Empower 400 Young Women Leaders in the NW!

With the support of Global Giving donors like YOU, we launched Y-WE Connect and Y-WE Write this summer! 30 young women participated in these new programs. They worked with inspiring adult mentors, built positive relationships with peers from diverse backgrounds, found their voices, experienced the outdoors, worked with incredible professional writers from the women's writing institute Hedgebrook, and gained the leadership skills they need to spark community change! 

Y-WE Write is a new summer camp in collaboration with the literary non-profit Hedgebrook. During this program, young women participated in high-caliber writing workshops with Hedgebrook alumnae: Shontina Vernon – Playwright, Musician, Performer; Karen Finneyfrock – Poet and Novelist; Rebecca Brown – Author, Artist, Curator, Performer, Teacher; Mayda Del Valle - Poet and Performer. To read about these amazing artists please visit our website. The young women who participated in this camp received writing education and built their self confidence. As one young woman explained, "Before this program I did not like writing--I thought it was just something boring for school that I could never be good at. But now, I LOVE to write and I now have the confidence to get up on stage and perform my work for audiences of over 300! I'm so grateful to Y-WE and to the donors who make these programs possible. Every girl deserves a chance to experience this kind of life-changing program where she gets the courage to get up on stage to tell her story."

Y-WE Connect is a new nature education program that will unfold from August 2014-June 2015. As one young woman exclaimed, “I’m grateful to nature and to the forest for holding us during this amazing program. This week I camped outside for the first time and I learned to appreciate the food, animals, and land that the earth provides!”  Over the course of the next 9 months we will be working with partner organizations: Service, Education & Adventure and Greenbank Farm to coordinate new Y-WE Connect field trips and service projects. Y-WE Connect will also include residential retreats and a year-long exploration of the relationship between a healthy environment and healthy eating.  We know that Y-WE Connect will be deeply enriching for participating girls and we are very grateful for the Global Giving support that has made this new program possible.     

We are getting ready to launch into our school year programs this fall: Y-WE Lead and Y-WE Speak! If you know a young woman in 8th grade-12th grade who would like to participate in our programs, please encourage her to sign up here. If you are interested in becoming a volunteer or mentor, please contact Adult Program Manager Victoria Santos at victoria@y-we.org or visit our volunteer page.

Young Women Empowered (Y-WE) prepares young women from diverse backgrounds to step into leadership in their schools, communities and the world. We do this through intergenerational mentorship, intercultural collaboration, and creative programs that equip girls with the confidence, resiliency, and planning skills needed to achieve their goals and improve their communities. Of our current youth participants, 70% are immigrants, 80% are of color, and 95% are from low-income backgrounds. We provide scholarships, transportation, and healthy meals for all girls in need! Please continue to help us make our programs equally accessible to ALL girls, by contributing to our Global Giving projects. Thanks for you generosity!