Just Leader Fellowship are now closed
Thank you for your interest!
We are excited to announce the launch of the Just Leader Fellowship, formerly known as the Racial Justice Fellowship. Applications will be open from May 16th to June 24th, 2022. CoFED’s Just Leader Fellowship is a 9-month opportunity for young cooperators of color working to close the racial wealth gap by advancing community ownership of land and the food system.
While developing their project vision, fellows will receive a range of support customized to their un/learning styles. Our ideal applicant is excited 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 Racial Justice Fellows. Over the course of the fellowship, the fellows will receive a $10,800 stipend as well as full scholarship to our cooperative education programs.
To apply for the Just Leader Fellowship, please answer the application questions on Google Forms here and in Spanish here, and provide 2 letters of recommendation. Applications are available in English and Spanish. For access to a Spanish language application please select the Spanish flag at the top right of this website page. Letters of recommendation can be submitted on the application form or via email to admin@cofed.org. Please contact admin@cofed.org if there are any accessibility issues with the application.
Applications will open May 16th until June 24th, 2022. Please apply and share widely with the young, BIPOC food freedom fighters in your network! Contact admin@cofed.org for questions.
More details about the program can be found below.
Eligibility
We encourage you to apply if you:
- Are between the ages of 18 and 30
- Identify as Black, Brown, Indigenous or person of color (PoC) – explicitly including folx of African, Latinx, Asian, Arab and/or Pacific Islander heritage
- Have been in the food, land, or racial justice movement for at least 2 years
- Belong to a co-op, collective, or other organized group that is excited to support your Fellowship project
- Live in the U.S. or tribal territories
Expectations for Fellows
Fellows are expected to:
- Be hosted by a supportive co-op or collective for the duration of the fellowship
- Have the space and desire to relationship-build with a small national organization
- Participate in 2 web meetings per month
- 1 monthly project check-in
- 1 monthly all-fellows’ meeting
- Develop an impactful fellowship project by May 2023
- Complete:
- 9 fellowship progress reports,
- 18 hours of political education and
- 1 blog post/ final report detailing the experience
- Serve as a thought partner and spokesperson for CoFED
- Be in open and consistent communication with the CoFED staff
- Model and uphold our core values
- Cooperation
- Joy
- Love
- Impact
- Accountability
And post-fellowship, participate on the selection committee to choose the next year’s fellows
Offerings from CoFED
CoFED will offer:
- $10,800 stipend
- Full scholarship to a cooperative education program hosted by CoFED, including:
- Transportation to and from the program (if in person)
- All housing, food, and transportation during the program(if in person)
- Leadership coaching
- (un)Learning and political education
- 2 hours per month of technical assistance and training in:
- 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 May 16th and are due by June 24th, 2020, 11:59pm PST.
Those chosen for the first round of video interviews will be notified by early July. From there, a small group may be chosen for a second round of interviews. All applicants will be notified of their status by mid July. The two chosen fellows will be asked to sign a fellowship agreement detailing responsibilities.
Applications will be read and chosen by CoFED staff based upon the following selection criteria:
- Commitment to ending racism and injustice in the food system
- Alignment with CoFED’s values, vision, and theory of change
- Feasibility to implement the project you are proposing
- Potential impact/contribution of proposed project to racial justice and cooperative movements
- Track record of transformative leadership
- Personal and direct stake in the issues being addressed by the proposed project
To apply, please access the google form here (Spanish version here). Complete each question and submit 2 letters of recommendation to enter an application. Submit your two letters of recommendation on the google form or have them emailed to admin@cofed.org with subject line “Just Leader Fellowship”. The letters should be: one from a member of your co-op/organization and another from a community member. We do accept supplemental information (such as resumes, portfolios, or links), but they are certainly not necessary and there is absolutely no penalty for not including them. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out! 🙂
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.
Fellowship Timeline
| May 16th | General applications open |
| June 24th | Application submission due |
| July 8th | Interview invitations sent out |
| July 11th – 22nd | Interviews take place |
| By July 26th | Fellows acceptance invitations sent out |
| August 1st | Fellowship Begins
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| August- March | Fellows will:
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| March – May | Fellowship Closeout Fellows:
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Explore our previous Fellowship projects! And check out our Fellows’ blog posts.
