About the organization
IGY (Israeli Gay Youth) is currently the only professional organization in Israel dedicated to serving all LGBT youth. IGY's goal is empowering LGBT youth within the formal and informal education systems, creating a meaningful social youth leadership and help them design a better community and eventually a better Israeli society.
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LGBTQ Youth (14-22 y/o) living in Israel? Join us!
Click here to see the list of all the groups (list is in Hebrew)
About the organization -
IGY (Israeli Gay Youth) is currently the only professional organization in Israel dedicated to serving all LGBT youth. IGY's goal is empowering LGBT youth within the formal and informal education systems, creating a meaningful social youth leadership and help them design a better community and eventually a better Israeli society.
IGY today operates educational programs and dozens of social groups, for over two thousand teens (girls and boys) with the help of hundreds of volunteers from all over Israel, Eilat in the south to Kiryat Shmona in the north.The organization promotes education and change for LGBT and heterosexual youth as one to eliminate violence and homophobia in schools, thus creating a just, equal and democratic society.
IGY – The Israeli Gay Youth organization is embarking on yet another year of activities, taking on many new and exciting goals and challenges! As the great educator Janusz Korczak said: "Fixing the world means fixing its education".
Help us raise the resources required to expand our activity and reach out to youth living out of the main metro ares, thus changing the lives these teenagers.
Your charitable donation allows us to put together more leadership seminars for our youth groups, open additional social groups in the distant south and north, generate more anti-homophobia education programs in schools or open another youth center, providing a safe and open space for LGBT youth.
IGY’s current projects:
Possibility for designated donation -
Social groups – Social groups for LGBT youth & young-adults ages 13-23. We're currently activating 45 social groups in 29 municipalities all over Israel, from Kiryat Shmona in the north to EILAT in the south. This year we're excited to open new groups in Eilat, Hadera, Ramla-Lod, Jaffa, Kiryat-Gat, Nazareth-Illit, Tiberias, Nahariya, Yokneam, Beit-Shemesh and Emek-Israel.
Nir Program – The Nir Program is an educational program about accepting other peoples differences, teaching the subject of gender and sexual orientation, based on the GSA. The sessions are part of the Citizenship class in high schools (11th and 12th grade) and are guided by two IGY volunteers and a local teacher. We will launch the program this year in 40 classrooms in various schools all over the country.
Youth centers – Informal educational safe spaces for youth to socialize and meet new friends. There are currently two active youth centers in Tel Aviv and Afula. We plan to extend this activity and open new centers in Rishon LeZion and Petah Tiqwa.
Leadership groups – In recent years we see more and more LGBT youth coming out of the closet, demanding and leading a change. The leadership groups are youth groups trying to promote a social change in their local space, be it their school, their neighborhood or their city. Fine examples of these groups are the first Gay Youth Council, the pre-army Service Year group and more.
On-line forums- The first encounter with IGY for the majority of youth joining IGY. A place where you can remain anonymous and ask questions, read and learn and talk to other people who can relate with the situation.
Priorty goals for 2016:
To broaden our outreach to more marginalized populations in need, which we see very little of in the LGBT community in Israel, by opening designated groups: Ethiopian community, Arab sector, Transgender youth & immigrants from the Former Soviet Union.
