Susan Said:

Some good performing art camps for kids in or very close to Pennsylvania?

We Answered:

If you're a Writer, DO THIS NOW!

THE PENNSYLVANIA GOVERNOR'S SCHOOL OF THE ARTS.

There are 9 or 11 different PA Governor's Schools: medicine, business, computers, sciences, maths, etc... and one for the arts. It's completely free: room, board, tuition, meals, EVERYTHING.

It's a 5-week summer camp. They accept 200 students from across the state, ten for each field:

10 Fiction Writers (that was my major)
10 Poets
10 Jazz Dancers
10 Modern Dancers
10 Ballet Dancers
20 Actors
10 Theater Techs
10 Opera Singers
10 Jazz Musicians
10 Orchestral Musicians
10 Painters
10 Sculptors
10 Photographers...

you get the point...

For 5 Weeks in the Summer (July 1 to August 10, or something like that)... they take over a Pennsylvania college campus (Last time I checked, it was Mercyhurst College in Erie, PA).

You can Major during the day as a writer, and minor as a musician on the side. It is a comprehensive art school. It's about a year's worth of arts education crammed into 5 weeks.

There are no grades. All you have to do is stay in the program for 5 weeks, and they graduate you at the end. You get a diploma, and a head start on an arts education, an arts career, scholarship searches, and a great item for your resume.

Most of the students go during the summer between their Junior and Senior years. BUT, they also accepted some sophomores and some seniors. They generally only take Pennsylvania students, but they also took a few students from Jersey, Delaware, Ohio, and West Virginia.

I can say with great fondness that it's the absolute Greatest Experience I had as a teenager. I loved Governor's School more than my own high school. I STILL keep in touch with the students and teachers, and I was the class of 2001.

Look into it. If you can get in, you'll absolutely love it.