Well, we can hardly believe it, but Youth Empowered Action (YEA) Camp is preparing for its 15th (!) summer training aspiring activists! (Two of those were virtual because of the Covid pandemic, but they still count in our book!)

So. after 32 in-person camps, 12 virtual sessions, and lotssss of testimonials, we are pretty confident we know what to expect. And we want you to know too!

So here, in no particular order, are 15 things you can expect as a camper (or guardian of a camper, or even as a staff member!) at YEA Camp this summer.

1. Finding Your People and Fitting In Perfectly

Our campers are some of the best humans in the world. They literally want to spend part of their summer vacation learning how they can make a bigger difference in the world. If only everyone wanted to do that! But many of our campers tell us that at school they sometimes (or maybe always) feel like that they don’t quite fit in, or that they are one of the only people at their school who cares about a certain issue.

At YEA Camp, they fit in perfectly. They’ll meet people just as passionate as they are about a certain cause. And they’ll meet people who are super passionate about other causes they might not know as much about.

And then of course there’s our amazing staff! These are some of the best role models a young person could ask for.(We’re hiring, by the way!)

These are like-minded people who can be friends or mentors for life and have way more in common than classmates at school. If you’re wondering what to expect from other campers or staff at YEA Camp, if you’re passionate about making a difference on progressive causes, we know you’ll fit right in.

2. Feeling Hopeful and Inspired

Don’t get us wrong. If you’re paying attention to the state of the world, there are lots of reasons to be demoralized and pissed off. We actually talk a lot about that at YEA Camp. This is not some Polyanna utopia where we tell you that everything is magically going to be OK. We’re not going to solve all of the world’s problems by the end of camp.

But you will learn how change happens and meet other people who are making a difference on the causes you care about. You will see that while we have every right to be angry or down about the state of the world, there are also reasons for optimism that can inspire action.  Our campers report feeling much more hopeful about the state of the world after camp than when they arrived.

YEA Camp’s Changemaker Toolbox

3. Build Your Changemaker Toolbox

Everything we do at YEA Camp is designed to develop 4 core areas that we feel are critical for activists.

First is knowledge. Knowledge about problems in the world and knowledge about solutions to those problems.

Next is skills to actually do something about those problems.

Then there’s building confidence. Developing knowledge and skills also builds confidence, but we will go a lot deeper than that.

And finally, there’s community so that you know you’re not alone. And you’re definitely not.

(More on all of these below!)

4. Figuring Out What to Do

Our campers show up to YEA Camp passionate about making an impact on at least one cause, but often they don’t know what to do or how or why to do it.

You’ll have the first half of camp to learn about different issues. Then, at about the midway point, you’ll get to choose what we call your Issue of Importance (IOI). This is the issue you primarily want to focus on.

At YEA Camp, we will teach you what we call the 4 Levels of Activism. This will give you tons of ideas to help you get started.

Then we’ll teach skills like effective communication, campaign planning, fundraising, grassroots outreach, and lots more. Want to learn more about politics? You’re in the right place. Maybe you want to start a school club? We’ve got you covered.

These are all actions you can take to make a difference on the cause you care about in a way that inspires you.

Don’t worry. You actually don’t need to know that much to get started on any of these things, but YEA Camp is one of the only places where you can get just enough training to get started or get serious about making a difference.

5. Figuring Out What to Say

Sometimes the hardest part about being an activist can be knowing what to say in different situations.

Maybe someone is legitimately curious about your cause, and you have a chance to educate and inspire them! Fantastic! At YEA Camp, you’ll develop your talking points, your elevator pitch, and your answers to the most frequently asked questions about your issue.

On the other hand, sometimes people just want to give us a hard time and don’t actually care about our cause. We’ll teach you about the Spectrum of Agreement, which will help you know how to handle this. Some people just aren’t worth your time, and we’ll help you prepare for these situations so you can handle yourself with poise.

What if you have a chance to do public speaking or to talk with a decision maker with power over your issue? We’ll help you with that too!

Everyone gets better with practice.

