Steve and Kate’s Camp – Noe Valley

My daughter was in pre-​school (4 years old) when she attended Steve and Kate’s (Noe Valley) for about a month last summer.
It’s now been four months since she was there, but she still remembers it and talks about it fondly at least once a week. She already can’t wait until next summer.
Some of things that really impressed me: (1) The pricing model. You will see what I mean when you visit their website. (2) The fact that one of the counselors visited our home before the summer started to make our daughter (and us) feel comfortable. (3) The counselors all knew my daughter by name and made me feel like they were all really watching out for her. (4) The younger children in the 4-​year old range were treated specially because the camp understood that four year-​olds needed that.
My only complaint was that our daughter spent the entire summer in two studios (the style studio and the break-​making studio) and barely explored the others. Hopefully she will move beyond those two this summer!
In general, I think Steve & Kate’s is a great camp option (especially for outgoing children like my daughter). It seems like most of the kids only go a week, but we saw a huge benefit in sending our daughter for multiple weeks.

My son attended Steve and Kate’s camp before kindergarten this past summer. He had a blast! He loved being able to select what he wanted to do each day. In addition, he ended up doing things that he had never done before — like cooking bread. And, the camp dealt with his rambunctious behavior. He thrived at the camp and we’ll do it again next year. The flexibility and hours are fantastic for working parents.

My daughter is in first grade and has attended Steve and Kate’s full-​time this past summer and the summer before. Most likely, she will go again next summer.
As a working parent, I like the convenience and pricing. Because I choose the summer membership, it broke down to something like $ 268/​week *including* food. I did the math, and if your kid goes every day, it breaks down to $ 44.72/day. You can’t even get a good babysitter for 3 hours for that. And compared with other weekly summer camp options, this is a steal. I have friends signing their kids up for camps that are $ 400/​wk! That’s great if you can afford it, and I’m sure it’s very enriching, but I feel like S+K is a solid value, and my daughter has fun playing with her friends, the way I did during summer vacation around my neighborhood, except this has a lot more options, and unlike when I was a kid, they’re actually supervised. :-)
Hours are very convenient — they’re open when I need them, not 3 hours a day like some of these other camps, or 9 – 3 and then you pay extra for after-​care. No, S+K is one price, all day.
The processes run like a well-​oiled machine. They have an army of extremely friendly, helpful counselors. The first time you do it, dropoff and pickup can be confusing, but once you get it, it’s easy. Every child is identified. Many counselors get to know who your child is, and there is a «huddle» group per grade, so that there are definitely at least 1 or 2 counselors who know your child well.
The activity options are exciting — if I were there, I’d spend forever in the knitting, sewing, animation, and breadmaking studios, but they have lots more to choose from. My daughter is pretty young and she and her friends like to hunt for aliens, so they choose to play outside on the play structure and look for signs of life from other planets. What can you do. But I think as she gets older, she will foray into the studios and try them out more. She has tried the animation studio a few times and the results were pretty entertaining. She has also made capes and scarves (insert scare quotes as she’s just 6…) in the sewing studio, which was fun for her.
I think there’s a good balance between freedom and group activities. Morning huddle, lunch, and end-​of-​day games are in small or large groups, but the kids are free to roam the rest of the day, which I like, since they spend all school year in class.
The food sounds great. They have a different theme each day that cycles through the summer, and you can wander up for snacks at any time. My daughter did have a little issue this past year where she was intimidated by the lunch line, so there were times she didn’t grab lunch. The younger K camp kids have food brought to them, which was less scary for her so she ate well the first summer. But the camp director Matt is really caring and responsive and he said they’ll be changing this in the future, so I’m not worried about it.
The facilities are good. It’s at Alvarado Elementary which is spacious and maintained well. Parking can be a bit challenging in peak dropoff times, but there’s always a spot within a few blocks of the school.
All in all, we’re happy we found Steve and Kate’s, and my daughter has met new friends, played hard, and had a very positive experience.

I have sent my 2 daughters to Steve and Kates for the past 3 years and am very happy overall with the program. The girls have plenty of interesting things to do, are allowed to choose activities based on their interests, and they love having snacks/​food choices onsite. In addition, the flexibility of the camp, which allows you to signup for a single day here and there, or at the last minute, is a truly amazing benefit! Headed back again next summer!

I was a little nervous sending my 5 year old there, without knowing if there were any other kids there that we would know, and wondering if my 5 year old would get mowed over by 5^th graders. My kid was fine, and the camp space is large enough that it had a fun, high-​energy vibe, but big kids definitely were not crowding or endangering the little kids. In fact, my feedback to the camp after our first day is that my kindergartener felt a little lost and unsure how to plug into the activities that day because there SO MUCH to do. Matt, the camp director, got back to me within a few hours with a very detailed response — S+K’s didn’t want to crowd a kid if a kid is already feeling adventurous and just wants to have their run of the place, but if parents think their own kid could benefit from some extra nurturing, the parent can easily be submit a request online or by email, and the camp will put a special note on file to have counselors specifically check in with your kid regularly to make sure your kid is feeling comfortable. With Steve and Kate’s: The more you communicate, the more you get out of the experience.
All I can say is that this camp is highly motivated to make sure your kid has fun — and if snack shipments to the camp are late, Matt the director, will even drive to Safeway and buy extra pretzels because he knows that kids notice when their favorite snack isn’t available (this happened this summer in Noe Valley). Most of the older kids at camp have been going there since K years, so the fact that the kids want to keep going back is a huge clue for me as a parent. My kid thought the lunch that S+K’s served was delicious. The camp seemed like there were activities for every kind of kid. In fact, my kid wants to keep going back because he didn’t have enough time to do all he wanted in a day or two. I really appreciated the detailed responsiveness of the camp director, Matt Voorhees. He’s just FANTASTIC. We’ll definitely be back again next year.

What an amazing camp! It is a godsend for any parent. The camp director, Matt, took time out of his busy schedule and gave my son and I a tour of the camp prior to signing up. I cannot even begin to express my gratitude for it was my son’s first camp experience and I wanted to see firsthand if it would be a good fit. I was amazed at all the activities that were available.
The online application form is really user friendly and a breeze to get through. What makes it easy is that you can pay for day passes and not have to purchase a whole week at a time, unlike most of the other camps out there. Plus no hidden fees for before or aftercare. And can you believe it??? Breakfast, lunch and snacks are included!
The staff is friendly, helpful during drop-​off and pick up. And the counsellors assigned to each group are amazing. My son really likes Alex, Evan, and Bridget!
Some of the activities are the ever popular coding and stop animation studio, sewing and knitting, music room with karaōke and a drum set, bread making, and two playgrounds (one for sports and the other for weekly activities).
The lunch menu rotates and features a wide variety of cuisines. (Not your typical Mac and cheese or beanie weenie fare!) My son gave it rave reviews!
It makes me want to be 8 years old again!

So, first the good part… super convenient and easy if you are in a bind which I was. My childcare fell through at the last minute and I needed a place for my kids for the day. The online sign up is easy, lunch and snacks provided, age appropriate for both kids, all checked. But the rest was meh. Neither of my kids had fun. When I checked in, I asked about sunscreen and they said there was a box to check if I wanted my kids to be sun screened which I did. Neither one was given sunscreen all day. My daughter said that all of the fun activities, like sewing and coding, were unstructured and there was no one to show her how to do them. At 9, she doesn’t know how to code or sew on her own. And bread making which she was also interested in was never offered. At the beginning of the day, they said everyone would get to make bread and that it would be called by grade, but hers was never called. My son played on his own most of the day. They did not have fun at all. And for $ 180. for the two of them, I was super disappointed!!!