2018 Tegan and Sara Foundation LGBTQ Camp Scholarship Grantees
ASPYRE (North Carolina)
The mission of the A Safer Place for Youth to Reach for Excellence (ASPYRE) Leadership Camp is to empower young members of the LGBTQ community and their allies to achieve personal growth through advocacy and activism while making a positive impact in their communities.
Camp fyrefly (Alberta)
Camp fYrefly is an educational, social, and personal leadership retreat for queer and trans youth. It focuses on building and nurturing their leadership skills and personal resiliency in an effort to help them learn how to make significant contributions to their own lives and to their schools, home/group-home environments, and communities. Camp is designed for queer and trans youth between the ages of 14 and 24.
Camp Laurel (California)
The Laurel Foundation offers the nations first free resident camp program specifically for transgender /non-binary youth aged 10-17.
The program is based on traditional camp programs, yet caters to the unique mental and physical health of youth who are gender non-conforming and transgender youth. The program helps to empower transgender youth in an accepting environment, filled with volunteer transgender role models. For many of the youth, it is the first time they were truly liberated and supported to be who they are.
Camp OUTdoors! (Arizona)
Camp OUTdoors! is dedicated to helping LGBTQAI+ youth develop leadership skills, work in collaborative ways, and develop a strong sense of self and community.
Camp Outright (Vermont)
Camp Outright is a residential summer camp program for queer, trans, questioning, and allied youth. Folks from throughout the US and beyond are welcome, with campers that range from age 13 to 17 and counselors-in-training ages 18-19. Straight allies are also welcome.
Campers enjoy activities based on their interests, from sports to visual and performing arts, to nature exposure activities, and workshops addressing social justice issues within the queer, trans, and questioning community.
QORDS Camp (North Carolina)
Queer Oriented Radical Days of Summer (QORDS) is a summer camp for queer youth or youth of queer parents, with special focus on youth in the South.
Over the course of a week, campers form bands and write songs to perform. Additionally, they attend workshops on issues related to gender identity, consent and sexual health, organizing for change, and sexual orientation as well as engage in other camp activities like arts and crafts, creative writing, dancing, drag, hiking and canoeing. At the end of the week, campers put on a showcase of their original music and poetry for family, friends, and community members at a local venue.
Spirit Pride Project (Texas)
The Spirit Pride Project (formerly Spiritual Pride Project) is a non-profit dedicated to the idea that LGBT+ young people deserve to know that who they are is valuable, powerful, and lovable. SPP uses camp as a vehicle for a spirituality retreat through team-building, community-building, and identity-forming games, workshops, and activities.
Camp True Colors (Minnesota)
Camp True Colors is a safe place where youth are free to express their true identity—completely without fear of judgement. Camp True Colors also connects youth to a wider LGBTQ+ community so that they can continue the conversation–and share the best of camp with others back home.