A Capella Singing Group Workshop Series
Four of Yale's famous A Cappella Singing Groups teach workshops on harmonizing, beatboxing, and blending to New Haven area students of all musical backgrounds, abilities, and experience levels. Students receive a recording of their groups' songs at the end of each session.
Academic Yale College Courses
Qualified New Haven public high school juniors and seniors, who have been selected by their schools, can enroll in Yale academic courses tuition-free. This program provides an opportunity for high school students to experience a collegiate academic setting and earn credits that may then be transferred to the college of their choice following high school graduation.
Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library
The Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library inspires engagement with the past, in the present, for the future. One of the world’s largest libraries devoted entirely to rare books and manuscripts, it is Yale University’s principal repository of literary archives, early manuscripts, and rare books. The exhibition hall is free and open to the public daily, with the Gutenberg Bible and Audubon’s Birds of America on permanent view along with special exhibitions. The Beinecke Library’s collections are used to create new scholarship by researchers from around the world in a wide range of fields, from literary and cultural studies to the history of science, music, theater, and art; the history of the book, of photography, graphic design, and architecture; as well as social, intellectual, and political history. The Beinecke is open to the public seven days a week.
Citizens Thinkers Writers
Citizens Thinkers Writers offers rising juniors and seniors from New Haven public schools a tuition-free opportunity to explore fundamental moral and political questions in a college setting. Students live together in Yale housing for two weeks during the summer and continue to meet as CTW Fellows throughout the following academic year. In small discussion seminars led by professors, they gain experience in close reading, analytic writing and college-level discussion, along with support as they apply to college.
City Step
CityStep is an undergraduate organization that aims to enrich the educational experience of public school youth by introducing them to dance and other creative activities as a medium for self-expression, a method to enhance self-esteem, and a means to mutual understanding.
David Geffen School of Drama Dwight/Edgewood Project
The Dwight/Edgewood Project (D/EP) is a community-engagement program out of the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale University (DGSD) and the Yale Repertory Theatre that serves middle school–aged students from Barnard Environmental Science & Technology School. Students in grades five and six are paired with mentors (DGSD students from all disciplines) to write their own plays, resulting in fully produced plays performed by DGSD students and the New Haven community.
Dining with the Dramat
The Yale Dramatic Association, also known as the Yale Dramat, is the oldest continuously producing undergraduate college theater company in the country. At Dining with the Dramat, New Haven high school students join members of the Dramat for an exclusive behind-the-scenes glimpse into theater production. Students engage in conversations with actors, technicians, and directors as they discuss their current musical productions. Students receive free tickets to each performance and participate in a post-performance actor talk-back.
Dramat Acting Workshop Series
The Yale Dramatic Association’s High School Acting Workshop is an immersive program that gives students a look into the world of acting, no matter their level of experience. From improvisation to character building, they learn the fundamentals of performance. The series takes place each fall and spring.
East Rock Record Journalism Program
The East Rock Record (ERR), based at the East Rock Community & Cultural Studies Magnet School since 2013, is driven by the belief that students are powerful observers and reporters of happenings in their own community. The newspaper is supported by Yale’s Office of New Haven Affairs. Student journalists in grades 3-8 work with Yale student mentors to plan, report and write each issue. ERR reporters cover the most pressing and interesting issues of the day, bringing curiosity and fresh questions to stories from elections to social media culture and school life.
Hear Your Song
Hear Your Song is an undergraduate organization that gives hospitalized children—or children in long-term care—the chance to become songwriters and to hear their songs recorded. Hear Your Song works with children in nearby medical pediatric facilities to write original songs, which Yale College musicians arrange, record, and share with the patients and their families.
