This summer, we have reached a DECADE of YOI Summer Freedom Schools!

We've built deep roots with Raleigh Freedom School and four years ago we expanded to include Durham. Two years ago, we added programs in Chapel Hill and Greensboro. We’re growing rapidly due to high demand and we’re calling for our community, allies, and comrades to help us sustain this fiery expansion.

By opening Freedom School to four cities, we are building a cohort of youth of color, LGBTQ youth, working class youth, and immigrant youth who are dedicated to fighting oppression on all fronts. Interest in Freedom School has always come from high schools across the state; from Durham County to Wake County; Guilford to Orange; Alamance to Randolph; Forsyth to Franklin. Each track has a local team of staff and volunteers and a curriculum sourced directly from youth participants, educators, parents, and members from each community.

Through popular education workshops, teambuilding games, and discussions, we learn about environmental racism, the school to prison pipeline, Indigenous land reclamation, reproductive justice, homophobia, and an end to school re-segregation and so much more.

Youth have always been and will continue to be catalysts for change. This year we've already seen youth rising up in mass to resist climate change, aggressive school push-out, and underpaid teachers. This has sparked conversations about what school safety could actually look like without violent laws that ultimately target marginalized students.

We will continue these conversations while building young people's leadership skills, critical thinking, and political analysis. We see our Freedom School program as a key part of this work. In the wake of this new decade and the 2020 Elections, we need to give young people the tools they need to resist what's coming.

Donate here! Can you help us build for 10 more years?

 

Please make a contribution today to get us to our fundraising goal of $35,000 by August 1st! This is essential to run Freedom School in all four locations. If you can donate even $5, we thank you deeply. We owe so much to our supporters, volunteers, and community partners who hold us down.

Our program provides transportation support, breakfast and lunch, as well as a participant stipend to all youth who attend freedom school. We couldn’t continue to do so without the support of our community!

Your donation goes to helping youth enact change throughout their communities by eliminating as many barriers as possible to organizing.

You can learn more about our Freedom School program here and checkout photos of our workshops, field trips, and actions we've taken to build youth power.