Just Leader Fellowship COMING SOON!
Watch this space for details about the 2024 Just Leader Fellowship.
CoFED’s Just Leader Fellowship is a 9-month opportunity for QTBIPOC folx working to close the racial wealth gap by advancing community ownership in food and land systems.
While developing their project vision, fellows will receive a range of support customized to their un/learning styles. Our ideal applicant is excited by their dreams of land and food liberation and is ready to develop their skills to reshape food and land justice in their communities. CoFED is eager to build relationships of support and care well beyond the 9-month duration of this project, we hope you will keep building with us.
We are excited to work with fellows who are leading with love, cooperation, and imagination. Fellows will be chosen by a selection committee made up of CoFED staff, board members, and previous fellows. Throughout the fellowship, the fellows will receive a $10,800 stipend as well as a full scholarship to our Build, Unlearn, Decolonize gathering.
To apply for the Just Leader Fellowship, please complete the application form and provide 2 letters of recommendation. Applications are available in English and Spanish. Letters of recommendation can be submitted on the application form or via email to jlf@cofed.org. Please contact jlf@cofed.org if there are any accessibility issues with the application.
ELIGIBILITY
Our fellowship eligibility is as follows:
- 18 years or older
- Your work centers on the collective liberation of Queer, Trans, Black, and Indigenous People of Color
- You are rooted in transformative food & land systems work
- Have been in the food, land, or racial justice movement for at least 2 years
- Live in the U.S., U.S. territories, or tribal territories
EXPECTATIONS
- Be committed to the transformation of our food and land systems through the visionary leadership of QTBIPOC folx
- Have the space and desire to relationship-build with a small, national food cooperative organization
- Participate in 2 virtual sessions per month
- One 60-min monthly individual project check-in
- One 2.5-hour monthly all-fellows’ co-learning session
- Develop an impactful fellowship project by February 2025
- Complete:
- Monthly fellowship reflections
- 1 final report detailing your fellowship experience and project outcomes
- Serve as a thought partner and spokesperson for CoFED
- Be in open and consistent communication with the CoFED Program Coordinator
- Model and uphold our core values
- Cooperation
- Joy
- Love
- Impact
- Liberation
Post-fellowship, fellows will participate on the selection committee for the next JLF cohort.
OFFERINGS
CoFED will offer:
- 9-month fellowship
- $10,800 stipend (disbursed on a bi-monthly basis)
- Full scholarship to our Build, Unlearn, Decolonize liberatory gathering in September 2024. Full scholarship includes:
- Transportation to and from the program
- All housing, food, and transportation during the program (if in person)
- Leadership coaching
- Co-(un)Learning and political education group sessions
- 1:1 project technical assistance and leadership development including but not limited to:
- Storytelling and communications
- Grassroots fundraising
- Trauma-informed conflict resolution strategies
- Tools for collective accountability and governance
- Networking opportunities
- Access to CoFED’s cooperative info and resources
APPLICATION PROCESS & CRITERIA
Applications open Tuesday, March 12 and are due by Friday, April 12, 2024 at 11:59pm in your respective time zone.
Through your application, please convey what you stand for, and how you embody your values in your work. All applications will be considered carefully, with some applicants invited to interview. If you are not invited to interview or selected, we will do our best to provide feedback upon request.
Those chosen for video interviews will be notified by late-April. All applicants will be notified of their status by mid-May. The three chosen fellows will be asked to sign a fellowship agreement detailing responsibilities, as well as complete an orientation and onboarding process.
Applications will be read and chosen by a selection committee, consisting of CoFED staff and network collaborators on the following selection criteria:
- Commitment to further the transformation of the current food and land systems to regenerative, just, non-extractive, and cooperative systems.
- Commitment to ending racism and injustice in the food system
- Alignment with CoFED’s mission, values, vision, and theory of change
- Feasibility to develop/implement the project you are proposing
- Potential impact/contribution of the proposed project to a transformational change of our food and land systems.
- Leadership experience in food/land justice
- Personal and direct stake in the issues being addressed through this fellowship
To apply, please access the google form here (Spanish version here). Complete each question and submit 2 letters of recommendation to enter an application. You may submit your two letters of recommendation through the google form or email them to jlf@cofed.org with subject line “2024-25 Just Leader Fellowship_Your Name.”
The letters should be: 1) from a member of a collective/co-op/organization that you are affiliated with, and 2) a community member that can speak on behalf of you/your work/your impact in your community. We do accept supplemental information (such as resumes, portfolios, or links), but they are certainly not required and there is no penalty for not including them. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out! 🙂
Fellowship Timeline
| March 12 | General applications open |
| April 12, 2024 @ Midnight | Application submission due |
| Late April | Interview invitations sent out |
| Week of 4/29/24 | Interviews take place |
| Mid-May | Fellows acceptance invitations sent out |
| June 2024 | Fellowship Begins
|
| July – March | Fellows will:
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| February 2-25 | Fellowship Closeout Fellows:
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FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
- The Just Leader Fellowship is a 9-month program where young +LGBTQIA, B/I/POC leaders will have fiscal and technical support in crafting a food and land justice project.
- This fellowship is designed to develop political education, project management, and leadership skills at a pace of the fellows’ genius.
- The fellowship includes a monthly stipend, free registration to any of CoFED’s cooperative education programs, an extensive network of various cooperative experts, a professional development budget, and loving, cheerleader support from the CoFED team.
- In alignment with our mission at CoFED, we design this fellowship specifically for emerging leaders in the food and land justice systems. Often people the ages of 18-30 do not have equitable access to training, education, and resources that could amplify their cooperative efforts. CoFED responds to this systemic construct with the Just Leader Fellowship.
Our Selection Committee prioritizes emerging QTBIPOC who are:
- 18 years or older
- Your work centers on the collective liberation of Queer, Trans, Black, and Indigenous People of Color
- You are rooted in transformative food & land systems work
- Have been in the food, land, or racial justice movement for at least 2 years
- Live in the U.S., U.S. territories, or tribal territories
Applications will be read and chosen by a selection committee, consisting of CoFED staff and network collaborators, upon the following selection criteria:Commitment to further the transformation of the current food and land systems to regenerative, just, non-extractive, and cooperative systems.
- Commitment to ending racism and injustice in the food system
- Alignment with CoFED’s mission, values, vision, and theory of change
- Feasibility to develop/implement the project you are proposing
- Potential impact/contribution of proposed project to transformational change of our food and land systems.
- Leadership experience in food/land justice
- Personal and direct stake in the issues being addressed through this fellowship
- Through the course of the 9-months, we explore curated political education curriculum that includes: a decolonial history of our food system through the lens of Black and Indigenous folks, deconstructing our relationships with money and wealth building, building our containers of care for self and our collectives; and share our journeys as food system leaders through the final presentation of their projects.
- We also offer 1:1 sessions during which fellows can access support with grant writing, developing fundraising tools, technological support, learning technologies, and building blueprints for the long-term sustainability of their projects and transformative work in the food system.
All JLF sessions will be held virtually over zoom.
PREVIOUS FELLOWSHIP PROJECTS
Explore our previous Fellowship projects! And check out our Fellows’ blog posts.
