Kids, police build relationships at summer camp in 'troubled days'
Jul. 29—Water balloons, fishing, dance parties and pizza spell out a day at many summer camps. But, at the National Conference for Community and Justice's summer camp, kids also get to run an obstacle course created by the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office's SWAT team.
NCCJ, a Dayton nonprofit, runs programs year-round to educate community members of all ages and to advocate for diversity, acceptance and inclusion. The Police and Youth Together Camp is one of organization's programs targeted at 10- to 13-year-olds to build relationships with law enforcement.
The camp, which started in 2010, helps Montgomery County youth understand the situations they see on the news, according to NCCJ Director of Education Lake Miller. He said the camp plays host to an open conversation between young people and police.
"I think one of the most beautiful pieces of this is it's honest; it's open. There's no question that is off limits for the young people," Miller said. "And for many of us, we don't have that opportunity to come in and just have those dialogues. ... We don't have the opportunities to ask somebody, 'Hey, I saw this in the news, and I'm really struggling to understand why that happened.' "
Nailah Abram, 11, participated in the week-long summer camp for the second time this year, at the Dayton FOP Hall in Huber Heights. She watches the news every day and wants to be a news reporter when she grows up. She said she asked her parents if she could go to the camp after she watched news coverage of the murder of George Floyd in the summer of 2020.
"It's fun, and it makes me feel a little safer with these police, as well," Abram said.
The 60 kids involved in this year's camp session spent Thursday outside fishing, having a water balloon fight and running an obstacle course put together by the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office SWAT team.
SWAT members, including Chief Deputy Daryl Wilson who serves as team commander, spoke with the campers about what the team does and showed off their new SWAT vehicle. The kids had the opportunity to ask the officers questions about policing before running the obstacle course. The course had teams of kids doing push-ups, carrying a battering ram, shooting a target with a nerf gun and donning a SWAT helmet and shield to dodge foam football projectiles.
Joelle Staches, 13, said she had fun running the obstacle course, but it was a lot of work. She said getting to meet the SWAT team and look around at the vehicles and equipment was very interesting. This is her first year at the Police and Youth Together Camp. She signed up because she is interested in policing and solving crimes, although she's not sure if she wants a career in it.
The SWAT team made sure the kids were having fun, which Wilson said was one of the main reasons his team was there; that, and igniting positive law enforcement relationships with the kids. Wilson, as well as some of the NCCJ volunteers, said some of the kids in these programs do want to become police officers or first responders, which he said is another reason to foster community-police relationships early on.
"Pretty much (we're) bringing the community together — especially in these troubled days that we're living in. With all this bad news, this is good news," Wilson said.
Wilson said sometimes kids look to social media for answers to what's being shown on the news, and he's grateful for the opportunity to be able to answer those questions directly.
One boy asked Wilson "Weren't you here last year?" during his explanation of the SWAT team, and Wilson said it was positive sign that what they are doing at the camp is working. He said it demonstrated the relationships the kids are growing with law enforcement.
