Refugee Youth Power Summit 2019

About this campaign

RYPS was founded with three main goals: to build a strong community of refugee youth leaders, to cultivate the critical ideas and tools necessary for social justice work, and finally to engage in collective action on behalf of refugee communities everywhere. More than anything, the vision for the summit was to create a space for refugee youth to learn, grow, heal, be supported, and organize as a community.

For the past two summers, the Summit did exactly that. Last summer, for two weeks, 26 youth participants, with the support of refugee youth directors who were participants the year before, engaged in social justice education, learned from local activists in providence, shared stories, wrote poems and songs, made zines, and organized together. While the program was new, the power of its mission and its community held it together. At the close of each summer, it becomes more and more clear that the summit is just a start of something with an exciting and infinite potential.

This summer, we are excited to announce that the Refugee Youth Power Summit will be back and better than ever! As a response to youth feedback we will continue to build solidarity with local activists and organizations. We have also added two new Community Care Director positions, and will also be integrating new educational materials and alternative learning opportunities to push the program to better serve its mission of building refugee youth power and healing.

For the past two years, our small and humble program was made possible through the generous contributions of so many individuals and communities who believed in what we were doing. This year, we are in need of support to grow what we started two years ago into the most incredible program possible!

Anything you can contribute counts, and will have a great impact on our ability to create this incredibly necessary space for the refugee youth community in Providence.

Your support will help support some of the new initiatives we’re taking on as part of our third annual summit, including
-The creation of two fully funded youth community care coordinator positions
-The integration of more field trips into our schedule
-The continuation of guest workshops from local leaders and activists in Providence

Support will also help contribute to our standard programmatic costs, which include…
-Transportation costs
-Food
-T-Shirts
-Workshop Materials
-Participant Stipends (each summit participant will receive a 150 dollar stipend for completing the program)
-Staff Stipends
-Space costs