What a camp looks like if it’s full (sold-out).

Ever since Classroom Antics began offering camps in 2008, we have managed wait-lists for full sold-out camps. And since we commonly are asked how we manage our WAITLIST for camps, I felt it was the right time to share our process openly with everyone.

What is a WAITLIST?

A wait-list (or WAITLIST) is a waiting list. And when you sign-up for a camp WAITLIST, you are putting yourself on a waiting list.

How Does the WAITLIST Work?

Our camps hold 12 campers each. When the 12th slot is taken, our registration system automatically adds a WAITLIST for other parents to enlist. The cost of placing yourself on the WAITLIST is free, but placing yourself on the WAITLIST does not guarantee a space in the event an open camp slot becomes available.

A camp space can become available if another parent withdraws or transfers from camp. When that space becomes available, the entire WAITLIST is emailed simultaneously about the opening.

We email everyone at the same time, and whomever registers for that camp first, gets it. It’s a free-for-all, so if you’re waiting for a camp opening, be sure to use an email address that you check regularly.

How Often Does a Camp Slot Become Available?

Our camps, on average, have a 25% chance of having an open space become available after it becomes full.

While it’s recommended to still sign-up for the wait-list, it is also recommended to register for the same camp (LEGO Robotics, Stop-Motion Animation, Video Game Design, or Computer Programming) in another near-by location. If a space becomes available to you, you may call us to transfer you into the camp space that just became available.

Can Camp Take a 13th Camper?

I would love for this to be true. This would solve our WAITLIST challenge by just expanding our camp. However, growing our camp size causes a couple issues that we are not comfortable with.

1. Equipment – We have 12 laptops, 12 robotics kits, 12 movie backgrounds, etc for camp. We have enough equipment for everyone in camp. Unfortunately, we don’t have additional equipment for expanding our camp size.
2. Quality of Camp – We are comfortable with a maximum of 12 students in camp. We have 1 teacher per camp. If we expand camp for one additional camper, we are reducing the amount of time and attention we can give our original 12 students who signed-up for camp.

Suggestions

We are always open to suggestions for changing the way we offer camp and manage our wait-list. If you have a suggestion, we want to hear it. Please leave your feedback in the comments section below. We will consider and personally respond to each and every suggestion.

What is LEGO KidsFest?

LEGO KidsFest Aerial View

The LEGO® KidsFest is a giant traveling LEGO® expo coming to Louiville’s Kentucky Exposition Center April 5-7, 2013. This hands-on, educational, all-ages LEGO® extravaganza features millions of LEGO® bricks, not to mention lots of construction zones, dozens of life-sized LEGO® models and displays, LEGO® Ninjago and LEGO® Games, group builds such as Creation Nation, live LEGO® Master Builders, and so much more covering three acres of space. Five identical sessions are available. Tickets are $18 for kids and $20 for adults.

Activities at LEGO KidsFest

Mosaic Wall from LEGO KidsFest

Among the many LEGO attractions, families will find:

• LEGO Model Gallery: dozens of life-sized models made entirely from LEGO bricks
• LEGO Master Builders: live demonstrations and activities from the crew who get paid to play
• Creation Nation: build your own creation to add to a custom map of the U.S.
• Race Ramps: build your own custom car, then race it down the ramp against friends and family
• LEGO Games Arena: roll the dice to play LEGO board games
• Construction Zones: creative free build, play and display areas
• LEGO DUPLO®: younger visitors can explore imagination through building
• LEGO Retail and KidsFest Marketplace: purchase LEGO merchandise and official KidsFest tour goods
• Brick Pile: a gigantic pile full of LEGO bricks for creative play and enjoyment
• Monochromatic Builds: bricks of a single color to foster group creativity
• Brickscapes: fantastic displays that combine lots of LEGO and DUPLO sets

My LEGO KidsFest Advice

LEGO Indiana Jones from LEGO KidsFest

You will notice that the LEGO KidsFest is broken into sessions. One session on Friday from 4pm-8:30pm. Two sessions on Saturday. And two more sessions on Sunday. You only have 4.5 hours to cover everything at LEGO KidsFest. If you arrive within the first 30 minutes of your session, you can comfortably see everything.

