During my time working at Camp SAY 2019, a summer camp for young people who stutter, I was part of a collaborative staff that wholly believed everyone’s voice matters and deserves to be heard, even if some people may take longer to speak than others. Throughout this experience, the staff encouraged campers to express themselves however they desired by participating in various activities such as singing, public speaking, reciting poetry, drawing, creative writing, and many others within Camp SAY’s supportive and empowering environment. Personally, Camp SAY taught me that being an effective communicator does not mean being fluent all the time, and I believe the written word can serve as an outlet for not just people who stutter like me but for all people to effectively express themselves and communicate ideas that are meaningful and worthwhile.

                Before the Camp SAY staff members and campers moved into the cabins at the Pocono Springs Campground, the camp directors had the staff come together for a one-week training program at nearby East Stroudsburg University. During that week, we participated in several exercises that allowed new staff members like me and returning staff members to get to know each other and prepare to wholly care for the campers. The training programs ranged from active-listening exercises that tasked us to remember and repeat stories our coworkers shared with us, educational lessons about stuttering, and informational sessions about the camp’s policies and procedures. About halfway through training, I enjoyed breaking off with my office staff colleagues where we introduced ourselves and did several bonding activities. We all immediately meshed perfectly well together, despite coming from California, Colorado, New Jersey, New York, Texas and – perhaps a couple of outliers – Sweden and New Zealand. We quickly reached the collective understanding we would do whatever was necessary and do our part to make sure camp was an enjoyable experience for everybody. Specifically, as we meticulously labeled and organized laundry bags for every camper and staff member, I recognized that our team would work together to make sure every single thing went smoothly no matter its scope, and we made it a point of pride that everyone else at camp could depend on us. Although my role with the Office and Support Staff did not always provide opportunities for me to interact with the campers, each of us had our moments with the campers when the time came. Personally, I loved when one of the younger campers came up to me and asked if I could walk him back to his cabin after he ate breakfast so he could brush his teeth. During our walk, he talked my ear off about how much fun he was having with his friends and counselors and made sure I was having a good time at camp too. Before I walked him back to the pool so he could meet up with his friends, he gave me a big smile showing me how good of a brusher he was and told me his dentist from home says it is important to stick to a tooth-brushing routine. 

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               Without a doubt, Camp SAY was an immensely transformative and enjoyable experience for me. When I returned to campus for my writing-intensive journalism classes during the fall semester of my junior year, I immediately recognized the profound and ongoing impact my time at camp had and still has on me. Moreover, I started to appreciate the potential I had in my classes and future sports media career to tell powerful and expressive stories through writing. Camp SAY taught me that the difference between people who stutter and people who do not stutter is that people who stutter may take longer to say what they have to say. Although everybody communicates differently, everyone’s voice and perspective deserve to be heard. For this reason, I have tried to retain as many of the valuable lessons from my classes as possible, such as how to write for specific audiences and purposes, the importance of having accuracy, brevity and conciseness in my writing, and using research, interviewing and copyediting skills to enhance my storytelling and writing abilities. 

               Six months after my experience at Camp SAY, my JOUR 361: Introductory Reporting & Writing class presented me with opportunities to tell powerful and expressive stories in my own right. In this class, I learned about many important journalistic skills and concepts such as interview techniques, lede writing, the inverted pyramid structure, and AP Style guidelines for news writing. About halfway into the class, I was assigned to put these skills to practice by writing a web story on a topic of my choice. I used this opportunity to write about stuttering, and I met with one of my coworkers from Camp SAY living locally in Columbia who was willing to be interviewed. As I look back on this assignment, the part that resonates the most with me is the research and planning I did during the prewriting phase to create my series of interview questions for him and hear his responses. Through the research and interviewing I did before I began writing the story, I learned firsthand that storytelling starts well before a writer puts their pen to paper, or in today’s increasingly digital age, fingers to the keyboard. This assignment allowed me to fully understand how asking open-ended interview questions can prompt an interviewee to provide in-depth and authentic responses far better than the writer could have even imagined or hoped for. As my coworker passionately expressed his genuine perspectives through each response, I realized assembling his words and the things I had already planned to include into the story would not be as challenging as I first thought once the time came for me to move on to the actual writing phase of the writing process. 

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             Furthermore, this assignment also led to me meeting and interviewing a Communications Sciences and Disorders professor and current speech language pathologist on campus. Just as my coworker from Camp SAY did during his interview, this professor provided me a plethora of powerful and useful quotes for my story. I am never going to forget hearing him say my favorite quote from him and favorite quote I have ever used in a story: “I would say that we need to hear a lot more stuttering especially in the popular media. In order to normalize stuttering, we need to hear more and if we can normalize it, it’s going to make some progress in reducing the stigma surrounding stuttering."

            As a person who stutters, I strongly believe in the power of the written word as an effective medium of communication and expression. My experiences at Camp SAY coupled with the prewriting components that went into my story in my Introductory Reporting & Writing class have served me well in strengthening and fully appreciating that. My experiences at Camp SAY, my Introductory Reporting & Writing class project, and all of the things I have learned along the way have led to me becoming more open about my own struggles and triumphs with stuttering and recognizing what it means to truly listen to what other people experience to best empathize and understand them. Authenticity is a major aspect of Camp SAY, and my coursework has shown me it matters in writing as well. Being on the Professional and Civic Engagement pathway for Graduation with Leadership Distinction, I understand the potential to learn from and support classmates, peers and colleagues. All the while, I know that although some people may appear different at first glance or the first time we hear them speak, they truly are just like everybody else.