and white paper copy of a certificate he received. His cousins even said the wrong camp on it. Lastly, the camp advertised meeting industry professionals. Unless the kids didn’t tell me something the only industry professionals I can think of that they met were The Minions. The kids found this fun, but my son is in the entertainment industry, so I think I thought professionals meant actual working professionals from the YouTube creator or filmmaking profession. My sister and I are torn over doing this camp again. The kids had an overall positive experience and had a lot of fun, but we were disappointed in a lot of aspects of the structure of the camp. And for us it was a bit of a drive from the valley. Edit: the drive from the valley isn’t a criticism on them, a valley location would be great, but we know we chose to make the drive. That’s because we were really sold on this camp. We just aren’t as sold now.

My son has a lot of fun in this camp, thank you Mr. Trey for your added support and making a connection with him. When I scrapbook his summer, your notes will make it in his memories. Thank you Ms. Roxy for all your support of my son. I don't like their methods of eliminating nut products from campers lunches. My son described it like this; someone announces to the campers if they have peanut butter products to raise their hands. Then they go around and pick up every product without replacing it or giving parents the option of bringing a replacement. I understand the allergy concern, but, my son's sandwiches were taken from him and it was not brought to my attention until another camp had already started. When I asked why they didn't reach out to me, they replied that they can't call every parent of every camper they take food from. Is it that many?? The truth is, my son has never actually eaten, "peanut butter" his entire life. The word, "peanut butter," is a household name people call any nut or non-nut butter spreads. Most parents use sun-flower seed butter due to the allergy restrictions, but, the staff does not confirm this before trashing the kids lunch. After explaining that I make my son's lunches and his sandwiches contain sunflower seed butter, which is nut-free. She apparently didn't believe me because she felt that she had to confirm this with my wife the day after. Not calling the parents gives the impression that they aren't concerned about how little the child is eating for lunch. I was upset after learning that my son had only eaten crackers, cheese and fruit for 3 days of lunch. The person I spoke with about it had an unapologetic attitude and came across that she made the right decision throwing my son's sandwiches away. This interaction has damage trust and now from one camp to the next I'm concerned someone may throw away anything my son has if it remotely resembles products containing nuts. Other than that, staff is nice, my son has fun, he is learning something new and they get a break to play outside. The camp hands out creator bucks and they also have trading cards, which are cool incentives. It would be nice if they had creator camp wallets and trading card binders in their merch to hold the incentives they give the campers. Creator camp is a great program and great company. Despite the above incident, I would recommend this to other parents.

We traveled for 10+ hours to attend this camp, thinking that our son would love it for his birthday. Because there were so many people on the WiFi at the same time, there was issues with loading and processing. Specifically, the app that they created had issues with processing and it created so much anxiety that my son didn’t even want to attend the final day. I spoke with an instructor who was kind and said they had ways to get their videos to play on the screen. She stated that the issue was known, but I don’t think they communicated that to the kids. Since it didn’t work at camp, he felt pressured to get it done after hours. Since we were away from home, this was during our vacation time. I think this is a good camp for locals, I don’t recommend traveling to attend. If the technology issues could be communicated to parents and students on the front end, that could ease some tension as well. If there are issues with WiFi, I recommend staggering the number of people on it at the same time. I was hoping to see photos or get information on what skills were learned so that we could continue to build on them. Overall, this wasn’t a fun experience for him. Which is really disappointing. Hopefully some of this feedback will help with the future communications or others looking to travel for this camp.

This is our second year at Creator Camp, and maybe our last, which makes me sad to say. First, I want to say that my son loved his class and loved his specific teacher. He did a stop motion animation camp, and he enjoyed making videos and putting them online. Our issue was with the camp director on-site, Bri. She was really unkind to our child. She put her feet around the chair legs of my son's chair to stop him from getting up, because he was allegedly disrespectful to another teacher. Another teacher was asking my son the same question about his hat over and over again, and my son eventually got visibly frustrated answering questions and Bri said, "oh no, I dont like that," and then blocked his chair. The next day, my son brought a PBJ for lunch. Apparently, the campus was nut free, but I genuinely don't recall that being communicated to the parents. Bri confiscated his lunch and yelled at him, and when he said, "hey, I paid for that, you can't just take my lunch, what am i going to eat" she then put him in her office for being "disrespectful." Imagine being 9, at camp, and having an adult snatch your lunch away like that. He didn't pack his lunch; he didn't know anything about a nut policy. There was a way for Bri to address this situation in a way that was kind and professional, but she did not go that route. Here's the thing---if you treat kids poorly, and snatch their lunches away like you are a prison warden, you aren't going to get respect in return. Luckily, I work nearby and was able to bring him lunch and he finished his day with his class. But, these events put a major damper on what was supposed to just be a fun camp to break up summer boredom. Instead of getting summer fun, it was stressful because an unkind adult singled him out and treated him poorly. Knowing he was at camp with her all day the last day gave me anxiety. I seriously considered pulling him and asking for a refund, but he really liked his actual class and wanted to go back. My son's teacher said he was a star student and did very well, but Bri soured the entire experience for us.

My 6 year old grandson said he had fun, but couldn’t tell me what he actually learned how to do in Roblox. He said they watched a movie, but how do I know this wasn’t just an expensive 2 days of babysitting? How can I see what he created? There is no report for parents.