There are more than 30 huge LEGO builds, including Indiana Jones, Woody and Buzz from Toy Story, R2D2 and C3PO from Star Wars, dinosaurs, Ninjagos, and the huge Lightning McQueen car. There are so many more characters that I didn’t mention, and your kids will love taking their picture with them. Bring your camera!

If you kids are like mine, they will get stuck in one LEGO KidsFest area and not want to leave. If you want to see most of the show, you need to time each area to no more than 30 minutes each.

LEGO Friends from LEGO KidsFest

There is a LEGO store in the KidsFest show. They have most of the items you’d find at Walmart, Target, and Toys R Us, but you’ll also find some hard-to-find items in the store too. Set a budget with your child on what’s acceptable to buy at the show, or you might have a disappointed child who couldn’t get the $300 LEGO Millenium Falcon.

This is a great event for the LEGO-lover in your family. This event does not return to your area often, as it travels from one city to the next. Each year, they only visit 4-5 cities. I guarantee you won’t see LEGO KidsFest in Louisville in at least the next 3 years. If you are thinking about going, definitely attend. Your child will love it!

The LEGO KidsFest often sells out. Be sure to buy tickets in advance. Buy tickets here: http://www.legokidsfest.com/louisville/

LEGO Robotics at KidsFest

If you are interested in seeing LEGO Mindstorms NXT Robotics in action, there is a station for this. However, robotics is so in-depth that you won’t have time to sit with the robotics kits long enough to appreciate what they can do. If you’re interested in learning about LEGO Robotics, I would recommend attending a LEGO Robotics Camp or Junior LEGO Robotics Camp — you’ll get much more time and come away with an incredible technology education as well.

Win Tickets to the Louisville LEGO KidsFest

a Rafflecopter giveaway

However, this doesn’t answer the real question you want to ask:

Registering for camp early gives parents many luxuries.

And the answer to this can be complicated. Factors that affect the answer are:

• What type of camp is it? (overnight vs day camp)
• What type of activities are involved? (sports vs specialty camp)
• How well-known and popular is the camp?

Most camps completely sell out by May and June. This is true in our Cleveland and Columbus markets. However, with Cincinnati being a new market for us, we have no historical data to predict how or when Cincinnati camps will fill.

The Luxuries of Registering Early for Camp

Classroom Antics Tech Camp registrations begin each year the day after Thanksgiving. Many people think it’s too early to open registrations. However, signing up early for camps provides families some nice luxuries.

• Planning summer vacations is challenging. Signing up for camp early allows busy families to organize their summer schedule comfortably.
• Get the camp you want. Families that sign-up in May and June sometimes take their 2nd option camp, because their first option is already full.
• Discounts are biggest the furthest away from summer. Signing up during the December holiday season yields our parents the biggest discounts.
• Cancellation insurance gives you ultimate flexibility. Classroom Antics camps are normally non-refundable. However, by selecting Cancellation Insurance, your family can change plans the day before camp, and still receive a 100% refund on your camp fee.

Follow-up Questions

Do you have a related follow-up question? Ask in the comments below, or feel free to call us at 800-595-3776.

Register Early to Guarantee a Spot in Camp

Use our registration system to find dates, times, locations, and availability of camps and classes in your area.

This past weekend, we met Susan Cornish at the 2013 Cincinnati Summer Camp Fair. Susan is the franchise owner of College Nannies+Tutors throughout Ohio, including Cincinnati, Columbus, and Cleveland Akron.

The Pickup-Dropoff Challenge of Summer Day Camps

What do you do with your children when summer camp is shorter than your workday or during those breaks in summer camps where the children are home all day? Do you spend each week planning out who will drop off & pick them up and entertain them until you get home from work? This is a common problem that many families who enroll their children in summer camp experience each year.

You can certainly find the high school student down the street, but they seem to have busier social schedules than most of us. And reliability can certainly be an issue. Grandma is often another option, but sometimes even “super grandma” needs a break during a beautiful summer day.

Introducing College Nannies

College Nannies+Tutors offers College Nannies to solve your pickup-dropoff problem with summer day camps.

College Nannies are educated, active role models. They are the flexible solution to your summer childcare dilemma. College Nannies+Tutors can provide a nanny for a couple hours each day or the full day, it’s your choice.

