The Pollination Project, a foundation that makes small grants to grassroots activists all over the world, has partnered with The California Endowment to look for and fund outstanding young people in California for its Youth Rising grant. Youth Empowered Action (YEA) Camp, a summer camp for teen activists, happens to know a lot of outstanding young people in California!

Three YEA Campers have already been selected to receive $1000 grants from this unique program, helping to manifest their visions to expand their efforts.

Phoebe Collver-Freeland, from Fremont, CA, attended YEA Camp in Oregon first as a 14-year old in 2013 and again 3 years later in New York. Phoebe is a lifelong vegan and became an animal advocate at the age of 11(!). Phoebe and her family have turned their Bay Area property into a microsanctuary for rescued farmed animals.

Phoebe’s vision is to add a visitor center to the microsanctuary so that members of the community, especially kids, can visit and connect with the chickens, pigs, and goats.

YEA Camp’s director Nora Kramer nominated Phoebe for the Flow Fund, and we are thrilled that Phoebe got the grant! Phoebe, now 17, was declared by PETA2 to be “The Coolest Vegan Alive,” just got even cooler!

Akosua Boateng is a senior at Sacramento Charter High School and attended YEA Camp in 2014.

After attending YEA Camp, she told us, “I’ve learned so much. [Before camp] when I looked at the civil rights movement, it was like, what can I do today? … Now I have a plan, instead of just going off the top of my head or going with the flow. I have a plan. I’m not unprepared for the world.”

This made our hearts sing! Since YEA Camp, Akosua has become very active in social justice causes at her school and a local sustainable farm in Sacramento.

We nominated Akosua for a grant for her Project GOOD, an acronym for Growing Our Own Destiny, and she got the grant! Akosua works with the Yisrael Family Farm in the South Oak Park neighborhood of Sacramento to, in her words, “use urban agriculture activism to get more people of color and of low income in touch with what we believe is a sacred thing — cultivating the Earth.”

With the grant, Akosua and her team will make starter gardening boxes to give to people in the community who want to grow their own food. “It’s our way of food activism, ensuring that all people can have a high-quality life while giving back to the Earth,” Akosua said.

Akosua was thrilled when she found out she had been awarded the grant. “I am truly inspired and grateful for us receiving this grant. It gives me hope for humanity. It reassures me that there are still people out there who are past the superficial and sincerely care about the health of our bodies and the Earth. We must step and be good stewards of the land given to us. Here in the city, we will start with urban agriculture.”

Similarly, Aly Pelka, 18, from Oceanside, who attended YEA Camp with Akosua three summers ago as a 15-year-old, has become passionate about farming, growing food, and helping people in need. She helps organize monthly events to provide food and needed items to homeless and low-income people in her area. Aly has found that the homeless community in her area are “smart and care about health, they just unfortunately don’t have access to healthy food.” Aly has gotten a certification in permaculture and lived abroad farming on sustainable communities in Central America, and she wants to put what she’s learned into action in her community.

We nominated Aly for a project that is inspired by combining these passions, and we were thrilled that she was selected to receive the grant.

Called Plant Love, Aly will be working with members of her community to create planter boxes of veggies that will be maintained by local businesses in her town, many of which have already agreed to participate.

“I am beyond grateful for this grant, as I strive to positively influence the world, starting with my own community,” Aly said. “With this grant, I am going to touch the lives of my community, and fuel my neighbors with organic fruits, veggies, and lots of love.”

We have been beyond thrilled to help these outstanding young changemakers access the funds that have been made so generously available by The Pollination Project and The California Endowment.

For our final project in supporting the California Youth Rising grant, YEA Camp and The Pollination Project are partnering with Reframe Labs, an incubator and accelerator for innovative in and out of district schools dedicated to equity, to put on The $1000 School Hack contest this Saturday. The day-long event held at Sunnyside Baptist Church in the South Central part of Los Angeles will award up to 5 $1000 grants to students in the LA Unified School District who develop innovative ideas to improve their schools.

“Students crave to express themselves and take ownership of their lives,” Sean Markin, the VP of Advocacy and Communications at Reframe Labs, explained. “We all want the pride that comes from helping our community. But how often do students get the opportunity to help reinvent their education? How often can students bring investment back to their school family? We are excited to use the $1,000 School Hack to empower our city’s children in these unique and powerful ways.”

Are you a student, or do you know a student in LA ages 13-18?

Click here to register to participate in this free event, which is open to middle- and high-school students throughout the state. 

“We draw so much inspiration and hope from young change makers. It is a privilege to work with YEA Camp to identify and invest in youth-led social change projects in California,” said Pollination Project’s Executive Director Alissa Hauser.

We feel the same! Being able to partner with The Pollination Project to help some of our campers get funding to expand their social change efforts and make a bigger difference in their communities has been an honor, and partnering with Reframe Labs has enabled us to connect even more young change makers with the funds to help them implement their visions. We are thrilled that there are organizations like The Pollination Project, The California Endowment, and Reframe Labs that are helping to elevate youth innovation and passions to make a difference.

If you or someone you know is a young changemaker, ages 12-17, check out YEACamp.org to see about joining us at our summer camp for social change to take your efforts to make a difference the next level. And if you or someone you know is doing social change work that would benefit from greater funding, visit ThePollinationProject.org.

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We say it every year, and every year it is true! This was our best summer yet!

With Labor Day gone and, with it, the symbolic end to summer, we are still basking in the accomplishments of our seventh(!) year of epic, life-changing summer camps.

It is impossible to capture in a blog post, but we will try to expand on “WOW!” with a few highlights, outcomes, and testimonials from the campers themselves.