Hemispheres
Hemispheres, a program of the Yale International Relations Association, brings over 60 students in grades 9–12 from New Haven public schools to Yale’s campus every week to explore topics in international affairs and develop their analytical, creative, and critical thinking skills. In addition to weekly sessions and mentorship, Hemispheres offers two field-trip opportunities for students, first to visit the United Nations Headquarters in New York City, where students meet with U.N. officials and learn about diplomacy from experienced professionals, and later to visit Washington, D.C., for a weekend of educational and cultural activities including visits to the U.S. Institute of Peace, the Supreme Court, and international embassies.
Institute for the Preservation of Cultural Heritage
Yale’s Institute for the Preservation of Cultural Heritage (IPCH) is a research collaborative dedicated to the preservation and interpretation of material culture. IPCH has offered tours of their conservation space and hands-on demonstrations at on-campus science events through Yale Pathways to Science, including Chemistry on Canvas, a summer laboratory workshop for Pathways high school students.
Marshall-Brennan Constitutional Literacy Project
The Marshall-Brennan Constitutional Literacy Project is a collaborative teaching program that sends law students into local public high schools to teach constitutional law. Participants in this student-run organization also have the opportunity to coach their students in a national moot-court competition, the first round of which is run by the Yale chapter in New Haven.
Mondays at Beinecke
Mondays at Beinecke is a virtual series of gallery talks that are open to the public every Monday at 4pm. Talks focus on materials from the collections and include an opening presentation followed by conversation and question and answer.
Morris Steinert Collection of Musical Instruments
The Morris Steinert Collection of Musical Instruments is committed to fostering an understanding and appreciation of musical instruments from all cultures and periods. The collection also serves as a laboratory for historical, artistic, and innovative exploration and education in the arts and sciences.
MOSAIC: Minds on Society, Arts, Ideas, and Culture
MOSAIC: Minds on Society, Arts, Ideas and Culture is a lecture series that offers local students the opportunity to engage in thought-provoking discussions with Yale professors and interactive workshops with graduate students. These events challenge their ideas about identity, civic engagement, history, community, and culture. Past topics include “Ballots after Bullets: Democracy Design Lab” and “No Laughing Matter: Comics in the Middle East.” All MOSAIC events are free and open to the public.
Music in Schools Initiative
The Music in Schools Initiative, New Haven (MISI), is an active partnership between the Yale School of Music and New Haven Public Schools. During the academic year, MISI places graduate-student teaching artists from the Yale School of Music in more than two dozen public schools throughout New Haven. Teaching artists are trained to complement the work of full-time New Haven public school music teachers. They teach sectionals, ensembles, private lessons, and other activities depending on the needs of the school to which they are assigned. In addition, MISI coordinates after-school ensembles for New Haven students throughout the school year.
Music in Schools Initiative All-City Ensembles
All-City Ensembles provide tuition-free rehearsal and performance opportunities for students beyond the activities they have in their schools. The All-City band, choir, and string ensembles are led by a collaborative team of teaching artists from the Yale School of Music and music educators from New Haven public schools. In addition to large ensemble rehearsals, students work with teaching artists in small-group workshops to develop technique and musicianship.
Music in Schools Initiative Morse Summer Music Academy
The Morse Summer Music Academy is a free music program for intermediate and advanced music students in the band, choir, and/or orchestra programs in New Haven public schools. Over the course of four weeks, students are taught and mentored by a team of music educators from the New Haven public schools and teaching artists from the Yale School of Music. This month-long program offers opportunities for growth in musicianship, technique, and personal achievement. New Haven public school students entering grades 4–12 are eligible to apply and audition.
Music in Schools Symposium
The Symposium on Music in Schools is held once every two years at the Yale School of Music as part of the Music in Schools Initiative. This invitational “working symposium” brings together national leaders for three days of intense discussion on pressing issues surrounding music education in public schools. The symposium also honors outstanding music educators and teaching artists with the Yale Distinguished Music Educator Award.
NACLO at Yale
The North American Computational Linguistics Open Competition (NACLO) is a contest in which high school students solve linguistics puzzles drawn from a variety of languages. The Yale Linguistics Department offers four training sessions for local high school students each fall, in preparation for the Open Round of NACLO in January. No experience required to participate.
