GRADUATE FELLOWSHIP
The Graduate Fellows Program supports, during the course of their graduate education, exceptionally well qualified students who have bachelor degrees from Lilly Network Schools and who are interested in becoming teacher-scholars at church-related colleges and universities in the United States.
Cohorts of the Lilly Graduate Fellows three-year program commence every other year. Cohorts are composed of ten Fellows who are entering PhD or equivalent graduate programs in humanities and arts at schools of their choosing in North America. Finalists for each cohort are selected in two rounds, during two consecutive years, after a nomination process. The cohort’s first conference takes place in late summer, following the second round of selection.
Over the subsequent three-year period, these Fellows, along with two mentors who are senior scholars at Lilly Network Schools, will communicate and collaborate with each other in areas of research, teaching, and professional development, by way of colloquia, frequent communication, and summer conferences.
The program will reach completion with the introduction of the Graduate Fellows to representatives of the national Lilly Network at the Network’s annual National Conference.
Lilly Graduate Fellows will receive three annual $3,000 fellowship awards for use at the Fellows’ discretion.
IMPORTANT NOTICE
Graduate Fellowship Paused
The Lilly Network has paused the Lilly Graduate Fellows Program selection process and currently is not recruiting Lilly Graduate Fellows.
This pause will allow for the assessment of a number of questions regarding changes in graduate education, the academic job market, and higher education more generally that impact the nature of the program and the process of recruitment.
The Lilly Network Staff also is pursuing opportunities to begin a graduate fellowship program in STEM fields to complement the ongoing program in the humanities and the arts. Look for updates on these developments in the coming months.
PROGRAM DISTINCTIVES
Four Conferences
Lilly Graduate Fellows attend four conferences over the course of three years. These conferences allow Fellows to collaborate with each other and with senior scholars and luminaries who integrate research, teaching, vocation, and an interest in church-related higher education.
Mentoring Relationship
Lilly Graduate Fellows will develop a relationship with two mentors who are senior scholars at a Lilly Network school.
Online Colloquium
Lilly Graduate Fellows and mentors, over the course of the three-year program, will participate in common readings and online discussions that explore the intersections of Christianity and higher learning by drawing on classical and contemporary works of art, literature, theology, history, and philosophy. This colloquium requires an average time commitment of two to three hours per week. Cohorts in the past have engaged such thinkers as Simone Weil, Augustine, Dostoevsky, Dante, and Flannery O’Connor.
ELIGIBILITY
Nominees must have earned or be in the process of earning a baccalaureate degree from a Lilly Network institution.
Eligibility depends upon the year of the nominee’s undergraduate degree, which must have been received no more than five years before the fellowship.
Nominees must be U.S. Citizens.
In order to receive this Fellowship, nominees must have been accepted into a PhD, MFA, ThD, or equivalent program by June 1 the year the fellowship begins. The school must be located in North America.
Eligible disciplines are: art; art history; creative writing; history; interdisciplinary studies; languages and literature; music; music history; philosophy; religion; rhetoric; theater history; theater arts, and theology. Those applicants pursuing an MFA in creative writing must indicate their intent to continue to a PhD program.
Finalists must attend an Interview Conference in the spring (usually April) of the year the fellowship begins (overseas applicants please contact us). Fellows must attend an Inaugural Conference during the summer of that year. If selected, Fellows begin the program in the fall after the Inaugural Conference. The Graduate Fellows Program will cover all expenses for these events.