The Albert Schweitzer Fellowship is a one-year interdisciplinary leadership development program that creates sustainable change in community health.

Students enrolled in graduate or professional degree-granting programs from any accredited academic institution in the geographic area may apply. While the applicant’s field of study does not have to be traditionally health-related, his/her proposed service project must focus on health and/or the social determinants of health. Past Fellows have addressed health from a wide variety of perspectives and disciplines including, but not limited to, dentistry, education, engineering, law, medicine, music, nursing, occupational therapy, pharmacy, physical therapy, public health and social work. Applicants must be enrolled throughout the Fellowship year (April-April). Applicants scheduled for a December graduation would qualify.

The project should:

• Provide a direct service that meets a community-defined need and reflects national and local health priorities, such as Healthy People 2020. Applicants should investigate and reflect on unmet local health-related needs and think through the ways in which their own energies and talents might contribute, even in small ways, to ameliorating one or more of these problems. Applicants are required to communicate with potential community partners prior to submitting their applications and to be specific in their proposals about their relationships with their community partners.
• Be of an enduring value to the community/agency served. Sustainability should be a major consideration in the project proposal.
• Applicants should identify a faculty mentor as well as site mentor prior to submitting their application.
• Applicants may identify a unique proposal or one that innovates on a previous Schweitzer Fellow project. Because the Fellowship is designed as a leadership model, most projects are individual. However, partners are accepted, as long as the roles of partners are distinguishable. Please note that we do not accept applications from groups larger than two.