There is simply no substitute for someone who can really engage and have fun with your children. Not to mention, you have a reliable team of employees available to assist with backup when your nanny needs a day off or is not feeling well enough to help out. Their nannies are employed by College Nannies+Tutors, which means each employee is fully background screened, reference checked and trained, before they are assigned with a family. Their nannies are comfortable driving children to and from activities like summer camp.

Stop hunting for “that neighbor who watches kids in the summer.” We may have found your solution to before- and after-care for summer day camps.

Video Showcase of College Nannies+Tutors

Your Feedback is Desperately Needed

The College Nannies+Tutors program is not endorse or sponsored by Classroom Antics. This web article is an unpaid advertisement from Susan Cornish about the services her company offers, and I think it’s worth looking into.

I would love to hear your feedback on her company’s service, as well as other options parents have for before- and after-care for summer day camps in the Cleveland, Columbus, and Cincinnati areas. Please leave feedback in the comments below.

Robotics BSA Merit Badge

We discussed the Robotics Merit Badge in 2011 when the badge first came out. Little did we know this was going to revitalize the entire Boy Scout Merit Badge collection!

• Released: April 11, 2011
• Link: Requirements
• Attending a LEGO Robotics camp fulfills the most challenging requirements for this badge.

Game Design BSA Merit Badge

• Estimated launch date: March 2013

The Game Design Merit Badge will focus on one or more of the following:

• Electronic (games for computers, game systems, or mobile devices)
• Outdoor/Athletic (sports or games like capture the flag)
• Tabletop (dice-based games, board games, card games)
• Pen and Paper or Role-Playing Games

In addition to designing and testing a game, scouts will also learn:

• How to think critically about certain games
• What makes games fun
• Important game terms
• How to design and implement rules
• Problem solving

This is great news, which means that the Video Game Design camp will likely qualify for most of the requirements for the Game Design merit badge. It also means that if someone cannot attend a Video Game Design camp, the merit badge can also be attained by developing a tabletop, outdoor, or RPG game without a computer.

Animation BSA Merit Badge

• Estimated launch date: 2014

The unofficial information about this badge is: Computer or traditional animation tasks that will test a Scout’s creativity, artistic skills, and storytelling abilities. Boy, this sure sounds like everything we do in the Stop Motion Animation camp!

• Scout creativity: Every movie we make in Stop Motion Animation camp is unique, all the way down to the characters, background, action sequences, and storylines.
• Artistic skills: In camp, we build backgrounds with LEGO and green-screen chroma key, covering physical and artificial backdrops.
• Storytelling abilities: We storyboard our movies before we begin our video capture. This is key to detailing what we need to digitally capture to tell our story.

This merit badge should be fulfilled by most everything we do in Stop Motion Animation camp.

Programming BSA Merit Badge

• Estimated launch date: July 2013

The Programming Merit Badge will focus on the software side of the old Computers Merit Badge. We expect the badge to allow programming in any one of the many computer programming languages out there, including Scratch which we teach in our Computer Programming camp.

References

Bryan Wendell, an Eagle Scout, is the senior editor of Scouting magazine. His information was used in creating the content for this Classroom Antics blog article.

• Link: http://blog.scoutingmagazine.org/merit-badge-calendar/
  

Continue the Conversation

Do you know more about the merit badges mentioned in this article? What do you think about the direction the Boy Scouts of America is going with these new merit badges? Tell us in the Comments section below.

Campers may enroll in up-to-two camps. Choose one camp in the morning, and another in the afternoon. Or just sign-up for a morning or afternoon class for a half-day option. Camps are $159 each.

Fairfield 2013 Camp Details

Tri-County Assembly Church in Fairfield, Ohio

• July 1-5, 2013 (except July 4)
• Tri-County Assembly Church
  7350 Dixie Hwy
  Fairfield, OH 45014

Morning Camps - 9:00 AM to 12:00 PM

• Junior LEGO Robotics Day Camp (ages 7-9)
• Computer Programming Day Camp (ages 9-13)
• LEGO Robotics Day Camp (ages 9-13)

Afternoon Camps – 1:00 PM to 4:00 PM

• Junior Video Game Design Day Camp (ages 7-9)
• Stop-Motion Animation Day Camp (ages 9-13)
• Video Game Design Day Camp (ages 9-13)

The Tri-County Assembly Church has defered registrations to Classroom Antics Tech Camps for these classes. Register online.

