About YDA
Founded in 2014, the Youth Documentary Academy (YDA) trains young people how to locate stories from their lived experiences and direct their own documentary films. In a two-month summer intensive, students learn all aspects of documentary filmmaking from professional filmmakers, faculty and guest artists. At the end of the program, students complete a film, and learn how to distribute it to film festivals, community organizations and television outlets.
More about YDA
The Youth Documentary Academy (YDA) is housed at Pikes Peak State College in Colorado Springs. Students from the ages of 14 to 18 are encouraged to apply to the Summer session. What kinds of stories are ideal to explore in the Youth Documentary Academy? The answer is: personal, family or social-issue stories that tell us something we don’t know, especially something about diverse communities.
It might be a story about coming from a first generation immigrant family or about growing up as an LGBTQ+ person or coming from foster care or from a less traditional family. It could be a story about living with a disability or living with a family member who has a disability. Or maybe it’s a story about growing up in a military family or with few financial resources. Or even how a social or environmental issue may have affected you or your community. What access do you have to an untold story?
