Alaska Fellows Program
The Alaska Fellows Program Application is closed for the 2023/24 term. Please register for our listserv and watch our website for announcements about the 2024/25 positions and application period.
The Alaska Fellows Program (AFP) is a fall-to-spring residential fellowship program that nurtures the next generation of Alaska-based leaders by pairing talented young people with strong communities and professional mentors.
Initially launched with a small pool of Yale graduates in 2014, the program now boasts alumni from 35 states and seven countries and hosts fellows in Anchorage, Juneau, Sitka and Fairbanks. Forty-six percent of alumni continue to live and work in Alaska for a year or more following their fellowships.
By attracting young, dynamic professionals to the state of Alaska, AFP arrests and reverses the “brain drain” of young people supersaturating in Seattle, San Francisco, Boston, New York, and D.C. AFP also helps Alaska retain homegrown talent by connecting born-and-raised Alaskans with high-impact opportunities in their home state.
Fellows serve with a dynamic non-profit or public-sector organization for the fellowship term and receive modest living stipends and housing. Fellows live communally, work closely with professional mentors, and make lasting contributions to their host community.
Fellows attend opening and closing retreats as well as two facilitated “convenings” — events that draw together fellows across all sites to cultivate connections, friendships, and common identity.
Fellows are backed by a well-connected team of community members that help make introductions, integrate Fellows into the community (e.g. Arctic Entries, Stardust Ball, Alaska Folk Fest), and share high-octane experiences in outdoor, civic, and community life.
Further Reading
Read the 2023 AFP ANNUAL REPORT
For more on program structure, start here. For a comparison of the program sites, start here.
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Our Team
Tina has made Alaska her home since 1998. For the past eight years, she has worked at UAF’s International Arctic Research Center, in the world of climate science research. Her academic background is in biology — ask her about what pollinates blueberries! Outside of work, she lives and plays in Fairbanks with her husband, two sons, a goofy-looking dog and a grouchy cat.
You can reach Tina at tina@alaskafellows.org
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Meredith Redick is a graduate of Yale College and a 2016-’17 Sitka alumna. She holds dual degrees in Molecular Biophysics & Biochemistry and English literature, as well as certificates in elementary and bilingual education. She has worked with UAS-Sitka and Sitka Tribe of Alaska since moving to Sitka in 2016. She was the original Executive Director of AFP.
Ira Slomski-Pritz is a graduate of Yale College, an alumnus of both the Sitka and Anchorage sites, former staffer to Alaska Governor Bill Walker, and a NOLS instructor.
Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins (Founder) was born and raised in Sitka, Alaska, attended Yale College, and most recently represented his hometown and a dozen-plus other rural Southeast communities in the Alaska Legislature.
Jenny-Marie Stryker is a 2017-'18 Anchorage alumna, which brought her to the state and city she calls home now. She serves as the Political Director of The Alaska Center, and has previously worked as political campaign consultant in Alaska. She holds a BA from Wellesley College with a major in American Studies and a minor in Economics.
Pat Race is a filmmaker and illustrator with a background in computer science. Pat served on the Alaska State Council for the Arts from 2015-2021, and his artwork was featured on Alaska's "I Voted" stickers in 2018. Pat is co-owner of the Alaska Robotics Gallery in downtown Juneau, a comic shop and art gallery which was selected as a finalist for the 2019 Will Eisner Spirit of Comics Award.
Noah Star was an Alaska Fellow back in 2016-17, but then we called ourselves Sitka Winter Fellows. In Sitka Noah worked with then Rep. Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins and then did a session in Juneau the next year. Hooked on Alaska fisheries and natural resources law, he went back east for as little time as possible to get his law degree from Harvard. After law school, Noah clerked for the Alaska Supreme Court. And now he serves as an Assistant Attorney General for the State of Alaska working on civil litigation and natural resources matters. Noah lives in East Anchorage with his partner, Shoshi (also a former fellow!), and their dog, Morgan.
NOTICE OF NONDISCRIMINATORY POLICY
Alaska Fellows Program is a project coordinated through Outer Coast, and is a charitable organization recognized as exempt from federal income tax under Code Sec. 501(a) and described in Code Sec. 501(c)(3). Outer Coast/AFP welcomes applicants from diverse backgrounds, including international students and non-traditional students. Outer Coast/AFP offers equal access to educational opportunity regardless of race, color, nationality, ethnicity, creed, age, religion, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, marital status, veteran’s status, intellectual or political conviction or affiliation, physical or mental disabilities for which reasonable accommodations can be made, or any other legally protected category.