This location is very close (within 15 minutes) to residents of Fairfield, Hamilton, Millville, Pleasant Run, Springdale, Glendale, Greenhills, Mt. Healthy, and parts of West Chester.

Well, we’re happy to tell you that Cromwell is doing well since he left the body shop, and he’s even improved a little.

Cromwell’s Improvements

• Additional hand clamp makes gripping items easier.
• Side head antennas design improves range that Cromwell can talk with other robots. With Cromwell traveling to Mars this summer, this was a much needed improvement.
• Larger torso allows Cromwell to have a larger battery, reducing the need to recharge between missions.
• Rectangular feet improve stability on foreign planet surfaces.
• Cromwell’s software was improved too. Running the new iRobot 2.0 operating system.
• Shinier green paint reflects the sun’s harmful rays when traveling unprotected in outer space.
• Cromwell drinks oil to avoid rusting out, and his new filtering system inside his body removes more impurities than ever before.

These are only a few of the improvements Cromwell received this winter. When we talked with Cromwell earlier this week about his new improvements, he said:

Many of the reasons to love Summer Tech Camps below are from parents and camp alumni. Hope you enjoy!

1. You get to try new things!
2. Meet new friends just like me!
3. The cool camp t-shirt I get to wear all summer!
4. Design an awesome Pac Man video game with rocket ships!
5. Produce the next movie sequel to Ice Age!
6. Write a computer program to do my homework!
7. Build a LEGO robot that walks the dog!
8. All the fun learning, none of the homework!
9. Your best friends today, you met at summer camp!
10. You get a full week of happy memories.
11. Develop life-long skills you’ll need when you get a “real job”.
12. Learn great life skills like critical thinking and reasoning skills.
13. It’s so much fun!

Add Your Reasons to Love Summer Camp

Add your reasons to love Summer Tech Camps below in the comments. We’d love to hear what makes camp special to you!

Campers may enroll in up-to-two camps. Choose one camp in the morning, and another in the afternoon. Or just sign-up for a morning or afternoon class for a half-day option. Camps are $199 each.

Montgomery 2013 Camp Details

Ascension Lutheran Church in Montgomery, Ohio

• June 17-21, 2013
• Ascension Lutheran Church
  7333 Pfeiffer Rd
  Cincinnati, OH 45242

Morning Camps - 9:00 AM to 12:00 PM

• Junior LEGO Robotics Day Camp (ages 7-9)
• Computer Programming Day Camp (ages 9-13)
• LEGO Robotics Day Camp (ages 9-13)

Afternoon Camps – 1:00 PM to 4:00 PM

• Junior Video Game Design Day Camp (ages 7-9)
• Stop-Motion Animation Day Camp (ages 9-13)
• Video Game Design Day Camp (ages 9-13)

The Ascension Lutheran Church has defered registrations to Classroom Antics Tech Camps for these classes. Register online.

This location is very close (within 15 minutes) to residents of Montgomery, Indian Hill, Kenwood, Blue Ash, Dillonvale, Madeira, Hazelwood, and Miamiville.

Campers may enroll in up-to-two camps. Choose one camp in the morning, and another in the afternoon. Or just sign-up for a morning or afternoon class for a half-day option. Camps are $199 each.

Mason 2013 Camp Details

Heritage Presbyterian Church in Mason, Ohio

• July 22-26, 2013
• Heritage Church
  6546 South Mason Montgomery Rd
  Mason, OH 45040

Morning Camps - 9:00 AM to 12:00 PM

• Junior LEGO Robotics Day Camp (ages 7-9)
• Computer Programming Day Camp (ages 9-13)
• LEGO Robotics Day Camp (ages 9-13)

Afternoon Camps – 1:00 PM to 4:00 PM

• Junior Video Game Design Day Camp (ages 7-9)
• Stop-Motion Animation Day Camp (ages 9-13)
• Video Game Design Day Camp (ages 9-13)

The Heritage Church has defered registrations to Classroom Antics Tech Camps for these classes. Register online.

This location is very close (within 15 minutes) to residents of Mason, West Chester, Maineville, Lebanon, Monroe, Sharonville, Loveland, Morrow, and Liberty Twp.