Southborough Youth and Family Services is asking the public to help support its “camperships” program for families in need. Send a Kid to Camp is funded through Friends of the Southborough Youth Commission. This year, they are short on what’s needed. They are reaching out to again to the community for help.*
Below is the message that the Friends group asked me to share:
Dear Neighbor,
For over 30 years, Southborough Youth and Family Services (SYFS) has been offering summer camp scholarships through their Send a Kid to Camp program for children of Southborough families who do not have the financial means to afford camp tuition.* The Send a Kid to Camp program is funded largely by the Southborough Community Fund and is also made possible by donations from local residents, businesses, and donations of free weeks or reduced rates from local camps. In 2018, SYFS sent 31 children for 33 weeks of camp at Fay School, Southborough’s Recreation Department, Southborough Extended Day, Hopkinton YMCA, YMCA Overnight Camps of Greater Boston, Teamworks and the Hopkinton Center for the Arts. The department is grateful for the generosity and support of the Southborough Community Fund and their camp partners.
In recognition of the innumerable benefits a camp experience offers school-age children and adolescents, SYFS hopes to be able to continue to meet the needs of Southborough families through the Send a Kid to Camp program. For SYFS to respond to all the camp scholarship requests summer of 2019 and to send each child to camp for a minimum of two weeks, an additional $2,500 is needed. SYFS is asking that you please consider making a donation to support this invaluable program.
Friends of the Southborough Youth Commission (FYSC), a 501 (c)(3) nonprofit organization that raises funds to help support SYFS programs, is gratefully accepting contributions in any amount. Employees are encouraged to explore matching gift programs offered by their employers. Donations to FSYC are tax deductible and may be made securely online through the FSYC website:
www.southboroughfriends.wordpress.com
You may also send a check made payable to Friends of the Southborough Youth Commission to 17 Common Street, Southborough, MA 01772.
To find out more about Southborough Youth and Family Services and Friends of the Southborough Youth Commission, please visit www.southboroughtown.com/YouthFamily/youthfam.htm or contact Shannon Kinayman at 508.481.5676 ext. 3. Thank you in advance for your support of the Send a Kid to Camp program.
With kind regards,
Sue Butka
Friends of the Southborough Youth Commission
*I sought clarification in case any readers are confused (as I was) about the program’s age. Six years ago that SYFS and the Youth Commission launched a public funding campaign for camperships. At that time, budget cuts led to them ending their middle school camp program, which increased their campership needs. For the first time, they required outside donations to help them send kids to camp. What I didn’t realize is that the agency had already been offering camperships to outside programs for decades based on Town funding.
