We must sleep to maintain health so beds and bed-clothing are necessary. These need care as well as the sleeping room, and all personal belongings in it.
We must be clean to be decent, and try as hard as we will, trash collects and must be properly disposed of. Wash houses and latrines are necessary and they must be kept clean.
Who should be more interested in doing this work and in doing it well than the Scout herself? She should take the greatest pride in keeping her camp up to the highest standard always. It can be done without great effort on the part of any one Scout if each one tries to remember a few things, among them:
1. That thoughtfulness reduces the amount of work to be done and saves time and money.
2. That unless the work is done conditions will be unbearable and camp will close.
3. That the work she does benefits herself as well as others. It is the waste and trash thrown or laid down where it does not belong, work half done that has to be done over, thinking of our own desires instead of the Scout standards, that are at the root of any trouble. Do not call the camp duties drudgery, call them opportunities for service.
4. The fact that the Girl Scout pays board does not absolve her from this work. If the Scouts do all that they can to be of service, and serve cheerfully, many opportunities are offered them that otherwise would be prohibitive.
Every girl entering a Scout camp has placed before her a camp program which if taken advantage of offers her the best the camp affords. There are always girls who accept the program and use it in full. They know that in order to BE PREPARED they must grasp every opportunity to develop along Scout lines. On the other hand there are girls who seem too lacking in interest, too blind to the opportunities, too inert to take advantage of it, and they leave camp having missed the very things for which they came.
The helpful Scouts who belong to the former group are real camp helpers, and the Director can always depend upon them, the Counsellors can depend upon them, and they are the power which makes or mars the success of the camp.