6. Using Your Unique Passions and Creativity For Your Cause

Are you passionate about art — whether it’s visual art like painting or music and spoken word? We do a workshop on arts activism to help you express yourself creatively for your cause! Maybe you love social media? We will teach you some key tools to apply those skills to get the word out about your issue.

We all have certain things we love to do or are just good at. Maybe you love to write or cook or skateboard?

There are so many ways to make a difference, and they are not all going to protests or public speaking.

We’ll do a whole activity to help you brainstorm how to creatively apply your natural gifts and passions for a cause you care about.

7. Overcoming Your Limiting Beliefs

We mentioned that as you learn more about your cause and what to do about it, it will build your confidence. But we all have self doubts and limiting beliefs that can hold us back. Really, we hold ourselves back when we believe these things.

We get deep into this. What do you tell yourself about why you can’t be successful? Why do you think people won’t listen to you? Is that actually true and a legitimate reason? Did you come out of the womb as someone who is “shy,” “a procrastinator,” or for whatever other reason you might have not able to make an impact? We think not!

Developing a positive mental attitude will help you in every aspect of your life in and outside of activism.

We describe the food at YEA Camp as kid-friendly vegan.

8. Eat Amazing Food!

YEA Camp takes our food very seriously!

We are powering the next generation of changemakers, and that means we need to feed you well!

To us “well” means several things.

It means the food has to be a perfect combo of healthy, delicious, filling, and ethical. That’s why we have the most amazing chefs cooking at YEA Camp!

Want to know more about the food at YEA Camp or even see some sample menus to know what to expect?

Read more about our food here!

9. Silliness and Fun

YEA Camp is not all serious workshops and vegan brownies. We do a lot of goofy activities and offer 2-3 hours a day of free time with lots of fun activities to choose from.

YEA Camp is held at a camp right on a like, where campers love to go swimming or kayaking. We have a basketball court, a Gaga pit, volleyball, soccer, or picnic tables if you just want to hang out and chat.

Whether you like to get up early to go for a run or do yoga, or you prefer to sleep in and rest, there’s a great combo of camp time and down time to enjoy your summer.

YEA Camp has beautiful, modern camp facilities

10. Beautiful and Comfortable Facilities Out In Nature

YEA Camp is held at a gorgeous camp in the Berkshire mountains of western Massachusetts. Not sure what to expect from our cabins? Don’t worry! Our facilities are super modern and comfortable. Of course there are the basics, like cabins with electricity and indoor bathrooms. Plus there’s gorgeous views while we eating overlooking the lake, and fresh air and quiet away from the busyness of city life. Well see geese and birds and squirrels and if we’re lucky, some deer. We’re pretty sure you’ll see more stars at YEA Camp than you do at home, too!

11. Getting Out of Your Comfort Zone

Changing the world can look lots of different ways, and we want you to build your muscles for taking action in ways that might push your comfort.

What if you had the opportunity to speak to your whole class, your whole school, or maybe your school principal, or the city council about your cause? Would you do it or would you say no because you’d be too nervous?

We will create an environment where you will be able to challenge your comfort zone. Don’t worry. We won’t make you do anything you don’t want to do. But we will encourage you because YEA Camp is designed to train you in a way that will make it easier for you to say yes and step up in the future when it really counts.

12. Learning to Take Better Care of Yourself

It might seem like activism is all  about helping others, but if you don’t take care of yourself, you’ll burn out fast.

And as changemakers, we can struggle with the extra challenges that come along with paying attention to what’s happening in the world and the obstacles we face along the way trying to make a difference on them.

At YEA Camp, we do a whole Self Care activity where you’ll get to try out different ways of taking care of yourself, which is a super important life skill.

Whether it means getting enough sleep, maintaining healthy relationships, having positive self talk, managing your time better, feeling our feelings, developing healthy coping mechanisms, or not taking it personally when you don’t get the results you’re hoping for, it is up to each of us to take good care of ourselves so that we’re also able to make a difference for others.

13.  Developing an Action Plan for When You Get Home

By the end of our time together at YEA Camp, you will get to create an action plan for how you want to make a difference when you get home.

This action plan is not something you have to do, and in fact it will probably change once you get home and start taking action, but it will give you direction. Maybe your action plan is to start an environmental club at your high school, but when you get to school this fall you find out that there already is an environmental club. That’s actually great news! You can join that club and adjust your plan from there.