New Haven Urban Debate League
The New Haven Urban Debate League believes in the transformative qualities of public speaking and discussion that are inherent to debate. UDL holds weekly after school coaching sessions at 14 New Haven middle and high schools, and hosts 3-4 tournaments per semester that allow these students the chance to practice and demonstrate what they've learned in the classroom. UDL also coordinates with other debate leagues to allow students to travel within Connecticut to attend tournaments outside of New Haven. UDL is committed to giving students a stage on which to present their ideas and be heard, and we believe that aim is in line with the Dwight Hall value of commitment to the greater community.
Pathways to Arts & Humanities
Yale Pathways to Arts & Humanities annually welcomes hundreds of New Haven public high school students to Yale’s campus for dozens of arts and humanities programs and events. Pathways to Arts & Humanities explores how humans use literature, art, music, theater, history, and language to understand our connection to the world and to one another. Programs encourage creativity, help solve real-world problems, and allow students to become civically engaged both locally and globally. The highlight of the program is the free, two-week on-campus summer program.
Pathways to Arts & Humanities Summer Scholars Program
Pathways Summer Scholars is a free two-week summer arts and humanities-focused program for local high school students. Each summer, Yale faculty, graduate students, and staff come together to create a program designed to share Yale's rich resources with New Haven students. Students take a variety of workshops where they examine the vast resources of the Beinecke, discover art and sculpture at the Yale University Art Gallery, explore the world of comics at the Yale Center for British Art, learn professional photographic techniques, practice graphic design, study ancient languages, and more.
Pathways to Arts & Humanities The Art & Science of Library Preservation and Conservation
Pathways students get an exclusive behind-the-scenes tour of the Yale Center for Preservation and Conservation, including the Gates Conservation Lab, exhibition preparation rooms, and the photo documentation studio. Students also participate in a hands-on demonstration of the Traveling Scriptorium to learn about medieval pigments and book binding. Students meet conservators and preservationists who dedicate their careers to preserving invaluable books, works of art, and much more.
Peristalsis Dance Group
Peristalsis Dance Group volunteers provide weekly movement classes at Yale New Haven Children's Hospital to give pediatric patients a creative outlet to express themselves and alleviate stress throught therapeutic movement.
Splash at Yale
Splash at Yale is a biannual event that brings local middle and high school students to Yale University for one day of unlimited learning. Students take classes in a variety of subjects taught by Yale undergraduate and graduate students. Students get to learn about things that they normally would not have access to, empowering them to find what they love to learn. Past classes have included Inroduction to Improv, Ethics Meets Self-Driving Cars, and Elementary Particle Physics. Splash at Yale also hosts Sprout, a similar program that gives students the opportunity to delve deeper into one topic in a series of three workshops.
Sprout at Yale
Sprout is a two-weekend learning program hosted by Yale Splash, an undergraduate organization. Middle and high school students take classes in a variety of subjects taught by Yale undergraduate and graduate students, with a chance to delve deeper into certain topics.
The View from Here
The View from Here is a free, semester-long photography program for public high school students in New Haven County. This program seeks to deepen young people’s engagement with visual art by exposing them to the history, materials, and practice of photography. Students learn the essential principles of taking and composing their own photographs using a smartphone or personal digital device. Working with curators, museum staff, Yale faculty, and photographers, students gain access to unique workshops, experiences, and mentorships. The program culminates in an exhibition of students’ work. A $500 stipend is awarded at the completion of the course.
The Way I See It: Yale Photography Workshop Series
The Way I See It: Yale Photography Workshop Series invites local high school students to explore photography with a Yale School of Art Photography MFA student. Sessions include making cyanotypes, meeting real artists in Yale Art studio visits, guided tours of the Yale University Art Gallery's photography collection, and a portrait studio and lighting demo. Students are also able to check out digital cameras for a week at a time.
