Internet Society Early Career Fellowship, 13 Mar 2021

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From YouTube: Early Career Fellowship: Experience

Description

What is the experience for the Early Career Fellowship?

We held the virtual Early Career Fellowship Event for Potential Candidates on 11 March, 2021, where we walked through the program’s elements, curriculum and eligibility requirements, explained the application process, and answered some questions.

Presentation slides: https://isoc.box.com/s/0hoq9ffa02o5bd6yowzsajwe67pwewp3
More information on Fellowship: https://www.internetsociety.org/fellowships/early-career/

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I'm going to walk you through the nuts and bolts of the experience of the fellowship experience. So so you understand what it comprises. um So we're really characterizing this as a fellowship journey.

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It's really taking us through a series of modules, four modules in which we are seeking to build the knowledge and the skills, the practical skills for individuals who will go through this fellowship and then come out all the more enriched by this experience.

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So we start by bringing people on board in what we're calling our onboarding and in this particular year for this cohort it'll be the week of 28th of june.

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um We move next into one of two modules, which really focuses on the the knowledge segment of this, one of which will be based will be focused on the internet ecosystem. um The other one will be focused on focused on the internet way of thinking. Both of these are academic.

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Both are interactive and both are being led by renowned scholars in the field and then, when we move into the third module, which is the project, management and advocacy. This is really where we start to build the skills um that you will need to be able to take your projects forward, but also the skills that you will develop in terms of presentation, skills, leadership, skills and other things.

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And then, finally, we are moving into the what we're calling the internet way of doing, which is the last module where we bring all this together and all of the things that alejandra and andrew have talked about so far really come together here. This is where the project comes together and it culminates in a symposium in week 24..

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So now, let's, let's dig into those in a little bit more detail, so the internet, so module one is the internet ecosystem, it's being led by dr laura dinardis, who is with american university and, as many of you probably know, she's a renowned scholar in this field and and she'll be covering off on some of the basics.

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If you will she'll be um talking about the internet, ecosystem she'll, be talking about internet history and architecture, she'll be talking through some internet stress tests and some of the core characteristics and and that will put the fellows in a very good position to move into module, two which is being led by professor victoria nash and her colleagues of the oxford internet institute. We're thrilled to have them on board as well, and here we're going to be focusing more on some of the challenges.

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Some of the policy and technology challenges that face the internet today, whether it's policy and regulation and the juxtaposition between technology and policy or internet threats and what the solutions might be and and really focusing on. How do we look forward? How do we learn from these challenges that we're facing at the moment? And how do we look forward and how do we grow and how do we strengthen the internet in the future?

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So that's modules, one and two, and then we shift we shift from the knowledge dimension into the skills, dimension and module. Three is really about project management and advocacy, so as as alejandro and army have mentioned, one of the core elements of this program with this fellowship is the project work that you'll be doing. So we see project management and advocacy. In other words, how do you advocate for your project? Not only, but how do you advocate for particular policy positions and other things?

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We see these elements as critical to being able to be successful in pushing policy positions and pushing your project forward and it'll involve media and advocacy training, as well as some core project management, training and then in module. Four, as I said, we bring it all to that all together.

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We have a couple more sessions on knowledge, building around digital policy and diplomacy, but a lot of this is going to be focused on the fellow on their leadership skills, their presentation, skills, they're, pulling the project together, because the fellowship culminates in the symposium and it's in the symposium that the fellows are going to present their projects and talk about their experience in the fellowship, and so this is.

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This is the shift from modules, one and two, the academic learning into three and four, which is really about the skills building, advocacy and bringing it all together and progressing the project. So let's talk a little bit more about the project, um as, as alejandro said we have.

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You know this is a core component of this fellowship and in many ways it's what differentiates it from many other types of fellowships, as as armory touched on, um and so the key part of this is really about coming with a an idea or coming with an uh already formed idea and possibly even a project that may be somewhat underway and throughout this, the four modules you'll be expected fellows will be expected to bring the learnings and the knowledge that they've acquired to the project.

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So it could well be thinking about the project from a different policy or technology project perspective which you may have picked up in the first two modules or it could be about thinking about how to talk about the project from an advocacy or a media com, or an outreach perspective in the last two modules. So, throughout this fellowship, the project is going to be a key element, but it really comes together in modules, three and four, um some interesting dimensions of this.

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We are encouraging the fellows to develop projects in the local languages, with a caveat that, of course, when it comes to presentations and the fellowship, the fellowship coursework and the project work that has to be in english and there'll, be a lot of opportunities for engaging with each other throughout there'll, be opportunities for presenting to the fellows to each other on their projects for interacting when asking each other questions or perhaps even help on their projects.

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There's going to be a whole series of mediums where the fellows can work together and pro, probably most importantly, the this entire project. Work is underpinned by the support of a dedicated project development mentor and that person will help and that person will be selected and will help they'll be selected based upon the interest, the project work and the nature of the of the project that the fellow brings and that development management will help them bring that project to fruition so that it can be presented at the symposium and that'll be a key pairing.

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If you will between expert mentor and the fellow and so let's, let's take a little bit of time and talk about what this entails, because it's important um to understand what the commitment is and alejandra talked a little bit about that in the beginning.

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But but this fellowship comprises a lot of elements um and you can see them on this slide here from the coursework through the independent project work through the lecture sessions through the special events and speaker series to the project development mentoring sessions and then the networking and the informal opportunities that the fellows will have to work with each other.

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So we calculate that this is a commitment of about, or at least six hours a week for each of the 24 weeks and, of course, that doesn't necessarily take into account the amount of additional work that may be necessary or not for moving the independent project through the 24 weeks as well.

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What's wonderful about this fellow about this fellowship is really the opportunities that you'll have to build your connections, to build your knowledge to build your skills.

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You'll have access to internet practitioners to leading companies and institutions in this space during your speaker series for example, and obviously chances to learn from your fellow peers and our real goal in in this is that at the end of the program, the fellows will have this excellent understanding of the policies that regulate the internet and the technical dimensions that make it work as well as this, this fundamental understanding and practical skills that will make the fellow um incredibly valuable and then have an incredible incredible impact on the internet, going forward as an internet champion and also in your respective.

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