Specifically, we:
1. Support and engage students to become Generations Fellows.
The Generations Fellows component embodies our inter-generational approach. Generations Fellows are upper-class undergraduate and graduate students who engage with their younger peers and senior giants. They are responsible for organizing and delivering the components below. Our Generations Fellows are recruited based on their experience related to pursuing an international affairs career and associated anxieties.
Generations Fellows are particular beneficiaries of the Generations Dialogue Project, and they are also key to its execution, enabling the project to reach substantially greater audiences. In each term they serve, each Generations Fellow reaches at least 70-100 participants. They model and engage in intergenerational dialogues with high school students, undergraduate students, and seasoned practitioners in international affairs. They are also responsible for planning and supporting the cohort programming. Through the project they gain leadership skills and build networks that will enable their future success.
2. Conduct Generations Dialogues (GDs)—youth outreach dialogue events—both virtually and in person, targeted to students from minority-serving high schools, community colleges, and universities.
Each Generations Fellow delivers Generations Dialogues (GDs) each semester. GDs open with a brief video that models an intergenerational dialogue between The Young Black Leader’s Guide co-authors Aaron S. Williams and Taylor A. Jack, introduces content from The Young Black Leader’s Guide, and includes remarks from some of the giants we profile. Participants then connect with each other in a paired discussion exercise to share experiences, aspirations, and anxieties related to educational advancement, international affairs, and professional pursuits. Following, a Generations Fellow engages in a live dialogue with a giant, and invites specific questions and concerns from our audience.
3. Provide copies of the book to Generations participants.
The Young Black Leader’s Guide addresses young people’s many fears concerning careers in American foreign policy. Its opening chapters introduce careers in American Foreign Policy and provide guidance for starting out, including family support, options for professional internships and overseas opportunities, and a discussion of the relative advantages of attending minority-serving and primarily white colleges and universities.
It does not stop there. We want to both attract more young people to careers in American foreign policy and to help them succeed. The book serves as a reference text and guidebook that individuals can return to at various junctures in their career, such as when they contemplate job changes and promotions, or become leaders; and also when they encounter performance reviews and confront challenging individuals and structures, which may reflect racist attitudes. It is an important reference for Generations participants at all stages: high school, college, graduate school, and various points in their career.
The book enables the Generations Dialogue Project to have a long-term impact on every participant—one that can inform immediate decisions about educational options, and longer-term career success so that we can achieve an American foreign policy infrastructure that reflects American society and brings every resource we have to crafting a democratic, American foreign policy that maximizes impact, relevance, and innovation.
4. Create a network and foster professional affinity support groups.
Social support is essential to anyone’s career. The challenges of being a minority in a predominantly white professional setting can be particularly daunting. The Young Black Leader’s Guide addresses the need and related how tos for seeking the support of others for professional development and mentoring, mental health, and navigating how to be your authentic self in such environments. The Generations Dialogue Project takes those lessons and animates them through a Generations network and cohort subgroups, and related communications strategy. Each Generations Fellow engages in live discussion forums every semester they serve, for example, using selected book chapters as subject matter.