Ulysses S. Grant Program
The Ulysses S. Grant Program is a six-week academic summer program for motivated middle school students from New Haven Public Schools held on the Yale University campus. Since 1953, U.S. Grant has drawn upon the enthusiasm of Yale undergraduates to deepen students’ current interests and explore completely new ones, while developing their critical thinking and collaborative skills.
WILL POWER! Yale School of Drama and Yale Repertory Theatre
WILL POWER! is Yale Repertory Theatre's annual educational initiative designed to bring middle and high school students to see live theater. Since 2003, WILL POWER! has served more than 20,000 Connecticut students and educators. Each year, programming is centered around one or more of Yale Rep's productions, offered to New Haven Public School students and educators. The program has included early school-time matinees, free or heavily subsidized tickets, study guides, and post-performance discussions with actors and members of the creative teams. WILL POWER! is committed to giving teachers curricular support through free workshops and professional development about the content and themes of the plays.
Windham Campbell Literary Festival
The Windham Campbell Literary Festival brings the Windham Campbell prize recipients in the fields of drama, nonfiction, fiction, and poetry to Yale’s campus for a week of celebratory events. Highlight events from past festivals have included a panel discussion and writing workshops for students at Cooperative Arts & Humanities High School, film screenings, and a group reading by all the prizewinners. All festival events are free and open to the public.
World Culture and Language After School Studies (World CLASS)
The World Culture and Language After School Studies Program (World CLASS) offers local high school students language instruction, along with cultural exposure, in several less-commonly taught languages, including Arabic, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Ukrainian, and Urdu. Weekly classes are taught by Yale faculty, graduate students, and local teachers. The program culminates in a student showcase of the language skills they have developed over the course of the year.
WYBCx Yale Radio Teen Takeover
The WYBCx Yale Radio station gives New Haven high school students a voice through the Teen Takeover Program. In this program, Yale students mentor New Haven high school students who come into the station twice a week to produce their own radio show. Over the course of the program, students learn how to run their own news segments, talk shows, music hours, and radio dramas.
Yale Center for British Art
The Yale Center for British Art (YCBA) houses the largest and most comprehensive collection of British art outside the United Kingdom in a landmark building designed by Louis Kahn. YCBA has a rich array of exhibitions and educational programs, as well as fellowships and academic resources, including a reference library and study room for examining works on paper in the collection. The museum is open to the public, and admission and all programming is free. YCBA encourages families and children of all ages to explore the collections.
Yale Center for British Art Exploring Artism Program
Children five to twelve years of age with autism or other sensory processing differences and their families and caregivers are invited to join a welcoming, engaging, and inclusive learning experience in the museum. Participants have opportunities to socialize and sustain focus by exploring works of art and no-fail follow-up activities. A quiet space with sensory toys is available.
Yale Center for British Art Family Programs
During select community events and in the monthly “Make Time!” program, the Yale Center for British Art invites families with children to explore art through gallery experiences, games, and artmaking activities. Self-guided group and family materials are also available at the front desk.
Yale Center for British Art Guided Tours for K-12 School Groups
School and community groups can explore the YCBA’s collections, architecture, and special exhibitions on an educator led tour. These free tours encourage close looking, critical thinking, and object-based inquiry. Upon request, tours can be customized to connect the collections to class curriculum goals and standards. Upon request, we can include an art making or interactive component. Classroom and homeschool teachers are also welcomed to bring their students and lead self-guided visits. The YCBA’s educational programming is designed to bring art into the learning process building students’ inquiry, observation, description, and critical-looking skills.
Yale Center for British Art Summer Teacher Institute
The Summer Teacher Institute offers practicing teachers an enriched understanding of how visual art can support their students’ reading, writing, and thinking. Workshops, discussions, and lectures by university faculty and museum educators demonstrate how “visual text” can be used to enhance literacy instruction. Institute sessions include hands-on experience with works of art and exploring ways to make the museum an extension of the classroom. Participants are given the tools they need to lead dynamic museum visits and to incorporate visual arts into classroom instruction.
