Mentoring Program Fall Match Retreat

On October 7th, the Camp War Eagle Mentoring Program broke into new territory with it's first ever Mentor-Mentee match retreat! Beautiful weather and the pristine grounds of Camp War Eagle hosted over 30 "matched" pairs for a day of camp activities and healthy competition.

The day of fun was an effort to continue to build and strengthen relationships between mentors and students. Groups split into teams (Aliens vs. Cowboys) to embark on something that Camp War Eagle does best: competition. Points were awarded for participating in numerous activities that gave kids a chance to introduce mentors to a few of their favorite aspects of camp. "It was really great for the adult mentors who had never been to camp before to go out and experience camp with students! They tried a lot of things and had so much energy," assistant director Hannah Cypert said of the competition.
After a great lunch, free time (or "Mish-Mash" as it's termed at camp) began and gave campers and mentors a time to have a blast together. The day ended with an awards ceremony, finding the Aliens victorious! Several other awards were given away for participation and enthusiasm. The male and female matches that garnered the greatest number of points during the competition were given a $15 Walmart gift card. The gift card will be used by winners to do something new and special together, or used by the matches to serve others.

It was a great opportunity for new matches to bond, for relationships to develop, and for the community of mentors to come together and be supported. We look forward to future Mentoring events as the program grows!

Check out some photos of the event!

Rogers Intern Spotlight: Scott Bolton

The Ozone Intern program is purposed to develop college-age leaders who have a passion to positively impact the youth culture of Northwest Arkansas by providing them with opportunities to coordinate local peer volunteers and connect with Camp War Eagle campers.

Scott Bolton, a long time Camp War Eagle counselor, recently made the move from Springfield, MO to join Rogers Ozone as an intern. 

Write a brief bio about yourself-3-4 sentences about where you're from, what you like, where you went/go to school.

I was born in Colorado Springs, Colorado but moved to a small northern Missouri town called Lawson when I was 2 and grew up there on a small farm.  My time in Lawson was spent playing percussion in the band, running track and cross country, and playing the drums for my youth group.  Music is probably my biggest interest, I've been playing the drums since I was in the 7th grade and I absolutely love it.  If playing in a band was a viable and responsible career path I would do it in a heartbeat.

How did you come to be part of Camp War Eagle?

A friend of mine, Dana Snyder(then Segal), made a facebook event about the video show at Missouri State, so I figured I'd give it a look.  Went to the video show, thought it looked awesome and signed up for an interview with Darrick Seaton [Camp War Eagle Associate Director], and here I am 4 years later.  Is it weird that I still remember the clothes I wore for the interview?

What originally attracted you to interning for CWE365/Ozone?

To be honest, I had no intentions of moving to NWA or interning for Ozone when I left Springfield for camp this past summer.  Towards the beginning of the summer God started laying it on my heart to move down here, at first I just dismissed it as me wanting to move down here to be with the awesome camp people, but the conviction kept growing until I felt I was being led to apply for the internship.  So I did, found out I had gotten the internship and started making plans to leave Springfield.  It was definitely an unexpected thing, but so obviously from the Lord and I'm so glad I followed the call instead of staying where I was comfortable.

What's been your favorite part of the internship so far?

Just hanging out with the Rogers kids has been awesome.  Our middle school kids are some of the funniest I've ever met, and the high school students are such a mixture of personalities that fit so well together and have fun, it's been a blast!

What's been your favorite camp or ozone memory?

I'm going to have to make two categories for this question, because both of these memories are too good not to mention.  My favorite memory with staff would definitely have to be being on SWAT [Servants Working All Together] 7th session of my 3rd summer.  We had such an awesome group, made a lot of great friendships, and strengthened some that were already there.  My favorite memory with campers would have to be my 4th session cabin, also my 3rd summer.  Almost half of that cabin was made up of kids that I had in cabins in the previous two summers.  It was just really awesome to be able to expand those relationships.  Plus getting to skip the awkward getting to know everyone phase on day one was great.

What do you hope to take away/learn from your time as an intern?

Deciding to do this internship so suddenly really gave me a chance to jump in with no expectations of what all of this was going to look like, which has been an awesome learning and growth experience, but I guess all I do hope to take away from this is a skill set for whatever God has in store for me on the next stage of my journey.

Describe your perfect day.

