Foundations Community Partnership has provided Valley Youth House with a Bucks Innovative and Improvement Grant (BIIG) for $10,000 to send youth to Valley Youth House’s Camp Fowler.

Funding will provide camp scholarships, transportation, and camping supplies for 12 Bucks County youth to attend the Camp Fowler Summer Adventure Program. Youth served would not otherwise have the opportunity or funds to attend summer camp and will come from Valley Youth House Bucks County programs as well as partnering youth service programs that work with youth who are homeless, in foster care, or otherwise without family resources.

This population is at high risk for negative mental health outcomes and may have limited opportunities to develop and practice interpersonal and leadership skills. Camp Fowler’s evidence-based outdoor behavioral health model emphasizes learning and breakthroughs outside of the clinical and classroom setting. Exposure to nature has demonstrated benefits such as the alleviation of chronic stress, which creates a restorative atmosphere ideal for healing and overcoming past trauma. Camp programming also promotes physical activity, which is especially important for the proposed population, many of whom suffer from poor fitness and obesity.

Activities will include use of the climbing tower and adventure course elements, a day of off-camp hiking, swimming, cooking lessons, skills development, and arts and crafts. Partnering agencies like the Wildlands Conservancy and the Lehigh Valley Amateur Astronomical Society will provide guided nature walks, a tour of the night sky, horseback riding, and other programming.