teen employment opportunities
We offer two teen employment tracks for teens with valid working papers.
Social Justice Leadership Academy (SJLA) - Transformative political education, arts, and community organizing. Help run and participate in an open studio arts lab for BIPOC youth. Express yourself while mentoring younger teens in practicing freedom through art-making.
ReGen Teens - Hands on gardening, compost management, and creative, environmentally-focused entrepreneurship!
Each of these programs include paid work opportunities for teens of working age with valid working papers. Both programs are fully staffed and applications are currently closed.
If you’re looking for unpaid after-school program opportunities this spring for youth ages 13+ without working papers learn more about our free SJLA program and apply.
SJLA PAID FELLOWSHIP (spring 2026)
Mar 26-May 29 | Teens with working papers
Wednesday & Fridays | 3:30 - 7pm
With Claire Cousin & Enrique Rivera
This season SJLA is grounded in the belief that performance, storytelling, and collective creation are tools for liberation, leadership, and community power. Participants will engage in artistic and collaborative processes that build critical consciousness, historical awareness, and organizing skills as a way of exploring political concepts through DOING.
The semester unfolds as a learning arc that moves from:
Understanding self and community
To locate that experience within history and social movements
To imagining and practicing collective action and leadership
And finally toward visioning the future and participants’ role within it
Throughout the program, youth are positioned not only as learners, but as culture keepers, historians, artists, and emerging leaders.
This is a paid employment opportunity for teens with valid working papers.
ReGen Teens (2026)
A 9-month Teen Employment Program
Mar 25-May 29 | Tues & Fri | 3:30 - 6:30pm | 14+
With Kenn Pan, Micaela McClinton & Guest Educators
Hands-on gardening & creative entrepreneurship for teen leaders.
ReGen Teens work as a team to build meaningful relationships with nature and the Hudson community, and operate their own environmentally conscious businesses, including a bike-powered smoothie stand, drop-off compost business, and neighborhood greenhouse nursery! ReGen work sessions are a mix of hands-on activities in gardening, herbal medicine making, outdoor nature activities, cooking, and creative art making at Kite’s Nest’s greenhouse and gardens. ReGen teens deepen their land stewardship skills by visiting local farms, meeting other teens engaged in food justice initiatives around the Hudson Valley, and hosting educational community workshops and market events at Kite’s Nest’s greenhouse and garden. ReGen is a paid employment opportunity that prioritizes teens ages 14-18 who are interested in building independent workforce skills and experience with a focus on the natural world and social justice.
This is a paid employment opportunity for teens with valid working papers.
Kite’s Nest programs are made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.