Every time I'm asked this question I have a hard time deciding between a handful of "perfect days" that I have dreamed up.  Spending the day hiking up a mountain would be awesome, or laying in a hammock on a cool fall day reading the Lord of the Rings.  Seeing the Red Sox beat the Yankees at Fenway park would be another awesome day.  I think the one I'm going to have to go with though would be spending the day playing or even writing music with some talented musicians and having a blast doing it with no goal for the day other than to play music.




There's a ton happening with Rogers Ozone, as well as Ozone in all other cities. To learn more or to get involved, visit our website at www.cwe365.org.

Great Pretenders: Coming Soon!

Great Pretenders 2011 is slated to be the greatest event that Ozone has ever seen. The lipsyncing competition in it’s fourth year is an absolute favorite and a chance for students to be rockstars in front of a crowd of fans. As the event draws near, we have narrowed down our Primetime and High School acts that will advance.  
From each city:
Bentonville – Megan & Lucie performing “The Dog Days are over” and Nathan & Neal performing “I Want to be Like You.”
Rogers – Brianna performing “Friday” and Carlos, Pia & Hannah performing “Baby”
Springdale – Abby, Amy & Natalie performing “We’re All In This Together” and Kayla performing “Concrete Angel”
Fayetteville – Ashley, Wendy & Katie performing “Firework” and a boys group performing “Be a Man”

GREAT PRETENDERS.  An event full of talent, creativity, Hollywood excitement, and much more.

Who will take home the prize?  Who will win it all?  COME WATCH & FIND OUT! Wear your tacky red carpet-award show attire.

TUESDAY OCTOBER 25, 2011 @ First United Methodist in Springdale.  6-8pm.

For more information on transportation from your city, check out www.cwe365.org.

Highlighting Fayetteville Ozone

Fayetteville Ozone, led by Ricky Shade and Emily Bankhead, is full of excitement, energy and great relationships! Let’s take a deeper look at our southernmost Ozone chapter.

Ricky Shade

I grew up in Gore, Oklahoma along with three brothers and my mom. I attended Gore Public Schools from Pre-K to my senior year, graduating with 54 students in my class.  Sports were a huge passion of mine, playing in every sport that was offered.  It’s hard not to be passionate about sports in a small town like Gore, population 973.  In college, it was this same passion that led me to apply for the Christian sports adventure camp you might know as Camp War Eagle.

Emily Bankhead

I was born in Nurenburg, Germany and moved many times as a young girl due to my dad being in the Army.  I have a younger brother named Chance and a younger sister named Abby.  I loved babysitting, playing sports and selling lemonade and Kool-Aid in my Boise, ID neighborhood as a kid.  I went onto college at Ouachita Baptist University where I got my business degree and then worked for Dillard’s Corporate in Little Rock for four years.  I moved to Fayetteville with my sweet pup, Jeb, in 2007 to do Fayetteville Ozone.  I met my soon-to-be hubs at Camp War Eagle in the summer of 2009.  We are getting married four days before I turn 30 and then moving away to start our adventure together!  We can’t wait!

What is your favorite Camp or Ozone memory?

RS: I was working at camp’s fishing pond, while Scott Richards was teaching kids his method of preparing the bait (worms) for catching fish.  He placed a live worm in his mouth to cool down the worm’s body temperature to “make them more lively.”  This was just the beginning.  Another form of bait we had at the fishing pond was stink bait (not worms).  So a kid, only following the camp director’s lead, put the whole piece of stink bait in his mouth.  This didn’t turn out well, as one would expect.

EB: So many great memories over these past four years!  It is really hard to narrow down to a favorite.  I have absolutely loved inviting the Ozone girls and Ozone leaders over to my house on a consistent basis.  I love cooking with the girls, painting nails, baking cookies, watching movies, doing crafts and allowing a safe and loving place for them to come and spend time.  I love it when girls randomly stop by my house because they are in the neighborhood or when they call and ask if we can make cookies together.  It’s awesome to know that these girls feel comfortable enough to come to me.  I love it!

What originally attracted you to working for Ozone?

RS: Before working with Ozone, I had been a part of camp for three summers as a counselor and on counselor leadership.  I love working with kids and teaching them about the importance of Jesus Christ in our lives.

