The applications for counselors, lifeguards and day-camp aides keep landing, and the people behind them are in class until three. Your phone screens bounce between voicemail and "can I call you after practice?"
Here's the fix, up front. Send every candidate a link to the same three to five questions and let them record on their phone whenever they're free. That's a one-way video interview: no scheduling, no back-and-forth. Then spend your calls on the people worth watching first.
Why does summer camp staff hiring stall before the first screen?
Many in your pool are likely students, and students often don't pick up unknown numbers. Returners you already know. The new seventeen-year-olds and college sophomores, you don't. Each one still needs a screen before you'd put them near a bunkhouse or a pool deck. Phone tag eats the calendar. Every missed call costs a day. Multiply that by a few dozen candidates across branches and suddenly it's February with half the roster open. One-way video doesn't replace references or background checks. Those still happen, and a person still runs them. What video does is show you who earns a phone screen.
When should you start hiring summer camp staff?
Earlier than feels reasonable. Summer planning heats up early in the year, and the best candidates go to whoever responds first. You're already on the clock.
Now: lock your role list and reach out to returners.
Next two weeks: build one question set per role family, like counselor, aquatics and program aide.
As applications arrive: send the interview link the same day, by email, text or shareable link.
Weekly: review videos in a batch, not one at a time between meetings.
Then: phone-screen the shortlist and run references.
If your seasonal crews are more mowers than lifeguards, our post on seasonal hiring with one-way video interviews covers that side. For texts that actually get answered, see these invite for interview SMS templates.
What should you ask in a one-way video for youth-facing roles?
Keep it to three to five questions. Set think time, response length and retake rules so nobody freezes in front of a blinking red dot. A structured interview, meaning the same questions in the same format for everyone, also lets you compare like with like.
Why do you want to work with kids this summer?
Tell us about a time you helped a younger kid who was upset or left out.
A camper won't follow the group rule. What do you do first?
What does a good first day look like for a new counselor?
You'll hear tone, patience and how someone talks about kids. That's the stuff a résumé can't carry. The library has 150+ ready-made questions if you'd rather not write your own.
How do you review a stack of videos without a big HR team?
You know who's really doing the reviewing, it's the aquatics director and the camp director, squeezed between drop-off and the staff meeting. So make it a ten-minute habit, not a project. Share interviews with your team, and let each person rate, comment and leave notes in one place. Every candidate gets an AI summary and transcript. Candidate Signals reads the transcript only, and it assists. It doesn't score, rank or pick anyone. A person still decides.
"Wedge eliminates screening time and helps our hiring managers know who to prioritize." Deb Tallo, Chief HR Officer, YMCA
That's one YMCA's experience, and your results will vary. For the bigger picture, Wedge customers cut time-to-hire by 50% on average. Our page for YMCA video interviews shows how that looks for camp and branch teams.
How does Wedge fit into your hiring season?
At Wedge, we built the candidate side to ask for nothing. No logins, no downloads, no app. Candidates record on their own time, on their phone, with closed captions built in. Here's what candidates see before they hit record. On your side, there are no per-interview, per-invite or per-video fees, so a January rush doesn't change what you pay. Plan details live on the pricing page. More than 1.3M interviews have been completed on Wedge, so candidates have likely seen this format before.
Write the counselor question set before the first application shows up. Five questions, one link, and the first batch of videos is waiting when you sit down to review. Plenty of YMCAs already run their camp and branch hiring this way. Wedge works with a lot of them, from small branches to large associations. Read the YMCA case studies to see how those teams set up their questions, share reviews and get ready for summer. Then send your first link this week.
