Climate Action Fellowship

The Climate Action Fellowship is a full year commitment. Fellows begin in the summer and are expected to continue throughout the academic year. There is opportunity to re-apply for the fellowship for a second year. 

You should think of the Fellowship as something you layer on top of your internship or project work, so you may apply with an unpaid OR paid internship or project. 

For unfunded experiences, we will provide up to $4000 in supplemental funding. 

All Fellows - those with funded and unfunded experiences - will receive an additional $750 for participating in coordinated Fellowship efforts (weekly meetings, guest speakers, reflections, etc).

All Fellows continue into the school year to work on projects of their choosing, and will be compensated for their work at Middlebury on an hourly basis OR through an award. Applicants are encouraged to have ideas about their academic year work, but are not required to have an exact plan when applying.

During the summer, all Fellows are expected to attend a one-hour-long weekly meeting via Zoom throughout our summer session. Additionally, there are three reflection assignments throughout the summer, which will also take some amount of time to write. 

During the academic year, we also expect that Fellows will attend one-hour-long weekly meetings in person. There is also an end-of-semester reflection which will take some time to write. This is a time commitment in addition to whatever climate action independent projects, internships, and jobs you are pursuing as a part of your Fellowship. All Fellows continue into the academic year to work on projects of their choosing and will be compensated for their work at Middlebury on an hourly basis (or through an award if needed). Students can continue building and working on projects they began over the summer, or can take on a completely different project of their choosing. 

Of course, a key aspect of our Fellowship is flexibility and adaptability. For example: We have had fellows in the past who were in a completely different time zone in the past, thus couldn’t join our summer meetings. That’s okay! Just let us know and we’ll find ways to adapt to your needs, and can find creative alternatives to make sure you are still participating and contributing to the Fellowship with everyone else! 

As a Climate Action Fellow, some reflections on your work, projects, and experience must be completed throughout the fellowship duration. Typically, there are three reflection documents you will submit throughout the summer, in addition to one reflection at the end of each semester. We do not want to be too prescriptive, however! If you have other mediums by which you would like to share your reflections (a podcast, artwork, zine, poetry, video, instgram, etc.) we are open to exploring that with you. At the end of the day, these reflections are meant to be generative, and can be tailored to your learning needs. 

We are in the process of developing a blog where all reflections and any additional content can potentially live! 

As you take on projects, other “deliverables” can be developed if they support your experience! Many students have created zines, videos/recordings, hosted events, or written in public-facing media outlets as a part of their fellowship experience. These are all possibilities, and the whole point of the fellowship is to grant you the space and agency to explore. 

Yes! You can apply to the Climate Action Fellowship with a self-directed project. It does not need to be an official internship, job, or organized position with an established organization or entity. We encourage you to use this funding to create-your-own project/internship/etc. However, whatever independent project you do apply with to the Fellowship must have a solid structure, clear goals and learning objectives, and demonstrated commitment to maintaining yourself accountable to outcomes. All independent projects must have a guide, mentor, or supervisor who is holding you accountable to the project you’re doing over the summer and throughout the year. 

We encourage you to reach out to Climate Action Program staff with any questions if you intend to apply with an independent project and have any questions. 

Not at all! We see the Climate Action Fellowship as an additive experience to whatever projects you may already be working on, or hope to pursue during your fellowship term. We see the fellowship as an opportunity to complement space to expand upon the requirements of your academic work. 

For example: A past Climate Action Fellow was writing a thesis on Black farmers in Vermont. As a part of their work, the Fellow grew a strong bond with the farmers and decided to invite a handful of them to campus to speak to other students and share a meal. They were able to access funds and resources through the fellowship to provide an honorarium to the farmers and supply food funding for all guests. Their thesis work was a throughline through this event, but the farmer dinners themselves were an additive opportunity given the funding and capacity afforded to them by the Climate Action Fellowship! 

We cannot “double dip,” meaning you cannot get both credit and payment. If there is an overlap, please include how your fellowship project and academic project overlap yet diverge in! 

Yes! It’s nice to have students who will be here for a whole year, but we have had one-semester fellows in the past and highly encourage you to apply. 

If you are a graduating Feb applying to be a Climate Action Fellow, we encourage you to elaborate as to why being in the fellowship for one semester would work for the development of your project and why it is important for propelling your work forward. 

We’ve had Fellows doing research on seed systems, organizing for farmworker organizations, putting on LGBTQIA+ Pride events, teaching at Zen Buddhist retreats, doing research for consulting firms, creating poetry and art zines, and so much more! We believe that you can look at every issue with a climate and justice lens, and encourage you to apply to our Fellowship and make that lens explicit in the projects you take on. 

The climate crisis  not only requires collaboration across disciplines, but an understanding of the compounding effects that climate change has on all of the other social ills confronting our world. Climate touches everything, and we believe that unity, collaboration, and coordinated action which breaks our silos are critical. We believe that we cannot address the climate crisis without also addressing racism, ableism, patriarchy, colonialism, imperialism, war, violence, poverty, and other social ills. The environmental and climate movements have historically been exclusionary, neglecting to incorporate the voices and frameworks of our neighbors with marginalized identities. The Climate Action Program and Fellowship is a space where we want to encourage this sort of boundary-crossing intersectional work. We aspire for this space to be a place where we push each other to approach climate work with a justice, equity, and expansive lens. It is imperfect work, as intersectional climate work is understood but hard to implement in centuries-old institutions like Middlebury College, but we’re giving it our best shot! Join us in this effort!