Announcing: Integrity Institute Visiting Fellowship!
Hey there! I am writing this in the airport on the way to DC, where Jeff, Rachel, Katie, and I will be meeting friends old and new working on tech policy. On Wednesday, we will be co-hosting a mixer with TechCongress and the Atlantic Council’s DFRLab – cannot wait to have our DC-based members mingle with likeminded colleagues there!
In our previous newsletter, I honored our founding fellows and teased some long-awaited developments. Now I can publicly announce what the amateur sleuths among you might have already figured out: the Integrity Institute is launching a brand-new visiting fellows program!
Launching this revamped program is the next step in our organizational leveling-up. Jeff and I believe that the Integrity Institute is here to give all integrity professionals a platform to stand on, and our incredible members start projects on their own all the time (have you checked out the Trust in Tech podcast recently?) The visiting fellows program is a mutual commitment between Institute staff and members. Members with project ideas that could be scoped into reasonable sprints get additional resources and staff support; and staff get a commitment that those members (visiting fellows for each cohort’s duration) will see that work through.
The application opened on Friday last week among our members, and we expect the first cohort of visiting fellows to start in June. Here’s an excerpt of the internal announcement to our members:
It’s time to formally announce the launch of our visiting fellows program. Visiting fellows are members who lead a project as a volunteer. We want to honor and recognize the people already doing that, and give structure and resources to new projects and new leaders as well.
So if you’ve been doing a project so far — apply!
If you want to do a specific project but maybe have been waiting for the right moment, or wondering how to get in — apply!
If you generally want to be more involved and plugged in a committed way, but aren’t quite sure how — apply!
All of you can apply! Please do. We are now recruiting for an inaugural cohort of visiting fellows from our membership pool. The fellowship will have a cohort model and run for 6-months. Here are a few really important things we wanted to highlight.
You must be a member.
Every fellow has at least one proposed project they’ll apply with. Project ideas should support key anchors of Integrity Institute (research, policy, community, writing/thinking in public).
Some benefits include guided support from staff, reimbursement for project-related expenses, the ability to easily be honored and publish on our website and other venues, invitation to fellows summits, fellow-specific opportunities and introductions, and opportunities to present your project for further support.
Fellows also will get priority on other delicious opportunities, partnerships, ideas as they come up — we’re often in touch with partners and funders and while we can’t commit on their behalf yet, we can say that there’s likely more coming down the pike.
We appreciate you, your work, your ideas, your engagement with the Integrity Institute regardless of the outcome of your proposal. We literally would not exist without you.
Our community organizer Maddie Aleman has played an instrumental role in helping us get to this point. In case you also want to apply to be a visiting fellow but are not a member yet – apply to be an Integrity Institute member first! You’ll also get to meet Maddie – who is absolutely delightful – that way.
Recent blog posts and podcast episodes
We are convinced that the visiting fellows program would do well because our members have been producing amazing work even without additional support! I have not highlighted their work here in a while, so here is a non-exhaustive list since the last round-up:
Did you know that 2024 has 65 (!) elections globally across 54 countries, and we won’t see that many again until 2048? Senior advisor and founding fellow Katie Harbath (with her co-author Ana Khizanishvili) shared this insight and more in their blog post.
Despite all the Elon drama recently, Twitter has played an instrumental role in global events. Member Theo Skeadas shared some top moments of Twitter outside the United States in this blog post.
Trust in Tech podcast is releasing amazing episodes weekly, led by member-producer Talha Baig. Make sure you catch up by subscribing on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.
Keep your eyes peeled on our blog and podcast pages for future updates!
Public events this week
We’re in DC this week and will be co-hosting a mixer with TechCongress and the Atlantic Council’s DFRLab on Wednesday! RSVP by tonight – write me in case you don’t have the details yet.
Our very first public event of 2023 is on Thursday! Darius Kazemi and Kat Lo from Meedan will be joining member Laure X Cast to talk about how to moderate the fediverse. Details and RSVP here!
Looking forward to seeing many of you this week in-person,
Sahar