By Bill McMahon, Director

A powerful idea to emerge from recent thinking about human behavior is this: we don’t change because of willpower… we change most effectively because of our environment. This notion, which Angela Duckworth in a recent article in the NYT called ”the power of situational agency,” makes the case that the situations we live in—our routines, our physical spaces, the norms of our community—shape us far more than daily bursts of determination ever could. Given this, a key goal for parents should be to place their kids in environments where the people, structures, and culture bring out their best selves.

Below are core environmental ingredients that make Moosilauke a place where boys grow into their happiest, most resilient, best selves—often far more easily than they can at home.

1. No Phones, No Screens

Phones don’t exist at Moosilauke. Screens don’t exist. Social media doesn’t exist. What a gift for young people! What fills the space they leave behind? Connections, imagination, spontaneity, presence. This single shift changes everything.

2. More Face-to-Face Time With Peers

With boys across the country facing historic drops in in-person interactions, Moosilauke flips the script. Eliminating screen time, living in cabins, eating together, playing together—Moosilauke creates the social connections that boys crave and need, and can have an increasingly hard time finding when at home.  

And the campers your son will live with are an intentionally diverse group (geographically, socio-economically, racially) because we know that a diverse community benefits everyone.

3. A Daily Experience Centered on Positive Risk-Taking

Research tells us that performance character and well-being are developed when boys leave their comfort zone, try something new, and encounter and overcome failure in the process. But in our modern world, positive risk-taking by boys is tamped down by a number of factors including the desire to look cool (and thus avoid failure at all costs), increasing specialization in sports, and parents who over-scaffold the lives of their kids.  

Moosilauke’s unique program of broad and deep positive risk taking across three main program areas–land sports, waterfront, and outdoor adventure–faciltated by a schedule that balances structure and choice, ensures that every boy on a daily basis accelerates on their path to becoming their best selves. Challenge → Effort →Support→ Competency/Mastery→ Well-being becomes the daily rhythm at Moose.

4. More Interactions with Aspirational Adults Who Care

Research tells us that boys thrive best when they have aspirational adult male figures who are not their parents, know them, care about them, and hold them to a high standard on a daily basis. Ask any camper or alum of Moosilauke and they will tell you one of the most powerful parts of the Moose experience is the multiple daily interactions with our amazing, caring counselors and administrators.

5. More Time in Nature Every Day 

We all know that time outside in nature improves a boys’ mood, attention, energy, and overall well-being. For most campers, their nature quotient at camp is significantly higher than at any other time of the year.

6. Daily Chores That Build Ownership and Responsibility

Daily cabin clean-up and meal-time jobs, along with weekly community focused activities, teach responsibility and contribution. Everyone pitches in at Moose, and this shared work builds one’s sense of self and community.

7.  A Culture that Values the Things Boys Need Most

At Moosilauke, we work hard every moment of every day to create a culture that emphasizes effort over achievement, that explicitly values inclusion and has a zero tolerance for teasing, and that ideally allows each boy to bring his best, authentic self to his day-to-day experience. 

In summary, at Moose we strive to make the right things easy and the wrong things hard. Our unique routines, emphases, culture, and overall environment, make positive and responsible choices easy, growth a natural outcome, and fun and well-being abundant.