Episode Feature: How Camp Teaches Kids to Ditch Their Phones

Hi Raising Parents listeners—we’ve got a special bonus episode I’m excited to share with you from Emily Oster’s feed, ParentData. It’s all about the greatness—and importance—of summer camp. Especially in 2025. Camp is one of the few places where kids get a permission slip to be off their phones. Where the kids—who don’t quite fit in at school—get a fresh start, and maybe even find their people. (Yes, Emily is talking about her personal revelation at math camp.) And it’s a kind of exposure therapy for parents, too, as they learn to be okay with unsupervised play. Emily Oster and Steve Baskin, a career camp director and incoming head of the American Camp Association, get into all of that and much more.