MEPI Leadership Development Fellowship
The Leadership Development Fellowship, funded by the U.S. Department of State’s U.S. Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI) and implemented by World Learning, is a leadership development fellowship to advance civic engagement and social entrepreneurship in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. The Leadership Development Fellowship (LDF) provides emerging leaders across sectors in the MENA region with advanced technical skills, financial and professional resources, and regional support networks to make positive social and economic changes in their communities.
MEPI Student Leaders Program
The Student Leaders program offers outstanding undergraduates from across the MENA region an intensive leadership training course of approximately 5 weeks in the United States. The program emphasizes lessons in participatory governance and the application of leadership skills.
The Student Leaders program is a rigorous leadership program for up to 60 undergraduate and graduate students from the Middle East and North Africa. Students are divided among U.S. academic institutions where they develop leadership skills and expand their understanding of civil society and participatory governance and how both may be applied in their home communities. Participants have the opportunity to meet their American peers, engage in local community service activities, and observe and take part in the governmental process on the local, state, and federal levels. The program includes academic coursework, as well as study tours to various regions of the United States.
Upon completion of the U.S.-based program, participants are mentored by the program implementer to leverage their experiences through sponsored alumni activities designed to effect positive social change in their home countries approximately 6 months after the U.S. portion of the program. A competitive follow-on accelerator workshop may be held in the region upon completion of the U.S.-based program.
MEPI Tomorrow’s Leaders Undergraduate Program (TLU)
The Tomorrow’s Leaders Undergraduate Program (TLU) supports students in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region by providing undergraduate level academic matriculation, civic education, and leadership development. TLU is a leadership-training program, partnering with leading U.S.-accredited universities in the MENA region to build a cadre of community, business, and national leaders who are civic-minded, intellectually able, and professionally-skilled.
TLU targets students from around the region who are academically qualified, but who are otherwise unable to afford American-style higher education. Students will enroll at the undergraduate level in a four-year program in one of the hosting institutions: The American University of Beirut (AUB), The Lebanese American University (LAU) in Lebanon and The American University in Cairo (AUC) in Egypt. Each host university offers a civic awareness and leadership-based component and participants receive mentoring and internship opportunities with local civil society, business, and non-governmental organizations. In addition each student has an opportunity to study abroad in the U.S. for one semester.
MEPI Tomorrow’s Leaders Graduate Program (TLG)
Tomorrow’s Leaders Graduate (TLG) program is a MEPI initiative aiming at offering students from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) a unique opportunity to pursue higher education and earn a master’s degree through leading American University with U.S. accreditation in the MENA region. TLG equips graduate students with professional experience needed to advance knowledge and contribute to the achievement of socially relevant outcomes through research that furthers the professionalization of emerging leaders while supporting and increasing scholars’ knowledge in gender issues in specific in the various fields of study.