At camp, you’ll get to work in small groups with a staff member who has experience working on your IOI and with other campers who are just as passionate as you are about that issue. We’ll help you come up with SMART goals and teach you an important skill called backward-planning to set you up for success. We’ll also have you do some important time management techniques to consider your priorities and to be realistic while also making time for what matters most to you.

You can expect some amazing humans at YEA Camp!

14. Having a Community To Support You

Most people will make friends at a camp that they go to. That’s basic for what to expect.

But at YEA Camp you can expect to make even more meaningful friendships because of all our campers have in common and because of the depth of the activities we do at camp.

This is extra important for once camp ends. Of course we all want to have more friends, but having people who really understand what you’re trying to do to make a difference is even more important for changemakers at YEA Camp.

Of course, it’s up to each person to take the initiative to stay in touch after camp. But what you can expect is a community of people who will be rooting for you when things get challenging and cheering for you when you share a success.

15. Being Proud of Who You Are

One thing that has been heartbreaking to us over the years at the start of camp is to see how many of our campers have been bullied or made fun of for caring about making our world a better place.

It can be tempting to believe criticism from haters or people who don’t have the courage of their convictions, but that’s not who YEA Campers are.

You will leave YEA Camp proud of yourself for caring, for taking action, and for being someone actively working to be part of the solution instead of part of the problem.

What to Expect: A Life-Changing Camp for World-Changing Teens

This is really just scratching the surface, but we hope this helps you learn a little bit more about what to expect at YEA Camp!

As we celebrate our 15th year, we are always looking to improve and grow, and so we are hoping for the unexpected too!

If you want to learn more about YEA Camp, check out these testimonials from past campers, parents, and staff, read all the details on our website www.yeacamp.org, send us a message, or sign up here!

We hope to see you this summer and that YEA Camp is everything you expect and more.

The post What to Expect at YEA Camp appeared first on YEA Camp.

This year we moved to a beautiful new location in western Massachusetts. For the first time ever, we were on a lake with not only swimming but kayaking, which the campers (and staff!) loved. These, plus basketball and Gaga, were some of our campers’ favorite free-time activities.

Our campers often tell us that they are surprised how fun YEA Camp is! We aim to show that activism needs to be sustainable. The problems of our world are upsetting, and we are honest that activism can be emotional, tiring, and stressful. To model a healthy approach to activism, we prioritize having lots of fun, in addition to learning from our curriculum.

The most common piece of feedback we receive from our campers year after year is to make YEA Camp longer. This year we listened! Granted, campers typically want it to be for the whole summer (or even YEA School!), but still. This was our longest YEA Camp ever, at 9 days — from Saturday to the following Sunday. This allowed us to incorporate more content into our curriculum and to offer more free time each day.

But the most important thing about YEA Camp this summer was how amazing our campers and staff were, and the inspiring action plans they developed to make a difference on the causes they care about once they go home. Our campers and staff came from 17 different states — all the way from Washington, Oregon, and California, to nearby Western Massachusetts — and their passion for social justice issues like racial equity, LGBTQ+ rights, feminism, climate change, animal protection, gun control, and more, gave us all hope.

YEA Camp Curriculum Basics

Much of our curriculum this summer focused on our framework of looking at 4 different levels of activism. These can be applied to any social justice issue.

The internal level of activism doesn’t bring about change directly, but it creates the conditions for it. It is the preparation we all need to do to be able to make change on the other 3 levels.

Internal activism includes doing research to understand a social problem and potential solutions to it, processing emotions about the issue so you can approach it with a clear head, understanding and owning your personal story, learning how to respond to common misconceptions and FAQs about the issue, and researching organizations working on the cause that you may want to connect with.

The individual level of activism includes actions that you can take on your own, without relying on other people to take action. These seemingly small actions don’t bring about huge changes on their own, but they add up over time and can influence others. Without many people taking individual actions, change at the community or institutional level is much less likely.

Depending on the issue you’re trying to address, this level includes anything from eating less meat, taking public transportation, boycotting unethical companies or products, buying less stuff, speaking up when someone does something racist or homophobic, or picking up letter.

