Usdan Summer Camp for the Arts in Wheatley Heights offers scholarship
Usdan Summer Camp for the Arts' new initiative will grant seven weeks of camp to up to 10 students. Credit: Matt Zugale
Usdan Summer Camp for the Arts in Wheatley Heights has launched its first scholarship for kids who can express what makes them unique through a video of up to five minutes. The initiative, dubbed Uniquely U, coincides with Usdan’s 50th anniversary and will grant seven weeks of camp to up to 10 students.
While Usdan already provides more than $1 million in need- and merit-based scholarships each year, those scholarships are based on financial need or on technical skills, says Lauren Brandt Schloss, Usdan’s executive director.
“This scholarship program is a little bit different,” she says. “What we’re looking for is kids who have incredible passion and who are really creative. For this program, we are not looking at need; we’re not even collecting that information.”
The new scholarship competition requires artists ages 7 to 18 and in grades 2 through 12 from across Long Island, New York City and Westchester to submit samples of their work in creative writing or visual and performing arts. Students who already spend summers at Usdan are eligible to apply, Schloss says.
The scholarship, which covers full tuition and transportation for the summer of 2018, is worth at least $5,450, Schloss says. Submission details can be found at uu.usdan.org. The deadline is 11:59 p.m. on March 11.
Usdan hopes to see schools urge their students to apply and will also grant one scholarship to the school with the most applicants, Schloss says. That school will decide which of its students receives the grant.
Usdan is on 140 acres at 185 Colonial Springs Rd. in Wheatley Heights. For more information, call 631-643-7900 or visit UU.Usdan.org.
Beth Whitehouse writes about families, parenting and great things to do with the kids on Long Island. She’s been a Newsday editor and shared a 1997 Newsday staff Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the crash of TWA Flight 800.
