The Millennium Campus Network (MCN) and the United Nations Academic Impact (UNAI) are proud to present the Millennium Fellowship Class of 2022, an ambitious program to help make the Sustainable Development Goals and UNAI principles a reality. The Class of 2022 Millennium Fellows have been selected among a record-breaking 31,397 applicants from over 2,417 campuses across 140 nations.
Millennium Fellows are university undergraduates selected based on their leadership on sustainable development-related projects that advance the SDGs in their communities. As Millennium Fellows, they will participate in a semester-long leadership development program to improve their student organizing, partnership building and community impact skills.
The Millennium Fellowship Class of 2022 includes over 3,000 Millennium Fellows on 200 campuses in 37 nations that are participating in the program this year. The Class of 2022 is on track to engage in projects collectively advancing all 17 Sustainable Development Goals and all 10 UNAI Principles. Here is just a snippet of the important projects the Class of 2022 has taken on:
At The University of the West Indies, Jamaica - Millennium Fellows will be working on ‘The Upliftment project’, tutoring and providing mentorship to underprivileged children in the capital of Jamaica, Kingston, with the goal of increasing young Jamaicans' access to education, information, and opportunities essential for their holistic development. The project is projected to positively impact more than 50 people during the Millennium Fellowship this year.
At Baylor University, United States, Millennium Fellows will be working on the project ‘Collegiate Foundations’ to provide one on one mentoring. This mentoring will assist 9th to 12th grade first-generation low-income high school students in Houston and the wider Texas community students with their coursework, SAT/ACT exams, college applications, financial aid and scholarship applications. They aim to help equip these students with essential skills like effective organization and communication, effectively empowering them with the advice and resources they need to thrive in their educational pursuits. They will also raise funds to donate computers to students who have been admitted to college but lack the financial resources to purchase them. This project is projected to positively impact more than 100 students this fall.
At Kisii University, Kenya - 10 Millennium Fellows are advancing SDG 15: Life on Land through their initiative ‘Green Kenya’. This project aims to promote environmental sustaiblity and support in the efforts to curb deforestation and restore drought-stricken regions in Kenya. Millennium Fellows plan to raise 3,000 seedlings during the Millennium Fellowship and collaborate with 15 primary schools across Kisii Town to engage students in the process of planting trees around the schools, from raising the seedlings to growing and maintaining a tree.
Ban Ki-moon, eighth Secretary-General of the United Nations, shared his enthusiasm for the program, "As Millennium Fellows, we need you to lead by example - with empathy, humility, and inclusion as guiding values. You can embrace global citizenship, building a strong global network to learn from and support each other…We are all counting on you to affirm the dignity of people and our planet, now and for years to come.”
The United Nations Academic Impact is proud to partner with MCN on this initiative, and you can check out our website in the coming weeks for more detailed articles on the Millennium Fellows and their projects. You can learn more about the Millennium Fellowship Class of 2022 and apply for the Class of 2023 at the Fellowship website.
