Climate Justice Fellowship

• Current Northeastern graduate or undergraduate students across the global network
• Must be accepted into or currently involved in some experiential learning program or activity where you will apply a climate justice lens to the work. This program or activity will serve as the basis for your engagement in the program.
  • Examples: academics, research, service-learning, volunteer position, co-op, student organizations, or extracurricular activities

• Spring Semester (January through April)
• Attend 5 meetings (2 ¼ hours), approximately monthly
• 6-8 hours per month including the monthly meeting (may vary by month)
• Meetings will be virtual, but there will be opportunities for in person gatherings for Boston-based participants

• • Participate in your selected activity and document how your role as a climate justice fellow can have an impact on that role.
  • Attend monthly CJ Fellow Meetings and come prepared to discuss your role with the facilitator and cohort.
  • Participate in monthly reflection activities to help prepare for and guide the discussions with your cohort.
  • Selected applicants will be required to take a Structural Oppression self-guided training before the first meeting in mid-January.

To prepare for the application here is a list of questions on the form:

• Full Name
• Email
• Undergraduate/Graduate?
• What is your major/program?
• What campus will you be located at during Spring Semester 2024? (e.g. on Boston campus, in Boston for co-op, Oakland campus, etc.)
• Are you available to contribute an average of 6-8 hours a month to the Climate Justice Fellowship program from January to April, 2024?
• How did you hear about the Climate Justice Fellowship?
• What experiential learning activity will you be leveraging during the fellowship to apply a climate justice lens to? (Examples include: academics, research, service-learning, volunteer position, co-op or extracurricular activities).
• Have you already secured or gained acceptance to this experiential learning activity? If no, please explain when you will have confirmation.
• When does this activity start or is it an ongoing commitment?
• How many hours a week will you be engaged in this activity?
• Please provide a description of this activity and the climate justice challenge you want to address through your work? (Maximum 400 words)
• What are some of the personal challenges you are facing or witnessing related to climate justice? What about your personal experience could enrich the diversity of thought and perspective in the cohort?
• What can you bring to this community of fellow learners that would help you sustain and support each other and each other’s work?
• Please upload your resume (to include relevant academic experience, work experience, or project experience) 

Yes, but you must identify what specifically about the course you will be leveraging for the fellowship. For example, is there a term paper where you will research and identify a climate injustice and make recommendations for improving the process or outcomes? 

No, it is important to move at the pace of trust and ensure that any interventions do not further exploit land or people. Thus, the fellowship could be used to make recommendations or explore a possible future intervention and the best process for ensuring it will be equitable and just. 

No, the activity does not have to be directly related to the environment or climate justice. It will be up to the applicant to make a case for how bringing a climate justice lens to the work could be fruitful through the application question. 

Probably. Again, it is up to the individual to identify what specifically about the experiential learning opportunity could be leveraged for the fellowship. Here are a few things you might consider for these types of activities.

1. Food Bank: Lower income households are disproportionately impacted by climate change due to not having the resources to handle the impacts of climate. In addition, food is becoming more and more expensive partly due to the impacts of climate (changing weather patterns affecting farmers and crops, having to travel greater distances to grocery stores). Access to nutritious food is also inequitable. Are there changes you could propose at the food bank to make nutritious food more accessible to a greater number of people? Are there partnerships that could be leveraged to bring greater resources to the food bank to help more people?
2. Women’s Shelter/Senior Citizen Home: Climate change is causing more extreme weather including more frequent and longer heat waves and more intense rain storms. Is there any outreach and education that could be done at the shelter to encourage greater access to resources around heat resilience and flooding? 

For your environmental research study to align with the Climate Justice Fellowship, it’s crucial to emphasize the inclusion of historically marginalized communities’ voices and experiences. Consider ways to incorporate their perspectives in a respectful and equitable manner. Additionally, explore the possibility of compensating local residents for sharing their lived experiences and insights into the environmental impact on their community.

The Hub is always happy to talk to students and connect them to opportunities we are aware of based on your interests. However, with the short application timeline, the Hub is not able to guarantee opportunities to align with the fellowship. We encourage you to think about what you are already doing or are about to do in the spring and what relation that may have to climate justice. A good place to start hearing about opportunities is signing up for our monthly newsletter.