The 519's Trans Youth Mentorship Program (TYMP) is a space for 2 Spirit, trans, non-binary, and gender-diverse youth (16 to 29 years) that has been running for almost 10 years. It aims to help trans youth build life skills, find support, and foster community. TYMP’s Summer 2025 Cohort, meeting Wednesdays, 5 to 8 pm, will run from July to November 2025 at The 519 [519 Church St.] This innovative cohort of the Trans Youth Mentorship Program (TYMP) will focus on leveraging your lived experience to prepare you to develop your advocacy and leadership skills and find out more about working within the community and social services field. Our curriculum will offer a mix of pre-employment readiness sessions, such as resume writing and interviewing tailored for community work, sessions on self-advocacy and communication skills, harm reduction, event planning, and facilitation/public speaking. Participants receive a meal, transportation assistance, and an honorarium. This program has limited spots, and registration is required. Sign up here: https://ow.ly/IKq050Wl4bx Questions related to the program? Email BMorais@The519.org. Or fill out the form. [Image description: Youth holding a huge trans flag above their heads as they march down a street. Text reads: TYMP - Trans Youth Mentorship Program - Summer Cohort: July to November 2025: Wednesdays, 5 to 8 pm at The 519. Registration required.] (fb)

Last week was the 41st annual AIDS Vigil. We were able to showcase the culmination of the work of the AIDS Memorial Storytelling Project, which added 34 names to the memorial this year, many more than usual. The theme of this year’s vigil was Legacy is the Light, Action is the Path. Performers included the Zhawenim Youth Hand Drum Group, Singing Out Choir, Honey Novick, Eldeekha, Samuel Lopez, Kristine Maitland, and the Circle of Cedar Singers. In interviews with AIDS Storytelling Project participants, a recurring theme is silence, and shame. families and friends who were told they should keep the way their loved ones died a secret. The AIDS Vigil is a place to let that shame go, and to tell our true stories. One presenter this year called the vigil the funeral their father never got to have. Communities of colour, lower income folks, people less connected to traditional 2SLGBTQ+ rights movements, and others have often been overlooked by the mainstream AIDS movement, so the AIDS Memorial Storytelling Project has intentionally sought out these community members to increase diversity in who the memorial pays tribute to, adding many names that have been left out in the past. The work of the AIDS Memorial Storytelling Project continues. We look forward to the online resources and exhibits they’re working on to tell the stories of the people on the memorial. We’re moved to partner with AIDS Service Organizations and community groups to deliver the AIDS Vigil every year. If you have a story to tell, visit toAIDSMemorial.com [image description: Several images of mourners at the Toronto AIDS Vigil 2025. They're lighting candles, drumming, holding pictures of loved ones, and telling their stories.] (fb)