We fly you here and pay you to play... and learn, and grow, and develop your leadership voice and soft skills necessary for success in any field you choose!
​
​
​
​
https://youtu.be/XzszO1RumVM?list=TLGG354bvK-_EgswNzAzMjAyNA​
Our Mission is your Mission
The mission of the Sunset Bay Marine Mammal Academy is two-fold. To educate and empower our students with outdoor education and environmental science life skills. And, to educate and empower our staff by helping them develop the type of leadership and soft skills necessary for success in any field they choose. And for those thinking about selective colleges or grad school but coming up short in the adversity and personal essay department, a summer here will provide you a lifetime worth of compelling human interest narratives for your grad school and college applications.
​​Looking for Management or Startup Experience?
You should be, and you’ve come to the right place. As a soon to be college grad you will be applying for various roles in management, and the best of these opportunities come from startups. And the first thing you will be asked to talk about are your experiences in management or startups. Fortunately for you, after a summer here, you will have a lot to say.
​​​
Managing People is a "soft skill"
With 3 distinct aspects, all of which take practice: “managing up” (dealing with your boss or bosses), “managing down” (dealing with your subordinates), and “managing across” (dealing with your peers in the organization). All three take real world experience to develop and the Sunset Bay MMA program offers a unique opportunity to practice these soft management skills in a forgiving and low stress environment.
The ability to start afresh each week leading an entirely new student group, and with different co-counselors and CITs each week is experience that would take years to replicate in a typical job with the same co-workers and customers week after week, year after year. ​​And Sunset Bay is small enough that summer staff have daily interaction with upper management giving them experience “managing up” rarely available in summer internships.
​
Sunset Bay MMA is the Classic Startup Experience
What makes working at startups unique and uniquely challenging, is they have new employees, in new roles, with new customers, in job rolls that evolve based on people’s skill sets, which require lots of creative problem solving. Convincing an interviewer that you are up to the task at a new startup that is taking off can be an uphill battle without prior experience.
Fortunately, these same features that define the startup environment also define your experience here. New staff from around the country and the world, new student and parent customers, wide latitude in managing your groups within the mission statement and safety rules, and new and unexpected things happening everyday for you to practice creative problem solving skills. By the end of a season here you will have the “receipts” in the form of compelling narratives of real world experiences handling the classic challenges presented by roles in management and the world of startups.
​​​​
How do I apply
Sunset Bay is a growing organization with student enrollment and year around programs growing every year. We have new career and seasonal positions every year with resume building opportunities for young people with a passion for the outdoors and empowering the next generation. There is simply no more valuable, fun, and rewarding way to spend a summer or beyond than living and working here with young people like yourself from around the country and the world.
Positions are limited to people who are happy and comfortable in and around the beach and water, and who support our mission of empowering the next generation with outdoor education life skills and the courage to use them.
If this is you and you are over 18 and wish to apply for a position for next summer or beyond, please follow this link to our online application. But first please check your availability dates. Summer instruction ends here with Week 8 each year on or about the last day of August, but we can accept some applicants who return to class at the end of Week 7 : https://form.jotform.com/232985869045169
​
For applicants under 18 and still in high school please go here for information on our CIT program: https://www.sunsetbaywharf.com/cits
​
Summer Positions
​
Counselor/Instructors
Two college student counselor/instructors and one or two high school CITs form the management team responsible for leading their Orca, Dolphin, Seal, or Minnow activity groups each week. Staff receive additional support from water skill instructors, head counselors, and staff members assigned to marine science data logging and manager duties for the week.
​​
Counselor/instructors attend two pre camp training weeks starting the last week in June and have access to training videos and written materials year around. Counselor/instructors receive lifeguard training, and since the main form of transportation here is paddleboards, summer staff must be sufficiently fit and water oriented to stand up on paddleboards leading paddleboarding expeditions for their groups. Counselor/instructors with aptitude may also be trained to operate our fleet of Zodiacs for trips to the sea lion buoy.
​​​
Blue Water Skill Instructor Positions
Water Skill Instructors are responsible for supporting counselor/instructors in teaching the MMA curriculum to Orca, Dolphin, Seal, and Minnow cabin groups. Water skill instructors receive assistance from CITs and counselor/instructors, and are primarily responsible for delivering skill instruction in one or more of the beach and water skill areas we teach including:
​​
-Sailing
-Skimboards/surfboards/foilboards
-Skateboards
-Zodiacs
-Rope rescue/rigging/knots
​
Staff Compensation and Overview
​
Summer Counselor and Instructor staff receive round trip air fare from anywhere in the country, $4,500 ($450 per week) stipend, food and lodging, and free time use of camp facilities so that at the end of the summer camp staff are likely to have most if not all of their summer earnings in the bank.
​
​
Summer staff attend two paid staff training weeks starting the last week in June, followed by 8 Monday to Saturday camp sessions with one Sat-Sun day off between sessions. Like any manager within an organization, counselors and instructors lead and motivate their group to accomplish a wide variety of missions each week. And like any modern organization managers, leadership is accomplished through fun and encouragement. What is unlike a typical management trainee job, is that our leaders live and work with young people like themselves from around the country and the world, and get a fresh start each week with a new group of students to try out new things and work toward finding their best leadership voice. Beach Camp educators leave with friends and connections across the globe, and with leadership experience equal to many years or many jobs in a typical organization.
​
​
Cheers!
​
​
Although it is never easy for young people to obtain meaningful work and financial independence right out of school, the Sunset Bay Beach Camp MMA Program offers a well trod path and supportive environment for young people to grow, learn, relax, and pursue their dreams.
​​​
​
Look us up!
Sunset Bay Wharf
14725 Norma Beach Road
Edmonds, WA 98026
206-324-6715 Main
​