Brighton Girls Camp is a camp for young women, ages 12-14, to have testimony-building experiences, form long-lasting friendships, and make unforgettable memories. It truly is God’s summer home!
Project Purpose
For the past few years, I have had the privilege of working with those at Brighton Girls Camp to make it a meaningful experience. This past year, the camp celebrated 100 years of joyful memories. With that celebration, a new presidency was called to run the camp. Those women decided that this would be the opportunity for Brighton Girls Camp to implement changes that needed to be made.
The purpose of my project was to help with that endeavor. With my communications skills developed in college, I felt qualified to help out with the production of social media outreach and videos. I also helped out with t-shirt designs and logos, creating the outline and finding pictures for a video, and helping them hire a staff with the culture that they are looking for. The original objective was a series of 8 reels to show on the Brighton Girls Camp Instagram and developing 5 designs or logos. I ended up doing a lot more beyond that objective.
The Project
Starting off with the t-shirt logos and designs, I partnered with DeDe Jones to design the following logos. Each were picked specifically for Brighton, representing different aspects of the camp. The images in plain black and white are the final approved designs, but the additional logos are earlier drafts. This is a sampling of the designs that were on the table.
Focusing on the logo for this year, the theme was picked based off of a scripture from the Book of Mormon. The idea of mindfulness is portrayed in the lightbulb. Things are clearer when the light is turned on. On the inside of the lightbulb, the 6 different Brighton flowers are represented in the image. These flowers carry a special meaning at the camp and will serve as a reminder to campers whenever they see the logo.
I created a series of reels for the camp’s social media, using personal experiences from camp. The council at Brighton Girls Camp asked that I wouldn’t share those with the audios of campers, as they only have authorization to share that on the official Brighton Girls Camp Website.
However, two of the reels have been posted publicly on my account, and will be up for the next week. The following QR codes allow you access!
How It Came Together
Reels:
Reels are a new medium for me. The truth is, before this project, I had never looked into how to create one. However, I discovered it to be so much fun! I watched a few videos on how to make reels and saved a few formats to copy later on before getting to work on my own.
The reel below, also accessed through the QR code, was a fun little photo shoot I took in February with one of the staffers from last year. Her prompt was to show how she felt while up at Brighton. I kept calling out different scenarios and she reacted, while I snapped away. This was a quick, fun reel to create. It taught me that Instagram really can be a simple resource to share a message.
Logos:
The logos were actually the hardest part of the process. It was a lot of back and forth between the leadership of Brighton Girls Camp, DeDe, and me. I have discovered that working with other people is fun, but also makes things a little less efficient.
I started by talking with the council about what sort of things they would want to see as a logo design and what words would represent the camp. Using both Canva and InDesign, I drafted multiple options of each, took a poll, and tried again. This system repeated itself until everyone was satisfied.
Additional work outside of the media content included the following:
- Developing a plan for camp culture, including a curriculum for the staff
- Planning workshops to teach staffers in the month of May
- Prepping mental and behavior health trainings with assistance from my mentor, Andra Hansen
- Helping out with over 20 hours of interviews/discussion
- Revamping the annual video that is posted on the Brighton Girls Camp website, working with Sasha Gordon
- Outreach to sponsoring stakes, registration meetings, and personal advocation for the camp
Mountains to Climb
With all things in life, people are both a source of strength and difficulty. Volunteering hours with these 4 lovely ladies was a source of joy.
Some of the back and forth on t-shirt colors and designs was pretty difficult. With the way that Brighton Girls Camp is set up, things are debated until there is unanimous decision. A lot of the designs had to be tweaked over and over again, until everyone was satisfied.
Selecting staff was also pretty difficult, because each person had differing opinions about the compatibility of applicants with camp culture. Those conversations were long; however, they taught me the value of knowing the why behind your opinions and decisions. Had I not known why I liked different applicants, I never would have been able to fully express myself.
Another challenge was being a little overbooked. While working on this project for Brighton Girls Camp, I was also working with Andra Hansen and Voice Advocacy to host a community and panel discussion about Child and Adolescent Well-Being. That project took up a lot of my spare time with community outreach, panel prep, website design and coordinating efforts between team members.
While it made it a little tricky to work on both projects, they actually helped me improve my work ethic. I would learn a skill for one project, and it would transfer over to the other! It helped me turn mountains into molehills.
Lessons Learned
I have been so grateful for the opportunity to work with Brighton Girls Camp. It has helped me recognize my capacity in this field and how to enlist the help of others.
Stretching myself to learn new things has been such a useful experience. I now understand Instagram reels, InDesign, and Photoshop a whole lot better. Setting up a game plan for future posts has also helped me be more creative in the process.
My two biggest takeaways: hold yourself to your goals and recognize that most work is people first. By holding yourself to your goals, you stay on track. It makes the final process so much easier! You are able to knock out the most important things and create a better product. By recognizing that work is people first, you are better able to adapt to the mountains that might pop up in your way. Listening before acting helped me move further in my project than I had expected. Rather than the initial plan of 8 reels and 5 logos, I was able to add on a variety of additional projects. Understanding the end vision at the beginning provides some much needed direction.
This project has put me in the path of some incredible individuals, including Andra Hansen, DeDe Smith, Sasha Gordon, Kathy and Dan Mills, Ann Barbieri, and Caryn Esplin. Without their mentoring, I would not have the same end result. Putting yourself out there and offering your skills can actually put you further ahead than ever anticipated!