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This page describes the practical details and goals of the Learning Together fellowship program. If you are interested in the program please read this carefully, and don’t hesitate to contact us with any questions.
Applications for fellowships were due on Sunday, March 15th. If you are a high school student and you’re interested in the program, unfortunately it’s too late too apply for 2015. Please contact us, however, and we’ll be glad to put you on our mailing list for future youth development programs.
The fellowship program began in March with a pizza dinner for fellows and staff, and is now continuing with a series of six training sessions for fellows, held on Tuesday evenings at the Interfaith Center of New York (at 475 Riverside Drive, between 119th and 120th Streets, in Manhattan). The program will conclude in June, with another celebratory dinner for fellows.
The six training sessions for fellows include:
- Facilitated conversations about religious diversity issues in New York schools. These dialogues will help our fellows develop their thinking on these issues, and learn from the experiences of their peers – religious, secular, spiritual, and everything in between.
- Skill-building exercises to help our fellows develop their writing and critical thinking skills – helping them to craft persuasive arguments, based on solid evidence and self-reflection. This training will serve our fellows well in college and beyond.
- Hands-on writing workshops, in which fellows will share drafts of their opinion essays and personal reflections, and receive constructive feedback from their peers and trainers. We’ll all work together, as a group, to find our individual voices.
- Opportunities to meet new friends from diverse local communities – bridging the divides that too often separate New Yorkers with different backgrounds and beliefs.
In addition to regular attendance at training sessions, each Learning Together fellow is doing a modest amount of independent research on religious diversity issues, including a bit of outside reading, and informal interviews with fellow students, teachers, or staff at their schools.
On the basis of this research, dialogue, and self-reflection, each fellow will write a brief essay exploring religious diversity and inclusion in New York schools. The essay could take any number of forms – an op-ed opinion piece, personal reflection, blog-post, or creative writing project – but it will need to engage with the issues explored in the fellowship program. Interfaith Center staff will then work with fellows to place these essays for publication in leading forums for discussions of religion and education.
It is impossible to predict where our fellows’ essays will be published, but some possibilities include:
- the online journal Religion Dispatches – an independent, nonprofit source for the best writing on critical and timely issues at the intersection of religion, politics, and culture
- the vibrant Religion Pages of the Huffington Post – a leading online source for independent voices and open dialogue on a broad range of social and political issues
- the online journal Kid Spirit – a website by and for young people from diverse backgrounds, that empowers 11 to 17 year olds everywhere to tackle life’s big questions together
- the online journal Killing the Buddha – an electronic Tower of Babel featuring cutting-edge journalism for readers who are both hostile and drawn to talk of God
- the opinion pages of WNYC’s SchoolBook – a website developed by New York’s leading public radio station, dedicated to news, data and conversation about schools in New York City
- the First Person section of Chalkbeat New York – a nonprofit news organization providing deep, local coverage of education policy and practice.
- and the Interfaith Center’s own Interfaith Matters blog – hosted on ICNY’s website, and distributed each month to thousands of New York religious and civic leaders
By publishing their essays in print or online, our Learning Together fellows will contribute to American civic life – sharing their thoughts and perspectives on an important social issue. And y’know . . . it’ll probably look pretty good on their resumes and college applications too.
Last but not least, each Learning Together fellow is receiving a $200 stipend for their important contributions to the Interfaith Center’s work. We view our youth fellows as colleagues, and we are delighted to pay them for their time, energy, and creativity.
