In the summer of 2007, leadership of the Baptist Convention for the Eastern part of Cuba came the the youth camp Press On Missions helped to establish at FBC Camaguey, Cuba and witnessed what God was doing at the camp. They loved what they saw and extended an invitation to Press On Missions to bring a team to help them with one of the camps they had planned at a campsite in Cespedes, Cuba the summer of 2008. In the summer of '08 Press On Missions sent a team to the campsite for three days to help them with their camp planning and programming. Our team had spent all day Friday and Saturday, and Monday morning helping with the college camp at FBC, Camaguey.

On Monday afternoon POM board members Kit Collins, Dennis Rohlmeier, and Rick Collins traveled to the camp late in the afternoon to meet with their camp directors. Press On Missions President Rick Collins spent time talking with their directors while Kit met with those lined up to be his refs for the week and Dennis spent time building relationships with students and leaders already at the camp. Rick was very impressed at the organization of the directors. Rick had sent in a proposed schedule back in the Spring and the "Press On" Bible study materials in Spanish that they would use as their camp theme. They had printed out a camp booklet for each student and leader that contained the schedule, the rec schedule and note sheets for the large group Bible studies. They had also already divided the students into two color groups: The orange groups, which had younger students, and the green groups, which had the older students. One thing that really excited them were the recreation supplies the Press On Missions team was able to make available. The campground was nicer than we expected and there was plenty of space to play all the games we had scheduled. On Tuesday we started the camp and it was amazing how quick the students and leaders caught on. The large group lecture and small group discussion groups were a new concept to them and they liked the format. It was amazing to watch the small groups engage during the recreation time. Other than volleyball, all the games were new to them and the students were excited about the organized recreation time. Kit had to spend a lot of time with the refs helping them understand a new way of conducting the camp recreation and explaining new games they were unfamiliar with. He spent time to encourage and train them each day before and after the rec time and the rec team really come together. On Wednesday afternoon when we left, Kit was able to confidently hand "the baton" of leadership to his rec crew to carry on the last two days of camp when we would not be there to help. We were also able to teach the large group times the first two days of camp and use PowerPoint, which was a great teaching tool. On the last day Rick was able to meet with Yolanda, the camp director. She is the point person for the Baptist Convention for the Eastern half of Cuba and is in charge of 8 different youth camps they conduct each year. She shared with Rick she was so pleased by the new camp format and materials the Press On Missions team had supplied that she would be changing all the other camps next year to use our camp format and our camp materials. She also said she desired to train her leadership to train the camp leadership in the western part of Cuba on the effectiveness of this format and the materials. Our Press On Missions team could only be with the camp for two days of camp, Tuesday and Wednesday. The camp had 145 participants: 115 student and 30 adult leaders. About one half of the students who attended were non-believers. From donations we received we were able to pay the needed expenses to allow all these students to attend camp for free! Yolanda told the Press On Missions team that without this help these students would not be able to afford to attend. Our team was able to leave the camp recreation supplies and group flags which they will be able to use as tools for years to come. We were asked to pray about bringing in a team in '09 to help them in their youth camp efforts.

One other success of the '08 camps is we were able to begin our vision of training and mentoring others to help us carry out our vision of helping to establish Christian youth camps around the world. John Bruggemann, the Mission’s Ministry Coordinator of First Baptist Church of Rio Rancho, New Mexico was part of our team this year. John has a huge heart for students and a passion for missions. He was able to shadow our team and gained valuable firsthand knowledge in conducting a youth camp in a third world country. It is our desire to continue to work with John to enable him to take the Press On Mission's vision and ministry to other third world countries he will travel to in the coming years.

Youth Camp 2008
Cespedes, Cuba

• Date of Camp: August 2008
• 145 Teenagers + Leadership
• Our team helped the Eastern Baptist Convention strengthen this camp in Cespedes, Cuba.
• 1/2 of the teens who attended the camp were lost students.
• Press On Missions provided scholarships for all these teens to attend camp.
• The camp lasted 4 days and we were with them the first two days of camp to provide some resources and mentor and encourage the leadership.