EB: Getting to do what I’m passionate about – spending time with students and making them feel loved and cared for.  Making sure these beautiful students see how sweet a relationship with Christ is…and then walking alongside them in their new journey!

If you could create any huge Ozone event, what would it be?

RS: A huge water balloon fight! 

EB: A big mission trip to a very poor and underserved place for an entire week.  Our kids love to serve, but they need to get out of NWA and see that there are so many people in need in this world.

Using only 5 words, describe Fayetteville Ozone.

RS: Community, Relational, Inviting, Fun, Memorable!

EB: Intentional. Family. Loving. Consistent. Home.

What's the best thing about Lifeline, Primetime, and Ozone in Fayetteville?

The best thing about all of our programs in Fayetteville is that we are such a close-knit family that everyone who attends walks away knowing they are cared for…not only from the leaders and directors, but they hear about Jesus’ deep love for them as well.

Is there anything new happening in Fayetteville Ozone this semester?

Small groups are a new entity that we have created for Fayetteville this year.  We break the group by gender and grade and meet for about 20 minutes to discuss the talks and how the Lord is moving in our lives right now.  It has been so cool to connect with a smaller group of girls this year.  We’ve already had a little 7th grade small group slumber party and it was so fun! Some of the groups are even teaming up to perform in our Great Pretenders lip-sync competition where the winner will receive $100. The parent involvement this year is phenomenal.  We have seen that just by asking parents to help, they are more than willing.  Numerous parents have stepped up to help with snacks, transportation, construction work, speaking to our kids, etc. Very awesome stuff.

If someone wanted to become involved in Ozone, what would you tell them?

COME!  Do not be anxious or nervous or not show up because it’s the middle of the semester or you don’t know anyone.  We have new people coming all of the time and I guarantee that you will feel loved and cared for.  It is such a sweet and fun time!  Bring friends!  It really is like being a part of a family!! We hope to see you soon!

Check out some photos from this year at Fayetteville Ozone!

There are so many ways in which someone could get involved with Ozone.  Whether that’s for our students, parents, or college volunteers, we have something for everyone.  For more information about Ozone, go to our website www.cwe365.org.

Young Gun's: Fire Safety

Ever seen the Jaws of Life in action? On Saturday, October 1st, elementary boy CWE365 students and parents attended a free community event and saw firefighters demonstrating this impressive piece of equipment. The Rogers Fire Department methodically dismantled an automobile, starting with the windows, removing each door, then the roof, the trunk and finally rolling the entire dashboard forward! The car was left in so many pieces. The RFD also had a real firetruck for students to explore!

Our Young Guns program, specifically for boys in the Lifeline (grades 2-5) group had it's monthly meeting at the fire safety program. Our students had the opportunity to build and take home rescue chopper replicas and enjoy some delicious free hot dogs! Carroll Electric Company was on hand with a high voltage safety presentation. They exploded fuse cut-outs and arced electricity through a hot dog! How's that for exciting! CEC demonstrated proper safety procedures for kids to practice around downed power-lines, as well as sent students home with information on how to improve the efficiency of their lifestyles and their families' homes. Thanks to these great presentations, our boys are excited about safety, which is no small task!

Beaver Lake Clean Up 2011

What do you get when you combine old, dripping tires, a few hundred yards of fishing line, three buses full of students and chicken rings? The possibilities could be endless but we know it's one thing: our annual service project, the Beaver Lake Clean up!

On September 24th,  CWE 365 students from each city in Northwest Arkansas joined together to undertake the massive project of cleaning up our beautiful Beaver Lake. Beaver Lake encompasses almost 30,000 acres in Northwest Arkansas and is enjoyed by thousands throughout the year. However, with all of the enjoyment comes a lot of trash. Over 100 parents, staff and students scoured the shoreline of Beaver Lake in Rogers and Springdale, picking up waste. Bags were filled mostly with broken glass, cigarette butts and plastic bottles, but several "treasures" were found as well in the form of tires, derelict couches and even an oven. After a morning of collecting trash, participants were treated to a delicious meal of catfish and chicken rings!

The yearly Beaver Lake Clean Up is hosted by the US Army Corps of Engineers and is a huge service to the lake and those who enjoy its natural splendor. It was a wonderful opportunity to encourage students in taking care of our environment and being responsible to keep it that way.
Check out our video for a look into the clean up!