This is a guest post by Amanda Metskas, the Executive Director of Camp Quest.

Hemant adds: I’m working together with Greta Christina, Jen McCreight, and JT Eberhard to raise more money for Camp Quest than PZ Myers! (It’s almost a fair fight.)

Also, when my side wins, I think there’s an unwritten rule that we get to shave off PZ’s beard. He doesn’t know that yet, but let that rumor spread across the Internets!

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The nontheist community offers many programs for adults, but very few for children. To provide a future for our values we need to provide freethinking families with a place for their kids to find community, develop critical thinking skills, and learn ethics and values. Fortunately, that is what Camp Quest is all about. Well, that, and all of the summer camp fun that you can pack into a week.

Fun, Friends, & Freethought

Camp Quest builds a community for children and teenagers from atheist, agnostic, humanist and other freethinking families. We provide campers a place to explore their developing worldviews, ask questions, and make friends in an environment supportive of critical thinking and skepticism. Camp Quest is open to campers from all backgrounds. We encourage campers to think for themselves, be comfortable with who they are, and engage respectfully with people who have different views.

Sound good? You can get involved! Camp Quest needs support from a broad community of freethinkers to be successful. You can donate online through out awesome new website. You can also register a camper or volunteer to be a camp counselor.

Instead of me telling you more about why Camp Quest is a great experience for kids, I want to share some of what the campers themselves say.

“Camp Quest helps me remember that there are other people my age who think like I do.”

“To be kind to others of different beliefs.”

“…to be a leader, about photography, different plants, about the oil spill, and many other things.”

“That it’s okay to be myself.”
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“how to make really good friends in just a week.”

“I’ve learned how to question things better.”

“That it’s okay to be an atheist.”

“So many things I can’t even count.”

Pretty amazing, right? Help us make that happen for more kids. When you donate online, you can make a one-time gift or an automatic monthly donation and put Camp Quest on your payroll. Paypal processes our donations, but you don’t need a paypal account in order to make your gift online with a credit card. You can also mail a check to Camp Quest, Inc., P.O. Box 2552, Columbus, OH 43216. Camp Quest is a 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation. Donations are tax deductible. If you have any questions about making a donation, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Here’s how your support helps us bring the Camp Quest to experience to more children:

1. More camp locations than ever before.

   Camp Quest Chesapeake, Camp Quest Montana, and Camp Quest South Carolina are new this year! That brings us to 10 Camp Quest locations in North America, plus our overseas partners in the UK, Ireland, and Norway. By providing support to these new camps, Camp Quest is available to more children and families.

2. More campers attending Camp Quest sessions.

   Registration numbers for several of our locations are higher than ever this year. Camp Quest Minnesota is already full, and has started a waiting list. Several other camp locations are likely to completely fill up this year. (If you’re not registered for 2011 yet, you might want to go do that now.)

3. More help to Camp Quest camps to make 2011 our best year yet!

   At Camp Quest, Inc. we provide all kinds of support to Camp Quest camps to help them launch, and help them improve and grow from year to year. Camp Quest, Inc. provides financial support, publicity, technological services, training, troubleshooting and more to Camp Quest camps. That support makes it possible for our dedicated volunteers to launch, and run amazing Camp Quest camps serving freethinking families across North America.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you’ll be a part of helping Camp Quest grow. For more updates from us, you can friend us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.

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Remember: If you’d like to help Camp Quest, use the widget below!

The Columbus Dispatch has an excellent article about Camp Quest, the summer camp for children of atheist parents:

The camp director’s housekeeping lecture met the usual disinterest from the dining hall full of sweaty, bug-bitten kids.

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But August Brunsman finished his cleaning directive with a so-subtle-the-kids-probably-missed-it pun that made clear that Camp Quest is not the usual summer offering.

“Remember,” he said, a slight grin crossing his face, “cleanliness is next to godlessness.”

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Started in 1996, Camp Quest emphasizes critical thinking and the scientific method. Counselors lead philosophical discussions about topics such as the nature of happiness.

Consideration for others is a key component of the “Rational Rules for Living,” posted on the wall of the dining hall at the 4-H camp where Camp Quest Ohio rented space.

