Texas A&M Offering Variety Of Youth Camps For Summer 2024

Parents looking for ways to occupy their kids this summer will find a variety of camp options at Texas A&M University that will both keep kids engaged and encourage them to explore their interests.

An online youth camps and programs dashboard available for the first time this summer on the Office for Youth Engagement website allows parents to sort through more than 170 options, with the ability to filter by age and topic. Office for Youth Engagement Director Stephanie Burns said while the university has offered a robust array of high-quality summer camps for more than 30 years, the opportunities have in a way been a “best-kept secret.”

“We’re excited that for the first time all of the information is now in one place for families to easily see the different types of activities happening on campus this summer,” Burns said. “That’s huge, because the question of, ‘What do I do with my student in the summer?’ is a big challenge for people with young children. Summer is a really great time for kids to investigate their interests and passions.”

Burns said there are day and overnight programs available for kids of all ages. And with camp categories including sports and recreation, arts and culture, and academics, there’s something for everyone. Scholarships are also available for several of the camps, Burns said.

The variety of camps offered by the university are an extension of Texas A&M’s land-grant mission and the purpose of the Office for Youth Engagement, which was established in January 2023 to strengthen and support youth programming.

“We know here in Texas that not enough youth are pursuing post-secondary opportunities or thinking holistically about all of the different careers they might be interested in,” Burns said. “It’s important to provide youth with opportunities to connect with a passion, to learn about career fields and to get experience that helps them envision themselves in college.”

For Tara Donnelly, who graduated from Texas A&M University at Galveston in May 2023 with a bachelor’s degree in maritime studies, her summer camp experience was an important introduction to the college experience.

The Galveston native loved playing in the mud and exploring the island as a child, so her parents signed her up for Sea Camp one year after learning about the program through a flyer in the mail. Donnelly attended nearly every summer from kindergarten through high school, starting out with arts and crafts at day camps before moving on to weeklong camps in high school where she’d take trips to the marshes and beaches around Galveston.

“It ended up contributing to why I came to A&M Galveston,” said Donnelly, who is now pursuing a master’s in maritime business administration and logistics. “I loved Sea Camp, and there were always good people here. Everyone here was passionate about what they were doing, and I could see that there were interesting, new discoveries happening on campus. I loved the community, and I knew I wasn’t going to get lost here in the mix on the Galveston campus.”

Texas A&M’s youth programs and summer camps play an important role in setting the stage for lifelong learning, Burns said, with research showing that children who have spent time on a college campus by eighth grade are more likely to apply to colleges.

“The experience of seeing themselves in college and feeling like it’s something they can do Is really transformational,” Burns said. “Camps play a huge role in that. Whether a student wants to come to A&M or not, we’re committed to them pursuing some sort of post-secondary education.”

For more information about camps at Texas A&M this summer, visit the Office for Youth Engagement dashboard. To learn more about how to support camp scholarships, visit the Texas A&M Foundation Online Giving portal.