Summer campers, I don't mind so much (especially since I have found a way to make that $work$ for me...) but Real Estate Games might be a bit much.
Don't be so hard on your school for this-- or any school for that matter. Universities are, for the most part, providing services for 9 months a year (summer classes tending to be much, much smaller) but they have to maintain those buildings and that computer network and pay all those employees year round.
So, why not put the campus to use for something that might forward the greater community good?
There is educational value in having high school kids and other campers run around a university for a few weeks each summer. They do learn a bit. I know this because I have been one of the people teaching for a High School summer program on my campus. Granted, they are not learning deep philosophy or high energy physics, but they do learn just a little bit about what its like to be in a college environment, what's out there beyond their high school, and such.
Its hard to be a College and University these days unless your name is Harvard or Notre Dame and you have billions of dollars sitting around (and even they have these summer camps). So, relax, enjoy the summer.
What about all the money the school gets from the students? I don't know where they are being allocated but so far nothing that is directly benefiting the community? I also don't see too much of an "educational value" in these "summer campers" other then how it once again reminds me that people can be really annoying.
Having been both a camper and a teacher (yeah, debate camp!), I can attest to the benefits that come from high school students becoming familiar with a university campus (and, most importantly, a university library, even if Certain School's libraries suck). I have to agree with the first anonymous: the buildings might as well be used for learning purposes.
Educational purposes I can deal with: debate camp, upward bound-type programs, etc. What bugs me are the money-making scam jobs, that either a) have no connection to education (the aforementioned Real Estate Games being a powerful example of this type of thing) or b) pretend to have an educational purpose but are just cash cows, like the numerous "student leadership" camps that are, as far as I can tell, mainly excuses for high schoolers to get away from their parents for a week or two and try to score with other campers. There's a time and a place for that, certainly -- but does it have to be on my campus during the summer?
[And yes, I know very well that debate camp is often an excuse to try to score with other debaters. But at least there's a programmatic focus on an activity that has some redeeming educational value: the production and destruction of arguments.]
I know that the rent has to be paid. But surely we can find better ways to pay it, ways that don't involve compromising so much of the mission of an institution of higher learning by turning it into a convention center?
Commenting by HaloScan
