Financial Assistance

During registration, you’ll be asked two questions about financial assistance:

• Are you interested in applying for financial assistance?Select Yes.

• How much financial assistance do you intend to apply for?
• Enter the dollar amount you expect to request from Camp Tawonga.

Choose How You’ll Pay

At the end of registration, select:

• Payment method: Credit card or e-check

• Payment preference: One-time payment or interest-free payment plan

After you register, we will notify you whether you are:

• Registered — your $150 deposit per child, per program will be charged immediately.*
• Waitlisted — no deposit or other charges will be made while you are on the waitlist.

*If the $150 deposit is a financial barrier, you may elect to defer it until after you have received your financial-assistance award.

We will notify you by email when the application available in CampInTouch. Log in to your account, click on the “Forms and Documents” tab, click on the link to the application, fill out and submit your application online.

Please answer the questions to the best of your ability. If you do not have the requested financial information, please estimate the numbers. If you do not have a tax return, please email [email protected].

Financial assistance award notices will be emailed to you by the middle of March. You must accept or decline the award within two weeks of receiving your offer.

If you choose to accept your award, you will move forward paying for Camp as described above, based on what you selected.

If you decline your award and choose to cancel from the program within the timeframe listed, you will receive a full refund of all fees paid for that program to date, excluding the $150 deposit.

Invite a friend or family who hasn’t attended a Tawonga program before to join for a Family Camp, Adult Retreat, or summer program in 2027. When they register for that program for the first time, you’ll each receive $150 off tuition, even if they’ve attended a different Tawonga program in the past. Just have your friend name you as their referral upon registration (one referring family per new camper).

Register your child for a Summer Camp session and the B*Mitzvah program and receive $500 off your registration.

Tawonga offers interest-free payment plans to make the cost of camp more manageable. When registering for Tawonga, choose “Payment Plan” to enroll in this option.

Northern California residents: Hebrew Free Loan provides zero-cost and zero-interest loans for lifecycle events like summer camp (as well as paying for a b’nai mitzvah, launching a business, purchasing a home, and more) Learn more at hflasf.org.

Southern California Residents: The Jewish Free Loan Association is a nonprofit agency offering assistance to people of all faiths facing financial challenges. For more than 100 years, JFLA has provided a helping hand instead of a handout to hundreds of thousands of people through interest-free loans for emergencies, education, developing small businesses, healthcare and life cycle events and more! Jewish Free Loan has a loan fund specifically dedicated to helping Jewish families send their child/children away to summer camp. Loans on average are about $2000 per child. Learn more at jfla.org.

First-time camper grants are available through One Happy Camper and PJ Goes to Camp — if your camper meets specific eligibility requirements.

If you are a current member of a JCC and this is your family’s first time attending a Tawonga program, then you are eligible to receive a one-time $150 discount towards any Tawonga program. To receive this discount, email a copy of your current JCC member card to [email protected], and we will apply the discount to your account.

Thanks to a donor through the Foundation for Jewish Camp, funding is available for California, Oregon and Washington Israeli families sending their child to summer camp for the first time. To be eligible for this award, families must have at least one parent from Israel and be completely new to Tawonga. To apply for this grant, click here.

Thanks to the Foundation for Jewish Camp, need-based financial assistance is available for Russian Speaking Jewish families attending Camp Tawonga. To apply for this funding, please indicate interest in financial assistance during registration and fill out the financial assistance application. If you have already registered your child and you would like to apply now, please email [email protected].

JCCA’s Operation Summer Camp is a four-year pilot program that launched in the summer of 2023 with the goal of providing children from Jewish military families with a true home-away-from-home and a Jewish community they can call their own, no matter where their parents are stationed or deployed.

The Small Communities Incentive Program offers new campers from small communities of less than 10,000 Jewish residents a special camper incentive to attend the overnight camp of their choice. First and second year grants are available and range from $1,000-$1,500. Reach out to [email protected] for more information.

Some Synagogues and Temples offer scholarships for members attending Jewish overnight summer camp. We encourage you to inquire with your own synagogue or temple to see if they are able to provide assistance for your family.

No. Families attending family camp only need to fill out one application per family. It does not matter which application you choose to fill out and submit.

Yes. You must fill out one application per child, per camp program.

You should apply for the amount of financial assistance that you need. No request is too big or too small.

The application is short and should take 5-10 minutes to complete.

You can find your financial assistance application by logging into your CampInTouch account with your email and password, clicking on the “Forms and Documents” tab, and then clicking on the link to the application.

You have the option of submitting either this year tax returns, OR last year’s tax returns and this year’s W-2 forms. If you do not have a tax return at all, please contact us so we can discuss the appropriate financial documentation to submit.

Please answer the questions as accurately as possible. If you do not have the requested information, please estimate the answers.

We encourage anyone to apply for financial aid if they need it. Tawonga strives to grant awards to all applicants, so the likelihood of you receiving some assistance is high, regardless of how much money you make.

You must accept or decline your award within two weeks of receiving your offer. If you choose to decline your award and cancel from the program you will receive a full refund of all fees paid for your program to date.

The likelihood of receiving a financial assistance award from Camp Tawonga is high. Almost every individual who applies for assistance receives some, if not all, of the amount they apply for.

Financial assistance is made possible through generous donations from individuals and organizations, including members of the Tawonga community, the greater Bay Area Jewish community, the Jewish Community Federation and Endowment Fund, and the Foundation for Jewish Camp, which provides grants for first-time campers.