Anyway, as some of you know already, I spent last week with the State Police. One week a year, the State Police puts on free camp for 11-13 year olds, called Lancaster County Camp Cadet. It is not your typical crafts-and-fun-activities-all-day summer camp. It's basically a police academy for kids. You don't walk unless you're indoors- you run everywhere you go. You are not allowed to eat with your elbows on the table. You are called by your last name, and you call all the officers "sir" or "ma'am". I had never been away from my family for a week before, and I didn't know anyone there at first. But I ended up loving it. I'll run through an average day.
The First Platoon girls' barracks is silent and peaceful until about 5:15 A.M., when an officer flips on the light switch, bangs her hand on the wooden wall, and tells us to get up. Chances are, you are probably sore and stiff from the day before. As soon as everyone is ready, we run through the freezing cold darkness to a large grassy area where we meet the other cadets and the officers, who are quick to inform you that your only easy day was yesterday. :) Then PT begins. We run, do pushups, bear crawls, obstacle course races, do stretching and ab workouts on the wet grass, etc.. Afterward we get into platoon formation (there was two platoons with four squads each) and are excused by the drill instructor squad by squad into the chow hall for breakfast.
After breakfast and a 3 minute shower, we race back to the grassy area as fast as we can. We form up again, and our drill instructor hops up onto the wooden picnic table known as the Table of Woe. Then we usually did drills or had a block of instruction. Throughout the week we had quite a few lectures and demonstrations on law enforcement related topics, such as:
- Red Rose K-9 Search Dogs
- Lancaster County SERT Team
- Secret Service
- Lancaster County Prison
- Mounted Police
That was just a few of them. We got to watch a shooting demonstration, practice water rescue techniques in the pool and see the police helicopter land not far from where we were standing. They set an old car on fire and we watched some firefighters put it out. On Thursday we had a field trip to Refreshing Mountain Camp, where we did climbing, zip lining and team building activities. After lunch we normally swam and did more drills or watched more demonstrations. Drills are basically practicing turns, marching, salutes, etc.. If you made a mistake you often had to do pushups. We had to do a lot of standing at attention, which means standing still, staring straight ahead no matter what distracting things are happening around you, with your arms at your sides, even if there's a bug crawling up your face or you have to itch your leg really, really bad.
Although there was a lot of drills (which I actually liked most of the time) and serious stuff, we did fun things too, like swimming, dodge ball, a tug-of-war tournament, and Frisbee catching. We graduated on Friday evening (most people don't have a graduation at the end of summer camp, but again, this is not a normal camp!!). The ceremony was held at a church nearby. On the way home, I had so many stories to tell my family. It was neat to get to know the other officers and cadets, and I learned so much cool stuff. It definitely wasn't always easy (some kids wanted to go home the first day), but overall I loved it and I'm so glad I went! The following to pictures were taken after the graduation; the top one is me with Sergeant Palmer and the bottom one is with the drill instructor, Corporal Comerford.
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