Year-Round Lessons
Free arts lessons for Caz Northwest campers under 18
Keep creating all year long
Who can take part
How to sign up
Other details
For the first time in 2026 any young camper who joined us at Caz Northwest can take up to five free lessons with one of our Caz artist-educators during the year between camp sessions. It's a way to continue finding your artistic path between summers.
Lessons are taught by the artist-educators and artists-in-residence who led a formal class at a Caz 2026 session. Lessons are by video (Zoom or similar), unless arranged otherwise with the instructor. Participating students receive up to 5 lessons, at no cost to the student’s family.
Lessons are available to anyone who attended a Caz Northwest 2026 session and is under 18 years old. Children who came to Caz 2026 as the dependent of an instructor are not eligible, due to lack of funding. The program is made possible by the Mervyn Seldon Charitable Arts Trust and by Caz Northwest.
The one thing we ask: If a student takes more than one lesson and returns to Caz Northwest in 2027, we'll invite them to share a small artistic project with the Caz community while they're at camp. It doesn't need to be polished or perfect, just something they've been working on.
Find your match. Decide which artist-educator you would like to learn from. Reach out to them (or they may reach out to you -- the first move can come from anyone), and make sure the student, their parent or guardian, and the instructor are all happy to go ahead. If you want to switch and try lessons with a different artist-educator, you will have another opportunity following Caz Northwest 2027.
Fill out the sign-up form. Once all three of you agree (student, parent, and artist-educator), complete the one-page sign-up form. It captures everyone's agreement, the length of each lesson, and the best way to reach each other.
Turn it in. Hand the form to Jonathan Shakes while you're at camp, or email it to admin@caznw.org.
Once you’ve received the all-clear from Jonathan or Amanda, you and the instructor arrange lesson times directly.
Scheduling and cancellations: You and the artist-educator set lesson times together. If you need to cancel, give the instructor as much advance notice as possible. If a lesson is cancelled with less than 24 hours' notice, it may count as one of your five lessons. If the instructor ever needs to reschedule, it won't count towards the five.
All lessons take place between July 12, 2026 and June 30, 2027. Start soon so there's plenty of time to fit in all five.
This program is brand new, and we're learning as we go. It will continue in future years, though details are likely to evolve as we figure out how to make it as valuable as possible for young artists.
For other questions, reach out to jonathan@caznw.org