The community level  of activism involves spreading the word about actions you want people to take. It can be as simple as publicizing the actions you are already privately taking.

We can publicize problems and their solutions on social media, do a school project or presentation at school, write for a blog or the school newspaper, or have an old-school conversation to get the word out about a cause and to encourage others to do something about it.

The institutional level of activism is where we see large-scale, long-term changes. Institutional change is not possible (or at least is unlikely for progressive causes) without the previous foundational levels of activism.

This includes registering and mobilizing voters, speaking at public hearings to influence community decision-makers,  setting up a meeting with the school administration, or pressuring leaders through mass protests or other forms of advocacy.

We encourage our campers to think about the institutional changes we need, as well as the individual and community level actions required to help manifest these changes.

If you want to learn more about YEA Camp’s approach to activism, download our free ebook, The Beginner’s Guide to Changing the World.

Choosing Their IOI

At about the midway point of camp, each camper chooses what we call their IOI, or Issue of Importance. This is the cause they will focus on for the rest of camp and beyond. We put them in a small group with other campers passionate about that issue along with an experienced staff advisor.

Much of the second half of camp is spent working with this group to think more deeply about their issue.

Campers think about core problems related to their cause and what to do about them. They develop and practice their talking points in response to common FAQs. Along with their staff advisor, they create and present info posters to educate the rest of camp about their IOI. They brainstorm actions they could take at each of the 4 levels of activism we teach about. And ultimately they each create an action plan for how they want to make a difference once camp is over.

These action plans included starting school clubs, launching fundraisers, publicity campaigns on social media, and lots more. It was so inspiring to hear campers share these plans and their visions for the future.

We are so grateful for our amazing staff members who led our workshops, advised campers in their small groups to develop their action plans, played and supervised games on free time, supported campers with any number of issues (from homesickness to actual physical sickness) and just generally hung out and befriended our campers and served as incredible role models throughout camp and beyond.

One of the most impactful aspects of YEA Camp is just bringing together our incredible campers with our experienced and inspiring staff both to hold the space and ensure the safety and success of camp, but also to provide examples and potentially long-term connections with changemakers working on making a difference in a wide variety of ways.

Towards the end of the week, many of our campers wrote thank you letters to staff to show their appreciation for our hard work and commitment. Seeing these letters was so inspiring and validating for all of our staff.

Each staff member went above and beyond this summer, doing countless things throughout the day that may go unnoticed but helped make YEA Camp such a success. It was beautiful to see that our campers noticed!

You can read some more of our camper appreciation letters on our Instagram.

It’s always so hard to explain what a session of YEA Camp was like. From the friendships and silliness, to serious discussions and learning, to confidence-building and epiphanies, up through their action plans…. It’s impossible to capture it in a blog post.

Ultimately, the only way to understand what YEA Camp is like  is to join us yourself!

Check back on our website at www.yeacamp.org to see our upcoming dates for next summer, other programs we are offering, or to apply to work with us.

Thank you so much to everyone who helped make another year of YEA Camp possible! This includes all of our amazing campers and families, staff, volunteers, and donors. YEA Camp is truly a labor of love. The impact of our work is only possible thanks to all of you! We will be seeing the ripple effects through our campers’ activism in the years to come.

We look forward to another life-changing summer, new digital offerings, and staying connected in the year to come.

The post First In-Person YEA Camp in 3 Years Was a Success! appeared first on YEA Camp.

We shouldn’t need Valentine’s Day to show our special someone how much we love them, but it can be a nice extra push and opportunity to connect.

Likewise, even if some of us have been taking our environment for granted for the past 364 days, Earth Day is a great opportunity to kickstart being more mindful about protecting this place we call home.

After all, the environment isn’t someplace far away, like a rainforest in a foreign country. It is all of our surroundings that we rely on for clean water, air, land, energy, food, and life itself for all species. Meaning, it’s really, really important!

There are so many things we can do to make a difference, and we’re here to help you think it through.

At YEA Camp, we train people to make a difference on 3 levels: the personal, community, and institutional.

