In March 2024, we hosted a four-day residential Spring Campference for sixteen teens and young adults, ages 18-29, living with sickle cell disease.
The participants made fun connections through community building games and had meaningful conversations around managing their healthcare. Workshops and activities through the weekend helped participants recognize the diversity of experiences in the room while acknowledging shared challenges. This environment helped our participants see that having people that you can share things without feeling judged is important. Ultimately, sharing perspectives and viewpoints helped the young people see the complexity and expansiveness in their own experiences and outlooks. In the words of one participant, “I am more than what I think I am.”
Thank you to the Le Meridien Hotel in Cambridge, MA for making us feel like we were at home during our multi-day Campference.
Watch Kepler recap our 2024 Spring Campference for young people living with sickle cell disease.
Listen to young people who’ve been to a Next Step Campference:
Monica
Each moment at Next Step Campference is seized to the fullest. It is the fun memories, such as competing in an ultimate cook-off, and the serious memories, of discussing how a disease affects your transition into adulthood, that really keep you going. Next Step helped me become who I am today, and who I want to be tomorrow.
Tom
I attended my first Next Step Campference. For the first time I was part of a community of people like me. As I heard others share their experiences growing up with HIV, I realized I wasn’t alone. I felt validated, and it changed my life. I’ve got new faith in my abilities.
Grace
At my first Next Step Campference I made friends who understood me because we shared a familiar story. No one judged me. And for the first time in a long time, I could be me. Being in this community has inspired me to share my story so that other young people in their cancer journey don’t have to be alone.
JOIN A NEXT STEP CAMPFERENCE
Click here for our 2024 Summer Campference schedule.
QUESTIONS?
Please contact us if you have any questions about joining one of our 2024 Summer Campferences.
Emily Efland, Community Program Coordinator emily@nextstepnet.org
Casey Casey, Nursing Director & Partnership Coordinator casey@nextstepnet.org
Kepler Jeudy, Program Director kepler@nextstepnet.org
Next Step Office: 617.864.2921
Click here to watch young people people talk about their Next Step experience.
