Summer camp is just around the corner, but most administrators have been working long before this to get ready for the campers and counselors coming their way. When you think about it, summer camp is simply short-term childcare over the course of a season.
While the thought of camping and computers don't often go together, technology can streamline paperwork and help you keep up with all your administrative chores. Management software for summer camps provides an abundance of tools that make preparation and administration less stressful for you and your staff.
If you choose a cloud-based solution, you can add flexibility of access to the list. You can access the camp management software from any device, anywhere, anytime. You don’t need to drive to your onsite office to use the computer or lug a laptop back and forth. Your tablet and smartphone are all the “infrastructure” you need.
Budgeting and Planning
Campers and their parents don’t realize the planning that goes into making the summer fun for all ages. You probably began planning for this summer as soon as the last camp of 2016 ended.
With management software, you can pull a variety of financial reports to help you make an educated forecast of your summer camp budget needs for this year. You have access to:
- Enrollment and attendance figures
- Bills and invoicing
- Payment processing
- Expenditures
Instead of trying to put everything into a spreadsheet, you can manipulate numbers and graphs through the accounting module of a childcare management software solution, which was created for professional childcare situations.
You can also track attendance to optimize your camp session dates and activity scheduling.
Hiring and Training
Storing documentation for new hires along with the returning staff is just as important, and can take up just as much space, as the information for your campers. You need a way to store yet quickly access medical, payroll, and other information about your employees.
If safety training is required, you must be able to show that each employee has passed all training courses. If you run a specialty camp, you want to be able to show parents and authorities that your staff has expertise in the chosen activity as well as any accompanying certifications or diplomas.
Childcare management software provides storage and access to employee documentation required by your state, including:
- Certification and training records
- Background checks
- Tax documents
You can also store employee handbooks, and copies of employment regulations, contracts, and other paperwork for easy access by the appropriate staff member.
Camp Preparation
Your scheduling duties don’t start with the campers, do they? You have a camp to get ready.
Use childcare management software to schedule and communicate with the caretakers and groundskeepers responsible for opening, cleaning, and preparing all camp areas. Use the staff management function to:
- Create and store work schedules
- Record and store hours worked
- Automatically notify staff when there is an emergency due to storms or other events
- Distribute group communications
The software solution is ideal for storing copies of vendor invoices to streamline bill payment. All invoices are in a centralized database to keep bills from being lost. You can set up a notification for when a bill is due to ensure timely payment and save on late fees.
Registration and Enrollment
Do parents and yourself a favor and provide online registration and enrollment. Using a parent portal, you can gather all required data for each camper, store the selected camp date, and activity selection, as well as receive payment.
Online registration eliminates stacks of forms and the pain of entering the same information into multiple databases (or multiple other forms). Nobody likes filing, and when records are lost, you are faced with asking parents to fill out forms again. An online database into which all information is directly entered saves you and your staff hours of time previously spent pushing papers and doing data entry.
Online registration payment and processing eliminates gathering checks and relieves you of a trip to the bank. Also, your payments are protected from loss or theft.
Scheduling
Getting campers, staff, and occasionally parents through a week of camp can be a challenge of D-Day proportions.
Childcare management software helps with scheduling of all kinds, and camp is a place that needs to move massive numbers of people smoothly from place to place, each of which is completely prepared to receive them.
Mistakenly scheduling two or three large groups of kids at the archery range at the same time can be easily identified and rectified before camp opens. The scheduling feature can pull from the central database accurate lists of campers, place them in an orderly activity rotation, and help counselors maintain as much order as possible.
Your administrative staff and camp counselors will also appreciate accessing their schedules online to ensure they show up when and where needed. Notification of an ill or absent teammate will reduce the confusion caused when someone doesn’t show when expected.
Meals
More than a scheduling challenge, menus and meals must follow regulatory guidelines and avoid allergenic contents (like nuts), while reducing waste. You need to be able to see who ate, if they ate, when they ate and if needed, what they ate.
Menu planning software keeps track of everything including lists of needed food and supplies. Later, you can dig into the records to learn more about camper preferences, change menus to match in-season foods, and make sure you don’t run out of food before the end of camp.
Don’t forget the marshmallows, graham crackers, and chocolate bars. You will never be forgiven.
Online Contact and Interaction
Keep parents in the loop by providing access to documents, photos, and a small sense of contact with their children. A parent portal provides online space to show off what the campers have been doing and give parents the reassurance that everyone is still in one piece.
If you want, you can create a communication system for parents and kids that is as limited or as open as you want to make it.
Mass notifications can be performed in case of weather emergencies, illness outbreaks, and other issues in which a large number of people need to know, right away, that everything is being taken care of.
Childcare management software saves you time and money as you set up and run your summer camp, no matter where it is. For everything from an isolated country campsite to a STEM camp on a local college campus, access to all of these features and functions takes a load off your plate.
Software that eliminates repetitive administrative work, reduces required storage space, and provides access to records anywhere from any device is welcome in today’s always-connected world.