Rule No. 1: “Remember that everybody is here to have a good time. Respect all people, whatever their beliefs, which you encounter while you are here.”

Amanda Metskas, the director of CQ, is also featured in a nice video on the newspaper’s website explaining what goes on at the camp:

I wish I had known about these camps when I was that age… the kids I’ve spoken to who have attended Camp Quest at any of its locations have had nothing but wonderful things to say about it. They can’t wait till the next summer when they can go back again.

(Thanks to Carrie for the link!)

Helen Kagin, the co-founder of Camp Quest (along with her husband Edwin), died yesterday from complications following cancer surgery at the age of 76.

She had been unconscious for days and her family decided to take her off life support, as she had requested in her Living Will.

She was one of the sweetest women I’ve ever met. Her eyes would light up every time we saw each other and she was often seen at atheist conferences and events. It was so cute to see her and Edwin together, always acting like they were newlyweds.

Dave Silverman of American Atheists knew her well and wrote this:

She was great. She smiled infectiously, loved children (who loved her back), and gave of herself selflessly, but that’s just the beginning.

Helen was one of the founders of Camp Quest, which has already had a direct positive impact on hundreds of children, with nearly unlimited potential for growth. This self-sustaining, quick-growing organization does one thing very well — it makes atheist children happy. That’s one hell of a legacy, one hell of a footprint, one hell of a ripple.

Sharon Fratepietro also knew Helen through their shared activism and wrote this in an email:

I will always remember her as a really nice person, unguarded, friendly, and really interested in other people. It was such a predictable pleasure to greet her year after year at conferences. She never changed.

Executive Director of the Secular Student Alliance August Brunsman adds:

I had the pleasure and honor of knowing Helen for just shy of eleven years. The joy, intensity, and brilliance with which she lived her life are totally impossible to capture in words. At Camp Quest Ohio, most of the kids, and the younger counselors played this vigorous, no-holds-barred version of keep away in the pool with a ball. There was no leader, no ref, no written rules, no score keeping. It just came together organically summer after summer. With a small handful of exceptions, only the youngest staffers played with any regularity. Mostly only the campers had the energy to play. Well into her 70′s, Helen could be counted on to play every time the ball was in motion.

In addition to the pool game, the thing that may stay with me the most about Helen, is my memory of her leading us singing the Phil Ochs song “When I’m Gone”. Part of it goes…

“And I won’t be laughing at the lies when I’m gone
And I can’t question how or when or why when I’m gone
Can’t live proud enough to die when I’m gone
So I guess I’ll have to do it while I’m here”

Helen did.

Helen’s husband Edwin — I can’t imagine what he must be feeling right now — wrote a brief eulogy on his website (more is coming later):

I know for a certainty that if she had decision making capacity, Helen would not have wanted to live on a ventilator and dialysis. Surrounded by family members, the ventilator was withdrawn and the life force that had been Helen departed within minutes. And she was dead.

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Helen’s body is now an empty shell, and it will be treated as such. The body will be picked up tomorrow by a funeral home and immediately cremated. The ashes will be given to her daughter Caroline, who has proved her very substantial character during these past few weeks. A celebration of Helen’s remarkable life will be announced later.

And what a life it was! I am honored to have shared it with her for twenty-five years. She will be missed beyond my ability to say. She was the finest human being I have ever known.

If you would honor her accomplishments and memory, do not send flowers; do not send money to some charity.

Help send a kid to Camp Quest.

If you can give a gift in Helen’s honor, here are links to the donation pages for the various Camp Quests:

• Texas
• Florida
• California
• Michigan
• Minnesota
• Smoky Mountains
• Ohio
• Ontario, Canada
• United Kingdom

If you’re near Minnesota (or, hell, even if you’re not) and you’d like to spend a couple weeks of your summer helping out at Camp Quest, the camp for children of atheist parents, they’re in need of volunteer counselors!

For more information, just send them an email

It’s never too early to get excited about Camp Quest!

Amie Parsons, the director of CQ Texas, recently announced next year’s dates at the Texas Freethought Convention.

Gotta love those presents at the end of the video

(Thanks to Joe for the link!)