Dzanc House offers a range of free youth programs to give kids resources and space to create and develop their skills in the arts.
Dzanc House is a home and hub for regional and national literary and cultural arts programs. Dzanc House staff and guests host workshops, art galleries, reading events, youth and adult arts programs and more. Dzanc House is a space for artists, writers and community members to create and showcase work, its website says.
Dzanc House offers three different youth programs: Beyond The Binary: Stories That Shift Culture, a high school visual arts and literacy program for LGBTQ+ youth; EmpowerEd, the middle and high school literary arts and critical culture program; and Roots & Wings, the elementary arts and culture program.
“Through our free studio workshops, kids — both big and small — can be inspired to enjoy and produce both collaborative and independent work, discovering new ways of bringing pen to paper, thought to passage, and innovative ideas into the world,” Dzanc House website says.
Beyond the Binary is a visual arts and literacy program for high school-aged youth. The program is intended to amplify the untold stories of LGBTQ+ youth, and provide them with a pathway to publication and on-air radio or podcast features, according to Dzanc House's website.
Beyond the Binary "centers, publishes and uplifts the voices of LGBTQ+ youth, celebrating and elevating our young LGBTQ+ voices, transforming lived experience into a force for cultural change and collective imagination," Dzanc House website says.
Sessions for this LGBTQ+ youth program are scheduled for 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. on the second Sunday of each month. Remaining 2026 sessions are on Oct. 11, Nov. 8 and Dec. 13.
EmpowerEd is a year-round creative program divided into seasonal sessions. EmpowerED is open to all middle and high school students, Dzanc House website says. The program focuses on creative arts and offers editorial and publishing experience for participants.
Dzanc House website says participants will "learn and share with our mentors, authors, poets, professors, educators and graduate students, and join the publishing crew, with a celebration publication in print, podcast, or multimedia showcase at the end of each semester."
Fall 2026 EmpowerED sessions are scheduled for every Sunday, 1-2 p.m., Oct. 11 to Nov. 8, 2026. Winter 2027 EmpowerED sessions are scheduled for every Sunday, 1-2 p.m., Jan. 10 to Feb. 7, 2027.
Roots & Wings is a year-round workshop, divided into seasonal sessions. Dzanc House creates a space on Sundays for the studio arts program for elementary students, said Charlene Choi, director of development programs and communication at Dzanc House.
Dzanc House’s website says the program focuses on art, games, reading, writing, creating and sharing. Roots & Wings participants create poetry postcards with the poems they write during the program, with many of the post cards also containing visual art.
“Kids can come focus, get a chance to be in a beautiful space to read, write, create and focus. It’s pretty remarkable what can happen when kids are given that space,” Choi said.
Fall 2026 Roots & Wings sessions are scheduled for every Sunday, 1-2:30 p.m., Oct. 11 to Nov. 8, 2026. Winter 2027 Roots & Wings sessions are scheduled for every Sunday, 1-2:30 p.m., Jan. 10 to Feb. 7, 2027.
To participate in any of the three programs, students can register on Dzanc House’s website.
