Accepted Proposals

15. What if Hamilton had a thriving community of post-baccalaureate fellows enriching the cultural and intellectual campus community?

May 16, 2025

The collaboration led by: Courtney Gibbons

With collaborators: 60 additional collaborators

Imagine a liberal arts student becoming a lifelong liberal arts champion by taking ownership of a piece of Hamilton for a year. We seek to create a critical mass of post-baccalaureate fellowships for new Hamilton graduates, each supervised by a mentor from a department, program, office, or center. From conducting research in Biology, to designing workshops for the Innovation Center, to running a community artspace—the fellow positions would be as diverse in scope as our collective imagination allows. As a cohort, fellows and their mentors would cross campus boundaries to enrich Hamilton's intellectual life and foster inclusive communities.

The proposal was submitted for TRANSFORMATIONAL funding (no maximum) and was ranked medium with respect to the other proposals based upon the evaluation rubric.

The committee applauds the proposers for:

• Envisioning an experience that would be enriching for the campus, supporting the curriculum, and providing creative opportunities for recent graduates

The points that the committee recommends the proposers need to continue to develop include:

• Collaboration with other proposals that focus on post-baccalaureate programs and/or fellows
• Consideration of infrastructure to support recent graduates

From the committee’s perspective, the next phase of this project would include:

• Program development
• Understanding what would be needed to coordinate a small pilot program
• Connecting with the other post-bacc proposals that were submitted

The committee recommends funding the next phase of this proposal for $5,000 to move this idea forward for further aspirational design and development.