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The Hart Fellows Program
In his inaugural address as president of Duke University in 1970, the late U.S. Senator Terry Sanford said that "Leadership suggests service and creativity suggests contributions to mankind, and I call these the greatest goals." The Hart Fellows Program is modeled on Sanford's vision of ethical leadership.
Its goals are threefold:
- To help recent Duke graduates develop their leadership capacity through intensive engagement with complex global issues;
- To be of service to innovative international organizations addressing humanitarian challenges;
- To help fellows develop research and critical reflection skills for exploring how policy issues relate to the lives of people around the world.
The Hart Fellows Program grew out of the Hart Leadership Program’s mission to help Duke undergraduates become engaged citizens in a democratic society. The HFP offers recent Duke graduates ten-month fellowships with organizations in developing countries that are facing complex social, political and humanitarian problems. This capstone experience helps Fellows develop their own vision of ethical leadership as they move into professional life. Since its inception in 1995, the HFP has selected 63 recent graduates to serve in 29 countries—from Azerbaijan to Zimbabwe—across five continents.
Fellows are paired with experienced mentors within their host organizations, and gain direct experience working on global issues such as forced migration, HIV/AIDS, and youth-focused poverty alleviation. Working with diverse communities and issues throughout the world, Fellows help to build organizational capacity, write grants and document programs. Fellows also engage in Research Service-Learning (RSL): they produce community-based research projects of tangible benefit to the communities and organizations they serve, while engaging in structured, critical reflection about their work.
Fellows have investigated the relationship between integrated home-based care and patient adherence to antiretroviral therapy in Brazil, children’s perspectives on their human rights in Tanzania, the barriers to and motivations for participation in community life in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the effects of child trafficking on behavioral and emotional development in Cambodia.
Through monthly writing assignments, Fellows examine the challenges they and their host organizations face and the meaning and effectiveness of their work. Their reflections are shared with faculty mentors in the Hart Fellows Program, and eventually disseminated to wider, public audiences. Fellows also use media such as photography and video to provide a window
into the communities they serve.
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