MOUNTAINTOP STANDARD FELLOWSHIP
The standard Mountaintop Fellowship is a paid, one-year, full-time fellowship for the most promising local leaders to stay in or return to their home communities and contribute to systems change in lower-income places around the world. Mountaintop’s Fellows receive a $3,600 grant, fully paid two week leadership institute hosted at Harvard University's Edmond & Lily Safra Center for Ethics, 1:1 mentorship, additional grant opportunities, and a lifelong community of inspiring peers to accelerate their leadership journeys and prepare them for large-scale impact to transform their communities and countries.
In the application, candidates propose a full-time project to address the challenge of their choice in their home community, and describe how the fellowship will help them stay rooted in their community.
This could be anything from leading a social enterprise, advocating for policy changes, or working for a high-impact government agency, NGO, or social venture. The project could be to continue developing an existing initiative such as an NGO or social venture, or starting something new. Mountaintop will select candidates serving a lower-income community in any country outside of the United States. Fellowships will not go to support individuals to run for political office or conduct research.
Note that candidates are still eligible even if they complete the fellowship while holding a separate full-time job if the fellowship would help them to refocus their work on an independent, high-impact project within that job. For example, a Fellow could be working at a health ministry in their home country, and the fellowship could support them to spend their time on a new public health community engagement initiative that they are leading as part of that job. Candidates applying under this scenario will be asked to show written proof of approval of their project proposal from their current supervisor if invited to a Finalist interview.