Community of Practice Enhances Understanding, Interest, and Commitment to Promoting Character Development in Camp Counselor-in-Training Programs.

This article examines a two-year instrumental case study of a community of practice (CoP) initiative designed to enhance character development in counselor-in-training and leadership programs at medical specialty summer camps serving youth with serious illnesses. The CoP, involving professionals from 12 camps across four countries, collaboratively identified seven context-specific character strengths—effective communication skills, teamwork, role modeling, empathy, possibility & perseverance, authenticity, and advocacy—and co-created a toolkit with activities and videos to implement these strengths in camp programming. Findings indicate that participation in the CoP fostered professional networking, increased understanding and commitment to character development, and motivated program improvements, with key success factors including community building, shared tasks, adequate onboarding, intentional sharing opportunities, and in-person meetings. The study highlights the potential of CoPs to support experiential education practices but notes challenges such as member turnover and engagement variability, recommending structured ongoing facilitation and further research on measuring CoP impacts.