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Tips for Staff Applicants
Camp Sequoia is an Equal Opportunity Employee that endeavors to hire the best available candidates from across the US. Please note that routinely our number of applicants exceeds the number of available positions. In our most recent season we had over 3000 applicants for less than two dozen available positions. We recognize that inflation has been significant since the pandemic and as such, our starting salary has increased OVER 50% since 2020. We are happy to discuss specific salary ranges based on qualifications with anyone who has completed a staff application. Congratulations, you’ve started the process on the right foot by reviewing our website and the tips below.
Review Our Tips for Staff Applicants
- All of our interviews are video interviews (typically Zoom, Skype or FaceTime). Please recognize that even in a video format, our expectation is that the attire will be professional (business casual).
- We prep for interviews and expect that you do as well. No-shows to interviews will not be rescheduled. Please do not ask. We will not respond to no-shows. We understand that life happens, so if you need to reschedule you are welcome to reach out BEFORE your confirmed interview time and we will be happy to work with you on a new time to speak.
- Be aware of what is going on behind you in the interview.
- In preparation of the interview, confirm the interview time for your time zone. All scheduled interview times are on “Camp Sequoia Time Zone” aka Eastern Time Zone. See note above on no-shows.
- Review the website. Don’t ask questions that reflect facts or information that is already publicly available. Be familiar with things like staffing ratios, schedule of the day, what the lodging looks like, our location etc.
- Be ready and eager to discuss your credentials and what motivated you to achieve them. If you are a lifeguard, what excited you about being a lifeguard and how does that translate to your desire to work for Camp Sequoia?
- Be prepared to respond to one or more what-if scenarios that relate to working with kids (leadership roles will have specific questions related to advanced levels of expertise).
- Know what role you are applying for and be able to articulate whether you desire to run the STEM program, be a nursing assistant, teach cooking, or as part of our scaffolding success team (SST) – as examples. This means that you should be familiar with the typical activities that we offer at Camp Sequoia.
- Review the camp dates and residential expectations. Please don’t apply if you’ll need to be gone for 3 or more consecutive days during the time that our campers are in residence. We do not hire partial season staff, nor is it fair to our community for you to miss extended time from our schedule.
- Be ready to have something that you could teach a member of our directorate. Our leadership team is always open to new research, ideas, and methods and we encourage all staff members to bring their expertise to our community as we provide an opportunity for young men to become the best versions of themselves.
- Be advised that Camp Sequoia completes a minimum of three background checks on all applicants (including a fingerprint based FBI database search). If you have indiscretions of youth or potentially disqualifying events in your background, the appropriate time to discuss those is when an interview is offered. We put the safety of children first and take this responsibility very seriously.
- Be advised that depending on role for which you are applying, there is an expectation that you’ll have a valid driver’s license and clean driving history. This typically applies to all leadership roles (division heads, SST staff, medical staff, admin roles). We do driver training on our camp vehicles for all of our drivers as well as a DMV driving record check for anyone who will be transporting, or has a chance of potentially transporting, our kids. If you are applying for a medical role, you’ll need to have reliable transportation for local (less than 20 mile round trip) visits to the pharmacy etc.
- Camp Sequoia is a drug and alcohol free campus. This means that if you are a smoker, if you vape or consume tobacco products of any kind, that you’ll have difficulty in our community finding the time and space for this off-site. We like to be honest and upfront with potential staff about this. We also do not allow alcohol in on our campus, camp buildings or residences. If you have specific questions, please feel free to ask. Recreational drug use is not part of our community culture.
- If you’ve never worked at a camp (your experience working with kids is as a counselor, teacher, social worker, nurse etc.) consider before the interview how the skills you’ve gleaned in your previous role are applicable to Camp Sequoia’s setting.
- Please have at least two higher level, open-ended questions for your interviewer. To reiterate, these should not be questions that can be answered through a review of the website, a google search or reading any of the work published by the leadership team. These questions should help us understand your passions, or help you understand our passion for creating this intentional community for twice exceptional young men.
- Please note that if you have questions about employment after the interview, we encourage you to reach out to us via chat, email or just call us. We the high volume of staff applicants for the current season, we will not be able to answer questions regarding your potential staff employment/contract offer prior to camp by third parties. This means that if your mom, dad, or significant other has questions about the staff experience not answered on the website, they should ask you and if you don’t have an answer YOU need to be the one to contact us if it is something that you would like to have answered.
- Finally, if you require any special accommodation for the interview or for the position at camp, please make sure that we are aware. For example, if your sister is getting married and you need to have a weekend to attend the wedding, let us know. If you are interviewing for a job as a principal or school social worker in the fall and you know you’ll need to have a flexible day off once or twice during the summer, please let us know this as well. We are good– but not all of us can read minds. It is your sole responsibility to be transparent and honest with yourself and us about your abilities and any needs for reasonable accommodations.
We are proud of our staff. Those whom we invite back are hard-working, ethical, trustworthy, caring, and incredibly skilled individuals who will help you every step of the way if you are hired to be part of our team.
We look forward to your application and wish you the best of luck with the interview process. Thanks for taking the time to review these notes. We encourage you to mention in your interview that you are looking forward to the smell of cooking chocolate from the local chocolate Blommer’s factory.
Staff Application
Please submit with a current resume.