Name: Sally Sweeney
Position: Recruiter for Camp War Eagle Summer Camp
City/State: Rogers, AR
Class/content area taught:
Training and explaining counselors’ roles and offering feedback, support, and encouragement
What you are most excited about with your new career:
I get excited about seeing my strengths utilized in unique ways in this role; every one of my top five StrengthsQuest strengths resides in the “Relationship Building” category, so in a role in which I am required to create and deepen relationships with counselors and campers, I am able to fulfill my job while utilizing some of my strengths, and that feels incredibly life-giving. In my Summer role, I love getting to teach and train counselors how to effectively do their job while communicating love to their campers as well as teaching campers how to try new things while relationship-building.
What you enjoy most about teaching:
I love working as a recruiter because it combines passions of mine with strengths of mine! I absolutely love interviewing college students for the position of camp counselor. I love to listen to, encourage, and teach others, and I am able to do that in this role. I love that, as an Elementary Education graduate, I am able to relate to them my experiences as a camp counselor and connect the growth I found in the classroom as well as encourage them to seek growth for themselves outside the classroom. I enjoy seeing others’ potentials and getting to develop them to the best of my ability- just like a teacher in his or her classroom!
Ways KSU especially helped prepare you for your new career:
My teaching journey began after I first worked at camp, so I related much of what I learned in classes to what I had seen at camp, and vice versa. KSU Education classes greatly prepared me for my current role in training me how to facilitate groups of people, providing me with management strategies, and training me how to effectively communicate material to varying ages in varying ways. Organizing many moving parts and prioritizing tasks while working with others are also skills I gained in the College of Ed that I use now!
Specifics about your background that make this position the perfect
fit for you:
I love empowering others to see and seek their potentials. This specific role feels like a perfect fit for me because I am able to do this by interviewing, hiring, and training new counselors. In this way, I am able to combine my passion of empowering others to grow with my strengths of empathizing and developing!
Suggestions/encouragement for new teachers:
I would like to encourage new teachers that there are plenty of teaching jobs available that include but also exceed the classroom teacher! I very well may do that one day, but for now I am very thankful for a job in which those teaching skills are utilized while taking part in something very unique such as a summer camp! Because teaching skills are useful in any setting, I value Education as being one of the most versatile and valuable degrees one can pursue! Keep it up!!
Other thoughts?
“Be fearless in pursuit of what sets your soul on fire.”
– Jennifer Lee