Aaron’s, Inc. (NYSE:AAN) is giving $10,000 to certain summer camps in five states under its “Own Your Summer” camp scholarship initiative that targets underserved youths. The company said the idea is to provide with the opportunity to interact and learn skills that can positively transform their lives. The scholarship program is targeting 100 youths in each of the selected five states. As such, ANN is giving out an aggregate of $50,000 for the summer camp scholarship program.

The Own Your Summer camp scholarship is part of Aaron’s initiatives to give back to the community and help transform the lives of underserved youths in a positive way. The skills and virtues that the youth attending the AAN-sponsored overnight summer camp will learn include decision-making, team work and developing confidence.

Selected states

Aaron’s current summer camp scholarship targets 100 underserved youths from Louisiana, Georgia, Tennessee, Massachusetts and North Carolina. The company has selected five summer camp providers in each of these states. In Georgia, it is sponsoring overnight summer camp experience at Camp Grace, which will receive $10,000 to take in 100 underserved youths. The company is backing Camp Atwater in Massachusetts to also give 100 youths an overnight summer camp experience.

YMCA Camp Harrison in North Carolina, Girl Scouts Louisiana East Camps in Louisiana and YMCA Camp Widjiwagan in Tennessee are some other summer camp providers selected for the scholarship.

Findings about summer camp experience

According to Aaron’s, research by the American Camp Association has shown that summer camps help campers to develop skills that enable them to become successful adults. Among other things, campers learn useful developmental, leadership, social and communications skills. Other skills that campers take home include trustworthiness, fairness, caring and citizenship, Responsibility and self-respect.