• The personal level: These are actions we can take in our own daily lives. Some of the most impactful:
  • 1. Reduce your consumption of meat and animal products.  Many studies indicate that this is the biggest individual action most of us can take in our daily lives. Being mindful of less packaging and eating local and organic is of course helpful too, but shifting toward plant-based eating makes a much bigger impact. Try out small changes like non-dairy milk in your cereal or coffee, participate in Meatless Mondays, or if you want to really go for it, take on a 30 day vegan challenge.
  • 2. Buy less stuff. Use the 4 Rs: Rethink if you really need to purchase this item; reduce the new items you buy; reuse things you own rather than purchasing new ones; and recycle what you can. The rethink is really the most important here.
  • 3. Green your home. This can mean changing habits, like turning off lights, buying ecofriendly products and light bulbs, or wear or take off that sweater if it means you can turn down or skip using the heater or AC. It could also mean investing in more eco-friendly improvements to your insulation or alternative energy like solar panels.  We’re skipping talking about transportation now as we are physical distancing, and the normal advice on public transportation really doesn’t apply.

Each individual aluminum can or cheeseburger has a relatively small impact, but it all adds up.

• The community level: Amplify your impact by inspiring others to take action too! Check out our list of featured organizations to connect with.
  • 4. Join an organization. There are lots of ways this can look, but connecting with a group that is already doing great work makes it a lot easier to plug in. Find at least one organization doing work you believe in and follow them on social media, join their email list, and look at the What You Can Do or Get Involved section on their website to find out how you can help — and then do it!
  • 5. Direct service. Volunteer for an organization, clean up litter in your community, or otherwise use specialized skills you have to make a difference. If you love to make art or teach or get your hands in the dirt, do that! Every nonprofit or community organization also benefits from more money to fulfill its mission. Raising or donating money to an organization is paying them to make a difference on a cause you care about!
  • 6. Share and inspire the people in your life, and beyond. How can you enroll someone to join you in these actions you’re taking or in the way you value our environment? It could be talking with a friend or expanding your reach through social media, like by taking a photo of an eco-friendly action you’ve taken or posting an article about an important topic. Or invite people to join you in your advocacy, volunteering, or donations.

If you get 1 more person to take that same action you take on a personal level, you’re doubling the difference you’re making. And when we can get hundreds or thousands or even millions of people to follow suit, we see big change.

• The institutional level: Ultimately, this is where big change needs to happen. We are not going to bring about the shift we need just by recycling or using both sides of a sheet of paper. We need giant companies to incorporate eco-friendly policies, and since most haven’t done it on their own, we need to show them that we think it’s important and pressure the government to make sure they do.
  • 7. Green your school, workplace, or town. This may be less possible during times of physical distancing, or maybe not. Maybe this is an opportunity to ensure that your town is more resilient or to do your research so you are prepared to approach your school or workplace to prioritize eco-friendly choices when things are back up and running.
  • 8. Advocate for companies to change their policies. This could mean calling, commenting on social media, creating or signing an online petition, or otherwise requesting that they shift their practices in consideration of the planet. Boycotting or limiting your purchases from companies who are harming the planet is only effective if the company knows why you aren’t buying their products.
  • 9. Lobby your elected officials to protect the environment. Here’s a scorecard evaluating where our legislators have stood on environmental issues. The more they hear from us to know how important this issue is to their constituents, the more likely at least some of them will shift their priorities and their votes.
  • 10. Help elect leaders who prioritize environmental sustainability.  This is an election year, so if you don’t think your elected officials are taking action to protect the environment, help elect new ones! This could mean anything from registering voters, phonebanking or texting for a candidate, or working toward fair elections, especially in the context of a global pandemic.

There are so many things we can do to make a difference, and some will be different for each of us. Some will also be different when we’re no longer physical distancing.

Either way, we hope this Earth Day is an opportunity for all of us to reflect on how we can have a bigger impact (or a smaller impact, depending on how you look at it!) on the planet.

To learn more about how you can help the environment or other social justice issues you care about, check out our ebook, The Beginner’s Guide to Changing the World.

The post Actions We Can Take for Earth Day Any Day appeared first on YEA Camp.

