From October 29 to 31, directors of children’s camps from the US, Canada, Colombia, Mexico, Malaysia and Croatia were at Artek. The delegation was led by President of the International Camping Fellowship (ICF) John Jorgenson. The visitors examined Artek’s approaches to the organization of educational activities and infrastructure. They also discussed joint international programs, exchanges of team leaders, the establishment of a multi-language environment as well as children’s diplomacy with Director Alexei Kasprzhak.

Artek presented its educational programs that might be of interest to non-Russian children and their parents such as on space, aviation, robotics and art. During their meeting together with Artek’s Director Alexei Kasprzhak the delegation members discussed joint international initiatives. These included producing more opportunities for youngsters from outside Russia to visit Artek.

“It’s highly unlikely that there’s another place where children will get a chance to work side by side with such people as cosmonauts on data from the Earth’s satellites or to build models of drilling rigs with oil industry professionals,” Alexei Kasprkhak said. “Foreigners are interested in our educational programs and at this point in time every country is looking for teaching methods that will make it possible to take full advantage of our main resource: people, to introduce them to the new economy and prepare them to face today’s challenges. This camp does not want to be different from anybody else that is why we point out to people that we should be regarded as an equal participant when it comes to educational methods, the best parts of which our colleagues from outside Russia would like to use in their own countries.”

The delegation was taken on a tour of some of the historical sites such as Pushkinskaya Square and Russkaya Polyana, the Suuk-Su Palace and the olive grove at Camp Morskoi as well as various new buildings, the library, the canteens, the sports grounds, the Artek Arena complex and Camp Solnechny, which is under construction at the moment. According to the participants, the most interesting part of the event was talking with the young people. “Children were able to speak flawless English so an interpreter was not required! They said that the main thing they acquired was a spirit of friendship. Children thanked their team leaders, and we could really see the contributions that they had made,” said ICF President John Jorgenson. “And sometimes children can also be good teachers for us, too. We could see this at Artek: when adults step aside and children decide what they are going to do and how they will grow up and learn how to resolve disputes. This is important. We should understand that the world’s future does not belong to politicians but to our children. There is a thing we teach at our camps: if there is a problem, we must find ways to solve it together. When we stop having such talks, this means we will stop moving forward. We should continue our dialogue.”

“I was impressed with how the Russian government invests in camps like Artek to try and help improve the lives of children through education,” said Juan Mario Gutierrez, Director of the Kajuyali Camp (Colombia). “Last year we sent a group of children to Artek for the first time, and we hope to continue cooperating with the organization. We want to exchange our team leaders.”

According to Sufriana Taib, Chair of the Asian-Pacific Camp Congress Organizing Committee, Artek must be represented at the 2019 congress in Kuala-Lumpur. “How do you train workers? How do you select the children who will be allowed to go to this magnificent place? This is very interesting!” she said. “This is my first visit to Russia and Artek. I was impressed with the center’s size. All the children have something to do and we’ve seen how happy they are. Your work with children of different ages was very impressive. Russian camps carry out multifaceted educational activities! We hope that Artek’s management and workers will speak at our congress in Kuala-Lumpur next year. We hope that our government and representatives of various organizations will attend their presentations.”

The visitors noted that after they returned from Russia, they would try to organize meetings with teachers, officials and public activists to spread the word to as many countries as possible about Artek’s practices.