Yale Center for British Art Visual Literacy Consortium
The YCBA Visual Literacy Consortium brings together a group of educators for a bimonthly consortium to promote the important dialogue about visual literacy and its role in school curricula. The purpose of the group is to share experiences, research, and resources and to work toward an expanded notion of literacy that includes making meaning from visual as well as written texts.
Yale Children's Theater
The Yale Children’s Theater is a Yale undergraduate organization that brings together a group of Yale students devoted to teaching, entertaining, and engaging kids with the dramatic arts. The Yale Children’s Theater produces four student-written shows each year, offers drama and writing workshops for local students, and performs throughout the New Haven community, reaching hundreds of students per year.
Yale Daily News Summer Journalism Program
Run by members of the Yale Daily News, the Summer Journalism Program is a three-day intensive course in journalism for high school students. Students participate in workshops on the fundamentals of reporting and writing, attend lectures by guest speakers from major national publications, and create a full summer edition of the Yale Daily News by the end of the week. The program is open to all high school students and is free for New Haven Public School students.
Yale Model Congress
Yale Model Congress provides high school students with an opportunity to learn about and experience the American legislative system first hand. As part of the program, students learn parliamentary procedure, write legislation, develop research strategies, and practice public-speaking skills. During the annual Yale Model Congress conference, students assume the responsibilities of elected representatives and tackle the issues facing our nation, such as security, the environment, and healthcare.
Yale Online
Yale Online brings access to professors, programs and courses to a range of people around the world, including career changers, lifelong learners, educators, and high school and college students. From online courses to on-campus experiences, there is a broad range of learning opportunities available for degree and non-degree seekers. The courses are free and open to the public.
Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History
From dinosaurs to diamonds, the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History presents four billion years of Earth's history under one roof. It houses a diverse collection of 13 million objects that includes Egyptian mummies, samurai swords, and animals and plants from across the world. The museum's paleontological collections rank among the most historically important fossil collections in the world. Not only can these collections be accessed by visiting the museum, but the Peabody's substantial online catalog makes digital images of more than 163,000 specimens, artifacts, and objects available to scholars and the public around the world.
Yale Reading Corps
Through Yale Reading Corps, Yale undergraduate and graduate students serve as reading tutors and mentors at New Haven Reads. New Haven Reads, founded to “share the joy and power of reading,” increases the literacy skills of children to empower their academic success by providing individually tailored one-on-one after-school tutoring, educational family support, and a community book bank. The Yale Reading Corps also places Yale undergraduate and graduate students as teaching assistants in classrooms at the Wexler-Grant Community School and East Rock School in New Haven. Fully integrated into the educational environment, the Yale students support teachers’ activities by helping prepare class materials or working with individuals or small groups of students. In addition, the program supports the school’s literacy efforts by sponsoring two book fairs, allowing students to expand their home libraries.
Yale Summer Debate Program
Offered by the Urban Debate League, the weeklong Yale Summer Debate Program is open to all New Haven high school students, regardless of debate experience. During the program, students develop their skills in public speaking, constructing arguments, and delivering rebuttals. The program is premised on the philosophy that students can use debate as a tool to critically engage with the world around them, helping them to become better debaters and students and more active members of society.
Yale Undergraduate Ethics Bowl
The Yale Undergraduate Ethics Bowl provides local high school students exposure to ethical discussion, philosophy, and public speaking through a structured competition.
Yale University Art Gallery
The Yale University Art Gallery has more than 4,000 works of art on view from cultures all over the world. The permanent collection, consisting of over 300,000 objects, spans thousands of years and includes paintings, sculpture, textiles, photography, furniture, and more. In addition to its permanent collection, the Gallery also has many educational programs and special exhibitions. The museum is free and open to the public Tuesday-Sunday.
