The Summer Grants for Kids program awards mini grants – typically between $1,000 and $1,500 – to area nonprofits to provide new opportunities over the summer to youth who otherwise could not afford them. While small in size, these grants help children accomplish big things and introduce them to new experiences that resonate for a lifetime.
Artists Working in Education: $1,500 to support its mobile art studio, which provides free, engaging and educational arts activities to Milwaukee's most vulnerable youth at parks and playgrounds.
Big Brothers and Big Sisters of Metropolitan Milwaukee: $1,500 for its Summer Bridge programming, which will serve 300 children in its school-based mentoring program and will help ensure children return to school in the fall ready to learn.
Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater Milwaukee: $1,400 to provide scholarships for youth residing in Milwaukee to attend overnight camp at Camp Whitcomb/Mason in Hartland.
Bradley Family Foundation: $1,400 to provide transportation for 300 children from various community-based summer programs in Milwaukee can attend the summer field trip program at the Lynden Sculpture Garden.
Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin Foundation: $1,400 for programming expenses related to Camp Ujima, a six-week summer day camp for at-risk and disadvantaged youth ages 8 to 17 who have been traumatized by community and/or interpersonal violence.
COA Youth & Family Centers: $1,000 to provide youth ages 8-17 an opportunity to attend a 13-day or six-day summer camp session at Camp Helen Brachman.
CORE/El Centro: $1,000 to support its Sustainable Sprouts program, a two-week summer camp for children ages 6 to 12 that focuses on themes of health, wellness, environmental stewardship, recycling and conservation, relationship building and self-care.
Danceworks: $1,000 to provide financial support for students ages 3-1/2 - 17 to attend its Summer Creative Arts Camp, which offers several creative arts forms.
Express Yourself Milwaukee: $1,500 to support summer internships where youth work in a multidisciplinary arts team as mentors for summer camp participants.
First Stage Children’s Theater: $1,500 to provide scholarships for youth to attend its summer academy.
Girl Scouts of Wisconsin Southeast: $1,500 to help 30 girls from Milwaukee to attend an outdoor leadership experience through Girl Scout camp.
HeartLove Place: $1,000 to purchase supplies to expand its summer gardening program by three additional garden beds. It houses seven garden beds and two orchard trees.
JFS Housing: $1,500 to sponsor summer activities, including literacy classes, educational activities and recreational outings, for youth living in Bradley Crossing Supportive Housing Community.
Journey House: $1,500 to teach youth ages 8 to 12 in its Kagel Community Learning Center Summer Gardening Program the basics and values of gardening, eating healthy foods and entrepreneurship.
La Causa: $1,300 to support its summer programming for children ages 3 through 12. Its 2016 programming will expose children to the wonders of nature, teaching them about plant life and rainforests through hands-on, guided experiences.
Latino Arts: $1,500 to support two college-age youth with summer employment for six weeks at the Latino Arts Strings Program.
Lead2Change: $1,500 to provide transportation for students participating in its career-focused internship experience and summer academy, Dream. Explore. Build.
Marquette University: $1,000 to provide equipment such as bikes, helmets and running shoes to youth for use in healthy summer sports activities through YES3 Multisport Club, which works with middle school students in Milwaukee’s 53204 and 53215 ZIP codes.
Milwaukee Ballet: $1,500 to support the Summer Relevé community outreach program, which serves third through fifth graders at ALBA, Allen-Field and Parkside schools.
Milwaukee Christian Center: $1,500 to support its Summer Experiential Literacy Project, which combines literacy tutoring with fields trips and hands-on activities to prevent summer slide. The program aims to serve 80 youth ages 6 to 13.
Milwaukee Public Museum: $1,500 for its Summer Urban Academy, which provides hands-on learning opportunities around science, technology, engineering and math for children entering fourth and sixth grade.
Nehemiah: $1,000 to provide support for a six-week math and reading youth learning camp. The camp aims to serve 100 K5 to sixth graders.
Neighborhood House of Milwaukee: $1,500 to support a 10-week environmental education and leadership program that will provide 300 low-income youth ages 5 to 19 with urban agriculture, environmental education and entrepreneurial activities. It will also provide paid internships for four youth, ages 15 to 24.
New Threads of Hope: $1,400 to purchase books for its Summer Slide program, which will be distributed at multiple sites, such as schools, social service agencies and other literacy programs, throughout Milwaukee.
Penfield Children’s Center: $1,000 to support five field trips during the summer for children in the agency’s early education and care program.
SHARP Literacy: $1,500 to provide books and materials for 450 students participating in the agency’s summer learning gain initiative, which builds students' vocabulary using literacy and visual art-based science and social studies lessons.
Silver Spring Neighborhood Center: $1,000 to extend its summer Community Learning Center program, which provides academic and social program support, into August.
St. Marcus Lutheran Church: $1,500 to expand its summer school program that helps stop and reverse summer learning loss.
Tippecanoe Presbyterian Church: $1,400 to support an arts and science literacy camp program for first through fourth grade children. The program will enhance children's literacy skills through use of nonfiction reading and encoding in handmade journals.
Triangle of Hope: $1,400 to support costs associated with the field trips that are part of a summer enrichment program at New Hope Baptist Church that includes an emphasis in STEM areas.
TRUE Skool: $1,000 to support its summer leadership and workforce development Program, which provides 25 youth with internships where they complete an individual portfolio showcasing their business and artistic skills.
United Community Center: $1,500 to provide support for a rowboat project for children who will attend the agency’s Acosta Middle School that offers fun, safe and enriching activities that reinforce basic math skills and fosters good communication skills.
Urban Ecology Center: $1,500 to support scholarships for children to be able to attend the agency’s summer camp, which provides inquiry-based education through exploratory outdoor adventures.
UWM Foundation: $1,400 to support fun learning activities for students participating in its TRIO and precollege programs mini-courses summer exploration camp. The camp reinforces core academic subjects and is geared toward enhancing student interest in attending college.
Variety – The Children’s Charities of Wisconsin: $1,400 to help fund Chatter Matters Communication Camp, a four-day summer camp for people with physical disabilities who communicate primarily through the use of assistive technology as well as their family members and caregivers.
Walker’s Point Center for the Arts: $1,400 to support its eight-week summer art camp, "Community through Art."
Wild Space: $1,500 to provide support for fifth through eighth graders in a five-week summer arts education program that integrates dance, visual arts and theater.
Wisconsin Humane Society: $1,000 for transportation expenses for students participating in the People Animals Learning program, a nationally-recognized empathy-building program that teaches students how to train shelter dogs to become well-mannered companions for adopting families.
Zoological Society of Milwaukee County: $1,000 to enable children ages 6 to 11 from area community centers to attend a summer camp at the zoo and learn about animals and conservation.
Cedarburg Art Museum: $1,400 to cover costs associated with its summer Main Street Arts Camp, which will serve a total of 150 children ages 4 to 10.
Mequon Nature Preserve: $1,500 to provide summertime opportunities to 230 Milwaukee youth via a weeklong camp for Native Americans, daylong field trips and a weekly land restoration educational program called Restoration Rangers.
Boys & Girls Clubs of Washington County: $1,400 for its Summer Brain Gain program, which provides students ages 6 to 17 with continued academic learning and skills development to prevent summer learning loss.
Casa Guadalupe Education Center: $1,000 to provide basic Spanish lessons in four separate week-long summer camps. Each camp will serve a maximum of 20 Hispanic and non-Hispanic kids.
Riveredge Nature Center: $1,000 to provide scholarships for campers ages 3 to 18 to attend its Nature Journeys Summer Camp program.
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