The best place for a child to start sailing is our Learn-To-Sail Summer Camp. It cost $199 for a 1-week session. The ages of the camp range from 9 to 16 and they all must be able to swim 75 yards and tread water for 3 minutes. Many of our camps enjoy their experience so much that they sign up for multiple weeks. Our summer camp runs weekly for 9 weeks beginning June 20, 2010. This program is designed to help children develop sailing skills. Working in small groups, participants also learn about responsibility and collaboration, while experiencing the practical application of science and mathematics! Because the study of sailing can be a lifelong process, our young sailors are able to challenge themselves, setting and moving toward their own goals.

Many campers achieve deckhand or mate certification, qualifying them for our popular Junior Program.

Registration

There are 3 ways to register

1. You can stop by the boathouse whenever we are open.
2. Fill out the paperwork available on our forms page and send a check to:

RPCS
PO Box 4008
Shrewsbury, MA 01545

Please make all checks payable to Regatta Point Community Sailing or RPCS. You can either pay for the camp in full at $199 or you can put a non-refundable deposit of $100 with the balance due one or before the first day.

3. Register online

Program Schedule
For the 2010 season, we are offering 9 one week sessions beginning on June 21

Our Typical Day

Curriculum

Sailing skills – the RPCS Summer Camp curriculum helps young sailors develop safe sailing skills.  Working with small groups, trained instructors deliver brief classroom sessions, perform demonstrations, and supervise on water practice sessions.

Sailing and Boating Safety

Nautical Terminology

Knots and Splicing

Care of boats and equipment

Rigging and derigging

Observing wind and weather conditions

Points of Sail

Sailing Team roles and tasks

Racing

Responsibility and Collaboration - Sailing is primarily a team effort.  From rigging to racing, success depends upon working and learning together.  While our staff is always available to assist, we frequently take a support role, allowing our campers the enjoyment of teaching and learning from each other.  Our boats and facility require significant upkeep.  Campers are responsible for keeping the boats and facility neat and clean.  We share the water and shore with many other recreational users.  Campers learn to respect others’ rights and to cooperate to ensure everyone’s enjoyment of our resources.

Science and Mathematics - Sailing, particularly sailing upwind, is a scientific endeavor.  The sail is shaped to create an airfoil, similar to an airplane wing, which in turn creates a vacuum, pulling the sailboat upwind.  While it is not necessary to understand this principle in early stages of the learning process, it is experienced from the very first day on the water.  Size and shape of both the sail and the boat, combined with sailing skills, determine ultimate performance.  As sailors work to improve their results, they become immersed in the practical application of physics, including mass, force, leverage, machines, mathematics, algebra, and geometry.  Because the need to know is established first, this learning experience is powerful and long lasting.       

Facility & Staff

Located at the south end of Regatta Point State Park on Lake Quinsigamond in Worcester, our brand new modern boathouse offers a classroom, private bathrooms, and indoor and outdoor sheltered spaces for learning, lunching or just resting.

We are adjacent to the State beach, and use that area for swimming.

Our primary training boats are safe, stable White 14’s.  Our fleet also includes several other types of boats from catamarans to canoes, and we provide the opportunity for our campers to experience these craft as well.

We oversee sailing practice from our two safety launches.

Our staff is made up of trained professionals, many of whom learned to sail right here at Regatta Point!  Instructors are certified in water safety.  We maintain a camper to staff ratio of 10:1.