About Windridge Tennis & Sports Camp

Fun comes first

We’ve always believed that the best way to develop a player, or a person, is to make sure they love what they’re doing. But it goes beyond athletics. Children carry enough stress and anxiety from school, busy schedules, and the pressures of everyday life. Summer camp should be a break from all of that, a place built around discovery, joy, and the freedom to just be a kid.

Windridge is a screen-free camp, and that’s part of the magic. Without phones and devices, campers trade scrolling for pickup games, campfires, and late-night cabin conversations. It’s the kind of fun that doesn’t need a charger, and most campers are surprised by how little they miss their screens.

At Windridge, fun and improvement aren’t opposites. They go hand in hand. When a child is truly having a great time, they’re open, they’re engaged, and they grow in ways that pressure alone never produces. We’ve seen it for more than 55 years. It works.

Every camper is an individual

There’s no single kind of Windridge camper. We welcome beginners and competitive athletes, first-timers and longtime campers, kids who come for tennis and kids who come for the horses. Every one of our programs is built to meet campers where they are, from players picking up a racquet for the first time to athletes preparing for high school and college competition.

Everyone comes to camp with their own background, story, and way of seeing the world. At Windridge, the comfort and safety of every camper comes first, and we work hard to make sure everyone feels welcome, respected, and free to be themselves.

We intentionally keep enrollment at about 140 campers per session, and we think it’s the sweet spot. Camp is small enough that our directors know every camper by name, and big enough that campers can always find their people, try something new, or have a little space when they need it. Staff know who’s struggling, who’s thriving, and who had a rough morning and might need a quiet conversation before lunch. That kind of attention isn’t possible at a much larger camp, and we’re not willing to give it up.

Our 1:4 staff-to-camper ratio means there’s always someone paying close attention. Every child arrives with different needs, different goals, and a different idea of what a great summer looks like, and we want each of them to feel seen, understood, and right at home.

Sport builds character

Discipline, resilience, sportsmanship, and teamwork aren’t things you can teach in a classroom. They develop naturally when kids compete, struggle, improve, and celebrate together, and we create the conditions for that to happen.

Sport teaches children how to set goals and work toward them, not because someone told them to, but because they want to get better. It teaches them to handle success with humility and disappointment with grace. These are skills campers carry with them for life, on the court, the field, the course, and in the ring, and just as much in the classroom, at home, and with friends.

There’s also something simpler and just as important: camp is good for the mind. For a few weeks each summer, campers get a real break from screens, social media, gaming, and the constant pressure to stay connected online. Instead, they spend their days outside, moving, competing, and playing in the fresh Vermont air. Time outdoors and physical activity are proven boosts for a child’s mental health. Just as valuable is the time spent with other people. Whether it’s working together in a coached session, laughing through an elective, or talking with cabin-mates before lights out, campers spend their days connecting face to face. That mix of fresh air, activity, and real friendship does something for kids that no screen ever could, and we think it matters as much as anything else we offer.

Community is at the heart of everything

The friendships made at Windridge are what campers talk about decades later, and our community is something we’re incredibly proud of. Sport brings kids together, but so do the evening campfire, the walk to the next elective, waiting in line at canteen, cheering on a cabinmate in a tennis match, and belting out a team song during the Teela Games. The moments that build real friendships aren’t always the ones you plan.

That’s why we’re intentional about balancing structured and unstructured time. Scheduled periods and coaching sessions matter, but so does the time in between, when kids are just kids, figuring out how to be with each other without an agenda. Those unscripted moments are where the deepest friendships form.

The connections at Windridge run in every direction: between campers, between campers and staff, and between families and the camp itself. They’re what bring people back summer after summer, and what make Windridge alumni feel, years later, like they’re still part of something. We think that’s the most meaningful thing we do.

Coaches who are great with kids. That combination is rarer than it sounds.

Our staff are selected not just for their playing and teaching ability, but for their enthusiasm, patience, and real interest in young people. Our tennis directors bring decades of coaching experience at the college and high school levels, working with high-performance players and first-timers alike. Many of our tennis counselors are current college players themselves, so your child learns from people who are still competing and growing their own games. Across all of our programs, our major sport staff are college athletes or have played at a high level, and every staff member completes a ten-day orientation before campers arrive.

A caring atmosphere starts with our staff.

The caring atmosphere at Windridge has always been one of our most distinctive features, and it starts with the people we hire. Parents and campers consistently tell us it’s the thing they notice most, and the reason they keep coming back.

Our counselors live in the cabins with campers, eat meals with them, and cheer them on at every evening activity. They’re coaches during the day and mentors, big brothers and sisters, and role models the rest of the time. Many of our staff were once Windridge campers and CITs themselves, and they know firsthand what a great summer at camp can mean.

Our staff also come from across the United States and more than 40 countries, bringing different languages, traditions, and coaching styles to camp. Every staff member is background checked and vetted before the summer, and our directors check in every day on how campers are doing, so no one slips through the cracks.

Campers come from around the world, and keep coming back

Windridge welcomes campers from 38 states and more than 30 countries. That diversity is one of the things that makes our community so special. A cabin at Windridge might include kids from New York, California, Brazil, Spain, and Bermuda, all brought together by a love of sport and a summer in Vermont. Learn more about our international community.

Summer after summer

About 6 in 10 campers return to Windridge each summer, and we take that as the clearest measure of how the experience lands. Families don’t bring their children back summer after summer because the brochure looked nice. They come back because it worked: their child grew, made real friends, and had a summer they still talk about years later. Many go on to become CITs and counselors, and we’re proud to welcome a growing number of second-generation campers, children of Windridge alumni who now share camp with a new generation.