our disability inclusion program (new in 2026)
We love running an inclusive program. We have seen campers who have struggled to find success in many other settings thrive at Clapping Hands and enrich our camp community with their presence. We find this to be one of the most rewarding aspects of camp!
Over the past 5-6 years we have seen the number of neurodivergent children registering for camp increase significantly. A few years ago we found that there were some camp weeks when we had multiple children who needed a lot of 1:1 attention from senior staff every day. Even though we have always had a remarkably low camper:staff ratio, there were days when we felt over capacity. We didn’t feel we could serve everyone as well as we wanted to and our staff felt stretched too thin.
In response to those experiences, we launched a Disability Inclusion Internship program in 2025. For the past two summers we have had teams of 4-5 wonderful interns who showed up eager to work with campers 1:1. This program has been immensely successful; it truly increased our capacity to say YES to more campers with disabilities, the interns reported that it was a tremendous growth experience for them, and it sharply reduced feelings of burnout for the staff as a whole.
YET, even with an intern program, we have come to understand that our capacity is not infinite! There are times when we might need to say “we can’t add more kids with disabilities to this camp.” or “we can’t add more without also adding more staff.” Or “we can’t do it alone, we need some help from the family”—- that might mean picking up at 3 instead of 5. Or sending a parent or a volunteer or professional 1:1 to help.
We are so aware of the load parents carry. All parents, and parents of kids with disabilities to the 10th power! But we humbly have to honor our limitations in order to run a good safe happy program for all of our campers and staff.
THUS, in 2026 we are rolling out our Disability Inclusion Program. Campers with disabilities will JOIN this program by filling out a questionnaire asking for additional information. It’s essential that we begin with as much information as possible so we have a pretty good idea, even with a new camper, how much support they might need and what kind of support will be most helpful.
With that information in hand, we will include as many people as we possibly can without compromising the overall excellence of our camp day for all campers and staff.
