The Boys & Girls Clubs of Kawartha Lakes (BGCKL) is planning to offer both licensed child care and an in-person summer camp program.
Licensed child care will be provided at the Kids in Motion site in Lindsay and at the Dr. George Hall Child Care site in Little Britain, although BGCKL has not yet confirmed start dates.
The organization will offer a general summer camp program for children ages five to 12 in four groups at its Lindsay site. Registration will open at noon on Wednesday, June 17th, with the camp scheduled to begin on Monday, June 29th.
“Everyone at the club is eager to welcome children back to our facility,” says BGCKL executive director Amy Terrill. “We have been working hard behind the scenes to clean and disinfect our facility and to develop procedures that meet health and safety guidelines so that we can offer a high-quality experience while keeping everyone safe.”
To request a space in the summer camp program, email info@bgckl.com or call 705-324-4493, ext 200. Requests will be processed on a first-come first-served basis. All registration will be week-long and the cost will be $147.50 per week for members.
BGCKL is not offering a summer camp program in Peterborough at this time, although it is working with its partners in Peterborough to see if such a program could be offered.
Both the licensed child care and summer camp programs will require approval from the Haliburton, Kawartha, Pine Ridge District Health Unit before they can begin.
BGCKL will be adopting the following public health directives provided by the Ontario government:
- Children and staff will be placed in groups of 10 or less day over day.
- A COVID-19 response plan to be implemented if a child, parent or staff member/provider is exposed to COVID-19.
- All staff and children will be screened prior to entry (anyone feeling unwell must stay home.
- Daily attendance records, which are always part of the program, will be revised to support contact tracing by the health unit if needed.
- The facility will be been thoroughly cleaned and disinfected, with cleaning protocols meeting or exceeding provincial standards.
- Drop-off and pick-up of children will be designed to facilitate physical distancing.
The organization will also be implementing additional protocols:
- Outdoor programming will be encouraged as much as possible.
- Groups will have specific room and equipment assignments with no crossover.
- Supplies and equipment that cannot be easily disinfected will be removed.
- Children will be encouraged to maintain social distance.
- Hand hygiene will be encouraged and additional hand washing stations provided.
- Supervisors will be in place to monitor social distancing, safety, quality of programming, hand hygiene, support staff and other related needs.
- For camps, face coverings (non-medical masks) will be used if physical distancing of at least two metres cannot be maintained. Consideration will be given to participants when face coverings are not tolerated due to by underlying health, behaviour issues, or beliefs.
Summer camp groups will be using the basketball courts at BGCKL’s facility at 107 Lindsay Street during the day, but after 5 p.m. the courts may be used by the public.
However, the splash pad will only be used by the summer camp groups and child care programs — it will not be open for public use.
“The capacity limits mandated by the province and health and safety requirements leave us no choice but to limit access to the splash pad to our summer camp groups and childcare programs,” Terrill says. “This is not an easy decision as we know how much our visitors enjoyed the splash pad last year, but we encourage the public to access other alternatives.”
BGCKL also plans to offer a virtual summer camp with the support of Jays Care Foundation. The organization continues to provide nutrition support to vulnerable families and virtually delivers infant and child development and various support services. Youth leadership programs will also be offered through virtual means.
Rentals of club facilities remain unvailable until further notice.
For more information about BGCKL, visit bgckl.com.
