Otolaryngologist, Head and Neck Surgeon
Name: Nathan Calloway
Years as a Camper: 1988-1996
Years as a Staff Member/Positions held: 1997-2000, Unit Leader Spartans 2000
Current Profession and Title/Years in role: Otolaryngologist – Head and Neck Surgeon, WakeMed Health and Hospitals
Can you provide a brief overview of your job responsibilities?
As an attending physician at WakeMed, our practice specializes in the surgical treatment of head and neck pathology. This includes facial trauma, pediatric otolaryngology, sinus disease, hearing loss, as well as cancers of the upper aerodigestive tract, endocrine, and salivary glands.
Do you have any career advice for members of our Camp community?
Find something in which you naturally excel and keep pursuing it. You may not know where it will take you, but if what you’re doing matches your talents and you enjoy it, you will find happiness and success. I was good at studying and working with my hands, eventually, that led me to surgery.
What do you believe have been some of your greatest personal and professional accomplishments? Is there a goal toward which you are currently working?
My family is easily my greatest personal accomplishment, and now my kids enjoy summer camp and my wife enjoys family camp! A close second is I once (just once) ran a 21-minute 5K. Becoming a surgeon has been my greatest professional accomplishment and something I enjoy every day, mostly because I am able to help people. My current goals are to enjoy my kids while they’re still at home and give back to the community which gave so much to me.
How do the values or skills you learned at Camp show up in your everyday work and/or personal life?
The energy, responsibility, and challenges of Camp make it a full experience. To meet that full experience requires drawing deeply from your energy, character, and talent. You also must figure out how to get along with a lot of people of differing ages. The work ethic and abilities I realized at Camp have helped me to this day when faced with a difficult surgery, coaching my kids’ sports teams, or working with faculty at the hospital.
Is there a person or a situation that had a huge influence on you while you were at Camp? How and why did they/it impact you?
Ben Russell, my Lower Lake counselor and then trainee director as a CILT and CIT. He challenged us all to be the best counselors we could be, leading by example. His advice came at a formative time for all of us as trainees and had a great impact at the time which continues today. Richard Hamilton also impacted us all thanks to his steady personality over my entire Camp experience – from camper to counselor.
What advice would you give your younger self?
Embrace the time you have at Camp to the fullest, enjoy being in the moment, channel your weird creativity, and recognize you are making lifelong friends in the summer heat!
Favorite Camp meal: Chicken sandwiches of course!
All-time favorite skit memory: I wish this had been my unit, but Jeff Riddle and Jeff Rose dressed the Rangers in black, then had them creep out of the woods beside the gym toward the campers while a Metallica song played loudly overhead. This was at the end of a rainy evening campfire, so it was dark and gloomy already. Although frightening to Spartans and Daises alike, it was an impressive piece of theater. I can't remember what the point of the skit was, and maybe there wasn’t one, but it left a memory.
The devotion you best remember from Camp: The Lorax, the Spartans always understood the message
Do you have a hidden talent? I can remember lines from books or movies that I haven’t read or seen in years. This frustrates my wife to no end because then I’ll forget a grocery store item she’s asked me to specifically retrieve. Well, we all have our talents.
What three words best describe you? Dedicated, energetic, thoughtful (I hope)