In November, YEA Camp launched the first-ever “Volunteer-a-thon” designed to encourage people to get more involved in community service and activism, and to do it publicly with greater accountability. The best part? The Volunteer-a-thon is a fundraiser, with all money raised going to the YEA Camp Scholarship Fund. For many campers who participated, it was an opportunity to pay forward their own experience to make it possible for someone else to attend in the future.

Each year, we receive dozens of financial aid requests from passionate activists who want to experience YEA Camp but do not have the monetary means to do so. In 2019, YEA Camp granted financial aid to 51 of our 100 participants and full scholarships to 17 of those participants. Overall, you helped us fund over $66,400 worth of financial aid. 

None of that would be possible without the generous support of our YEA Camp community. That is what made the Volunteer-a-Thon so special for us. By participating, our campers were paying forward their experiences to the next summer of activists. 

What was the Volunteer-a-Thon anyway?

Instead of trying to raise money by training for a marathon or selling cookies, members of our camp community created a donor page asking for they’d ask their loved ones to sponsor to their activism. 

Mia Jay-Pachirat is a two-time youth camper from New York City whose Issue of Importance (IOI) is climate change. For the Volunteer-a-Thon, she created an art zine focused on NYC-specific solutions to climate change. 

When asked about her experience with the Volunteer-a-Thon, Mia said, “It really pushed me to keep my action plan and other little activism acts to the front of my mind!” You can read more about Mia’s experience here. 

B.T. Salle Widelock attended YEA Camp in 2019 and pledged to volunteer 30 hours for local organizations in his community. “I had an amazing experience at camp. That great experience can only be made possible with others’ help.” We are so honored that 7 members of B.T.’s family donated a total of $850 to support YEA Camp and B.T. — and thanks to two generous donors who offered matching gifts, those funds mean $2550 for our scholarship fund!

For some, the Volunteer-a-thon was all in the family. Camper Marley Goldman and her mom Gail are working to end the use of rodenticide in Washington state. Marley says, “I want other young aspiring activists to get the same kind of training and support that I did so that they can pursue whatever cause is important to them.”

We already shared with you about our amazing former campers Dima Bischoff-Hashem, Audrey Watson, and Danielle Holtz also participated in the Volunteer-a-Thon. You can read their reflections on camp and their projects here. 

And YEA Camp director Nora Kramer participated in the Volunteer-a-thon, too! Nora’s project was to reach out to at least 100 former campers from over the years to see if she could support them in her activism. Nora reported back that this was a huge success! “It was so inspiring how many of our campers shared their positive experiences of YEA Camp and even sharing that their memories from YEA Camp were some of the happiest memories of their childhood! Several donated to our Volunteer-a-Thon, several offered to volunteer and are now working on cool projects for us, and one camper even wrote this blog post reflecting on her experience at YEA Camp, looking back 5 years later! It was an honor and pleasure to be back in touch with such phenomenal people!”

You can see — and you can still support! — even more amazing changemakers who created fundraising pages here. We are so grateful to everyone who participated!

The Final Results

We were so excited to pilot the Volunteer-a-thon this year and so grateful to the fourteen members of our community who created pages and helped us raise almost $6,000! 

Thank you to everyone who dedicated their time, energy, and dollars into this exciting new program. We could not have done it without you. 

It’s not too late to make a final donation to our Volunteer-a-Thon to help YEA Camp make a bigger difference for even more people!

Time to register for summer 2020!

Are you interested in taking your activism to the next level? We’ve announced the dates for this summer and would love to have you there. Do you know someone who would be great for camp? Nominate them here!

• Youth Camp: in Ventura, California (July 5 – 12) and Charlton, Massachusetts (August 1 – 8)
• Adult Camp: in Lanoka Habor, New Jersey (July 18 – 24)

The post YEA Camp Celebrates Success with First Ever Volunteer-a-Thon appeared first on YEA Camp.

We held the second session of YEA Camp for Adults at Woodstock Farm Sanctuary in New Paltz, New York.

Here are some of the highlights from YEA Camp 2019.

Our 11th Summer

This was our 11th summer hosting YEA Camp for teens ages 12 – 17 and we are so grateful for the opportunity to work with these inspiring young people. 

