WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, the Faith & Politics Institute (FPI) announced the launch of the John Robert Lewis Scholars and Fellows Program in honor of the founder of its annual Congressional Civil Rights Pilgrimages, one year since his passing. The program enables students to learn from changemakers of history, contemporary nonviolence practitioners, and civil rights leaders. During two trips to Washington, D.C, participants will connect with representatives from national, state, and local government, businesses, and nonprofits engaged in social impact work. They will also join Members of Congress on FPI’s annual Civil Rights Pilgrimage and complete an oral history project through a range of applications. All participants receive a $2,000 stipend.
“In every generation, young leaders like John Lewis have been at the forefront of social movements that promoted freedom of all peoples, across the country and the world. The John Robert Lewis Scholars & Fellows Programs will build and maintain a national and international network of rising leaders to create lasting, positive change based on the Civil Rights Movement’s revolutionary nonviolent social impact,” said Joan Mooney, President of the Faith & Politics Institute. “The same nonviolent philosophy that shaped the work of John Lewis and his contemporaries that defined their advocacy for civil rights will be shared in our curriculum. The program’s objectives are to help rising leaders in a variety of fields better engage in dialogue to advocate for positive change while reconciling conflict in our society and between individuals.”
From 1998 to 2020, Congressman John Lewis led FPI's annual nonpartisan Congressional Pilgrimages to places in the American South with a wide variety of current and future leaders, including hundreds of his Congressional colleagues, state and local officials, members of the diplomatic corps, three US Presidents, and youth. In retracing the footsteps of the Southern Freedom Movement he helped lead, the Truth & Reconciliation process in South Africa and the peace process in Northern Ireland, Lewis hoped everyone would be transformed by the immersive pilgrimage experience and come away from it with a greater understanding of the power of nonviolence as a way of achieving lasting social change.
Scholars will be part of a cohort of undergraduate students, chosen in the competitive application process, seeking to be effective changemakers in civic life through their engagement in an applied learning program of the nonviolent social impact philosophy that grounded John Robert Lewis.
Fellows will be graduate students and others beginning vocations in public service, nonprofits, education, and seminary. These rising leaders will be selected to examine the nonviolent social impact philosophy from a historical perspective; define its principles and strategies; and identify their applicability to modern times and movements, current issues, and everyday life.
The application portal is open from September 1 through October 1, 2021, for the inaugural January to July 2022 programs.
Apply at faithandpolitics.org, here.