Yale University Art Gallery Family Day
The annual Family Day at the Yale University Art Gallery invites families to explore the collection and buildings through tours, storytelling, and art-making activities. Family Day is on the last Sunday in January.
Yale University Art Gallery Guided Tours for K-12 School Groups
School groups can explore the Yale University Art Gallery’s collection, buildings, and exhibitions on free interactive guided class visits. Visits for school groups are led by the museum’s Wurtele Gallery Teachers, Yale graduate students trained as museum educators. Class visits stress critical thinking, observation skills, and creative evaluation through close examination, interactive activities, and discussion of works of art and are tied to Common Core Standards. This past year, more than 11,000 K–12 students visited with their classes and as part of after-school programs. School groups can schedule single visits or work with the Education Department to develop multi-visit partnerships.
Yale University Art Gallery Museum Club
As part of the partnership between the Yale University Art Gallery and Betsy Ross Arts Magnet Middle School, visual arts students from Betsy Ross visit the gallery with their parents monthly for a tailored after-school program.
Yale University Art Gallery Sidewalk Studio
Sidewalk Studio is an outdoor program, held in front of the Yale University Art Gallery, that fosters impromptu artmaking on a drop-in basis. Led by Gallery staff and Yale undergraduate and graduate students, each session focuses on a single medium and connects to works in the collection.
Yale University Art Gallery Teacher Leadership Program
The Teacher Leadership Program is a free one-hour workshop for educators of all levels and disciplines that meets at 4:00 pm on the first Thursday of the month throughout the academic year. The sessions are held on Zoom and are led by Jessica Sack, the Jan and Frederick Mayer Curator of Public Education, Wurtele Gallery Teachers, and Education Department staff. In this program, educators explore innovative ways to connect their curricula and interest in art with the Yale University Art Gallery’s collection.
Yale University Art Gallery Teen Program
Teen Program is on Wednesday afternoons from 3:00 to 4:30pm at the Yale University Art Gallery. Students can bring their friends, explore the museum’s diverse collection, and make art. Recent sessions have focused on drawing, painting, and photography. Bus passes are provided. For teens ages 13–19.
Yale University Art Gallery Weekend and Family Programs
The weekend family programs at the Yale University Art Gallery are designed to help start conversations about art with children of all ages. On the first Sunday of each month at 1pm, Gallery staff and graduate students lead Stories & Art. This program invites families to join for folktales, myths, and exciting stories from around the world that highlight objects in the collection and inspire children of all ages to view art in new ways. On the second Saturday of the month at 11:15am, Gallery staff and graduate students lead Getting StARTed, a program that offers engaging activities to guide families in looking at art together. The 30-minute sessions focus on a range of works from the collection and build in time for participants to try the month’s activity on their own. All family programs are free and open to the public; no registration required.
Yale University Library Digital Humanities Lab
The Digital Humanities Laboratory (DHLab) at the Yale University Library supports cutting-edge research and teaching in the humanities. During the summer, Pathways students are invited to the DHLab for hands-on workshops that explore the leading questions and tools driving ethical and engaging digital humanities research forward.
Yale Young Global Scholars Program
Yale Young Global Scholars is one of the most globally diverse, two-week academic summer programs in the world. Serving 1,800 students from 150+ countries (and 50 U.S. states), YYGS invites high school students to discuss pressing topics in STEM, social sciences, humanities, or cross-disciplinary studies. YYGS offers a full tuition scholarship for selected students who self-identify as currently attending one of the New Haven Public Schools, as part of Yale University’s commitment to supporting these students on their path to and through college.
YEP! (Young Entrepreneurs Program)
YEP! is a free entrepreneurship program for local New Haven high school students that teaches confidence and an entrepreneurial mindset, and creates an entrepreneurship incubator in under-resourced communities.