Our first youth camp was held at Nature’s Classroom in Charlton, Massachusetts from July 13 – 20. Our second youth camp was held at Camp Buckhorn in Idyllwild, California from August 3 – 10. 

We had around fifty campers at each youth session representing two dozen states and three countries. 

From June 30 – July 6, 22 campers from 12 states stayed with us at Woodstock Farm Sanctuary in New Paltz, New York for the second ever session of YEA Camp for Adults. From yoga in the morning to meeting with farmed animals after lunch, from workshops on gender and race to trainings on communication and fundraising, our campers had the perfect mix of self-care and reflection while also learning valuable skills to help advance their activism.

We love our YEA Camp Massachusetts staff!

Between the three sessions of camp, we were so blessed to have 35 amazing staff members from 16 different states.

Our Impact

Juan Antonio Nelson is an Iowa college student who flew all the way to New York to attend adult camp. When asked about the experience, he said, “Without YEA Camp, I wouldn’t feel that I could make a difference in my immediate community. I wouldn’t have the courage to stand up for others. If not for YEA Camp, I wouldn’t have met a strong community of activists who are passionately advocating for what they believe in.”

A few months ago, former YEA Camper and current YEA staff member Ananya Singh was featured on the Perennials Podcast. In the podcast, Ananya says, “When I was 12 years old, the summer before eighth grade, I attended this summer camp called Youth Empowered Action and this is a camp for teen activists and it really was a life changing experience for me. It exposes you to so many different social issues that are going on in the world and kind of takes the approach of intersectionality and showing how all of these issues are so interconnected and then really breaking down what is possible for young people to do.”

YEA Camp staff member Ananya Singh in action at the Morristown, New Jersey Climate Strike

We also recently shared the story of former YEA Camper Leah Kelly who FIVE years after attending camp, wrote this blog post where she says, “Five and a half years ago, as a 15-year-old, I attended Youth Empowered Action (YEA) Camp for the first time and my life was changed immeasurably. I can’t imagine how different my life would have been from then on had I not spent that pivotal week learning what it means to be an effective agent of change and forming lasting connections that supported, and continue to support me as I navigate a chosen path of social justice and fighting for what I believe in.”

Our Brand New Program

This year, we also launched the first-ever YEA Camp Volunteer-a-thon. The Volunteer-a-thon was created to encourage our community in service and activism while raising money for the YEA Camp Scholarship Fund. 

Dima Bischoff-Hashem created an awesome Volunteer-a-thon project supporting her Issue of Importance, animal rights!

Participants created donor pages, shared what activism they would be working on, and asked their loved ones to “sponsor” them in their work. You can read more about three of our camper’s projects at this link and click here to read what one camper wrote about the experience. 

All funds raised through the Volunteer-a-thon go towards the YEA Camp Scholarship Fund which makes camp accessible for all who want to attend. 

This year, 51 of our 100 participants received financial aid and 17 of those campers were on full scholarships. Overall, we funded $66,400 of financial aid this year.  

Our Gratitude

We cannot say thank you enough to everyone who made camp possible. From our food donors to our staff to our donors, thank you. 

Helping ourselves to vegan pizza with Miyoko’s Cheese and more toppings than we can count!

Thanks to two generous donors, we also have a special opportunity through the end of the year. All donations given before the end of the year will be TRIPLED. Click here to learn more and to donate to our Scholarship Fund. 

Every year at YEA Camp, we have the privilege of meeting passionate and activated changemakers who are taking the world by storm. We feel so grateful to be a part of their story and look forward to supporting you in making a bigger difference on the causes you care most about, too!

See You Next Summer

Do you want to experience YEA Camp for yourself next summer, or know someone who would love to join us? 

We are eagerly preparing for 2020 and are excited to offer an Early Bird special registration for $250 off those who sign up before the end of the year. Do you know someone who would be great for YEA Camp? Nominate them here!

• Youth Camp: in Ventura, California (July 5 – 12) and Charlton, Massachusetts (August 1 – 8)
• Adult Camp: in Lanoka Harbor, New Jersey (July 18 – 24)

See you next summer!

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