Who, What, When, Where, Wow

• We reached more campers than ever before this summer. Almost 100 youth ages 11-17 came from 16 different states and the District of Columbia to attend.
• We held our first ever issue-specific camp, YEA Camp for Animal Advocates, at the incredible new location ofWoodstock Farm Sanctuary, less than 2 hours from Manhattan, attracting extremely committed and accomplished young advocates such as 14-year-old Avalon from Florida, the founder of the nonprofit Conserve It Forward, and 16-year-old Phoebe from California, “PETA’s Coolest Vegan Alive,” as well as up-and-coming advocates who are just getting started on their activist path.
• Our staff was incredible – from Michael Starkey, a wildlife biologist with Save the Frogs in Central America, to Chloe Falkenheim, the 18-year-old founder of VegYouth, to Charles Orgbon, the CEO of the youth-run nonprofit Greening Forward, to so many more incredible adult mentors — classroom teachers, nonprofit organizers, and all-around do-gooders in life — thrilled to support younger advocates.
  
• Campers from our California and Oregon sessions this summer have already had a reunion that they initiated! Some have also met up to go leafleting, tabling, and protesting; launched fundraisers; launched clubs at their school; and been extremely active on the causes they care about in ways they had never done before YEA Camp. More on that below.

YEA Camp exposes teens
to things they may never learn elsewhere.

A few key things campers learned that they may never have otherwise learned without YEA Camp:

• Each of us has a huge capacity to bring about change, and we can’t allow limiting beliefs we have about ourselves or negativity that others may project on to us to hold us back.
• The interconnection of seemingly unrelated social justice issues — from animal advocacy to poverty, pollution to racism – expanding their understanding of the challenges we face and their deepening their desire and ability to help.
• Skills like grassroots outreach, campaign planning, fundraising, arts activism, and time management.
• Nonviolent communication techniques to connect with people and to feel more confident speaking with those who disagree — inspiring people to want to learn more versus nagging or judging them for being uninformed.
• Tools to inspire others to get involved and examples of ways that current activists and those throughout history have brought about change.
• Self-care approaches to cope with the injustices of our world and the difficulty of bringing about the change we want.
• They are not alone. There are many other people and organizations who care as much as they do and who want to support them in making a difference.

 What Campers Say:

“My time here this past week has shaped my life in a way that I didn’t even know was possible. It opened my heart and mind to what I can do to help the world we live in, and gave me tools to fight for my cause.” – Ollie, 14, NJ

“This has been one of the best experiences of my life — for the confidence I have gained, the friends I have made, and the change I know I will make.” -Eva, 14, NY

“This camp has helped me feel so confident and empowered. As someone who has struggled feeling confident and worthy, this camp changed my whole life. Going home I will be focusing on combatting the unrealistic harmful view on body image as well as gender roles by helping middle schoolers and others feel good.” -Ashley, 16, Oregon

“YEA Camp was an amazing experience for me. I have acquired the skills that I need to change the world for the good. I used to be shy and did not want to speak up, but YEA Camp has taught me to speak up. I feel good about myself, like I can change the world.” -Angel, 12, Oregon

“YEA Camp has been an amazing and life-changing experience for me. I have had so much support and learned so many things about important issues such as animal rights, LGBTQ rights, sexism, racism, and gender identities…. I am so incredibly thankful for all that I have learned and experienced at this camp.” -Carolyn, 14, California

Most Importantly, What Campers Have Done:

SO MUCH! We love to celebrate our campers’ many accomplishments! Here is just a small sampling of the things our campers have told us they have done in the short time since camp ended.

• Many campers have gone leafleting for their first time ever, passing out flyers on causes they care about. They have reported having great experiences! Here, Maya and Luzia met up to pass out leaflets about reproductive choice, vegetarianism, and their favorite presidential candidate: Bernie Sanders. Five other campers met up at a talk Bernie Sanders gave and passed out leaflets there!
• Orianna, 14, from a conservative part of California, reached out to a former teacher who has agreed to allow her to teach his elementary students a 20-minute class once a week on gender roles! She is bringing in toys, asking them which are for boys and which are for girls and why, having them analyze media, and having them learn about and deconstruct stereotypes.

• 

  Twelve-year-old Zinn testified at an Oregon Department of Agriculture hearing to oppose the  expansion of dairies in the state.

• Seven YEA Campers joined in a huge protest at the zoo to advocate for elephants.
• A group of YEA Campers from NY are fundraising for Farm Sanctuary’s annual Walk for Farm Animals, and all together campers from around the country have fundraised over $2,000!

THANK YOU.

Getting to actually spend the summer at YEA Camp in such a space of inspiration and community is such a joy — and it would not be possible without the efforts and contributions of so many people.

To all of our amazing campers, THANK YOU for being your amazing selves! You inspire all of us that our world can change and is changing for the better!

To our campers’ parents and families, THANK YOU for trusting us with your children and supporting their efforts to change the world!

To our incredible staff, THANK YOU for everything you did — from helping a camper with their action plan to doing the dishes — to make this summer so incredible.

To everyone who donated money toward our scholarship funds and operations, THANK YOU for making it possible for us to exist and to help so many young leaders along on their path.

To all of the companies who donated incredible food, THANK YOU for helping us eat so well, and for your contributions that made it possible for us to keep our costs down so we could accept campers on scholarship who otherwise wouldn’t be able to have the opportunity to attend.

To everyone who volunteered their time in any way, the organizations and individuals who helped spread the word about YEA Camp, offered advice or kind words of support, THANK YOU. You help us keep going when things feel hard.

We will be announcing our 2016 dates and plans in the coming months, but in the meantime, THANK YOU for everything you do to make our world a better place!

With so much appreciation,

Nora + Team YEA Camp

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