Loeb Fellowship at the Harvard Graduate School of Design (Harvard GSD)

Loeb Fellows are accomplished practitioners, influential in shaping the built and natural environment, whose work is advancing positive social outcomes in the US and around the world. In the middle of promising careers they step away from their hectic professional lives for one academic year. Fellows audit classes at the GSD and throughout the vast network of Harvard and MIT. They engage with faculty and students, participate in Fellowship events, and collaborate with their peers. They become part of a powerful growing network of colleagues passionately committed to revitalizing communities.

Who Should Apply

Urban designers, public artists, developers, journalists, civic leaders, architects, landscape architects, urban planners, policymakers, and community development leaders.

We encourage applications from a wide range of practitioners whose work focuses on improving the built and natural environment. In short, people of exceptional skill who design, plan, preserve, and critique the places where we live, work, and play are eligible to apply.

The program is for people in mid-career, with a minimum of 5-10 years of experience in the field. We seek professionals who have leadership ability and who show the potential to take their capacities to higher levels. The opportunities presented by the Fellowship work best for those experienced enough to ask the hard questions, but with plenty of time left to make an impact. A typical Loeb class averages about 42 years of age.

The Fellowship is for practitioners. It is not an academic sabbatical program or an artist residency; there are many other programs for those purposes. The Loeb is unique in providing support for renewal and reflection in an active career.

Fellows take stock of what they have learned, expand skills in the midst of a great university and chart the next phase of their careers to become more effective agents of change.

We value a creative and motivated work history above more traditional credentials. A completed degree in higher education is not a requirement. Professionals with atypical backgrounds or unusual career paths who have demonstrated the capacity to make a difference in their fields are encouraged to apply.

Details at loebfellowship.gsd.harvard.edu