Deadline:
April 01, 2026
Location(s)
United States of America
Overview
The Social Innovation Fellowship provides meaningful community engagement and social innovation experiences for students. Focusing on local partnerships and social impacts through the lens of innovation, this two-year developmental program offers students the opportunity to explore modes of social innovation and the tools required for starting successful ventures or for making transformational changes within existing organizations.
Details
Additionally, students’ work enhances the ability of nonprofit community organizations to use student talent effectively helping build organizational capacity while exploring ideas within the local social innovation ecosystem.
The Fellowship endeavors to build a learning community of students, faculty and community partners who are engaged in thinking about the nature of social innovation, the dynamics of sustained community change, and the connections between academic, community work, and active citizenship.
The Social Innovation Fellowship is possible thanks to the generous support of Kenneth Cole through the Kenneth Cole Foundation.
Structure
Led in partnership with the award-winning Social Enterprise Greenhouse, the Social Innovation Fellowship is a two-year developmental program that places the community at the center with SEG staff providing fellows with training while partners within the SEG network offer students coaching and hands-on social innovation experience. Fellows also benefit from inclusion in the Swearer Center ecosystem of faculty, advisors and students. In addition to instruction, hands-on training, and mentorship, fellows are provided with an annual stipend of $2,000.
In year one, fellows participate in regular workshops led by SEG and embed within an existing member of SEGs network of social innovators. In year two, fellows have the option to (1) develop and launch a venture of their own, write a sustainability plan, and secure funding as needed or (2) complete a substantial project within a SEG-supported social venture.
Opportunity is About
Eligibility
Candidates should be from:
Description of Ideal Candidate
The Social Innovation Fellowship is a two-year program and thus is open to first-year and second-year undergraduate students.
Dates
Deadline: April 01, 2026
Cost/funding for participants
- Fellows will have access to a curriculum designed to introduce and strengthen skills for social innovation in partnership with the Social Enterprise Greenhouse, community organizations and campus partners.
- Fellows will also have access to hands-on learning and mentorship through their community-based internships.
- Fellows receive an annual stipend of $2,000.
In year one, fellows will participate in regular workshops and intern with a community-based organization in Rhode Island. In year two, fellows continue engaging in regular workshops and can choose to either (1) explore a social innovation project of their own and/or (2) continue interning with the community-based organization they were matched with.
Un-save Opportunity
Internships, scholarships, student conferences and competitions.
