The Junior Summer Fellowship program enables selected juniors pursue an independent, immersive project in the summer between 11th and 12th grade. Fellows extend and enhance their knowledge beyond the boundaries of the traditional classroom in destinations around the world. Successful projects will have a well-defined focus and purpose that may be academic, artistic, athletic, cultural, or creative.

A committee of current upper school faculty will award a maximum of seven $4000 fellowships to current 11th grade students. An outstanding fellowship proposal will describe a unique and immersive experience that will broaden and deepen the student’s understanding of themself and the world. While this usually involves travel, that is not a requirement.

Download Application Packet

NOTE: The application packet is only accessible to those with a Harvard-Westlake email account. 
QUESTIONS: Contact Jim Patterson, Director of the Kutler Center.

2024 Junior Summer Fellows:

Image

Samuel Cleland

Jazz in The Big Easy: Conducting Not So Easy Discussions about Race and Jazz in its Birthplace of New Orleans

Image

Sasha Antonia Gadalov

Assimilation in Alaska: Old Believers and the Evolution of Their Identity

Image

Ashley Ham

Uncovering the Ancient Korean History of Pottery

Image

Saisha Kumar

The Continued Reform Efforts Following the Criminal Tribes Act on the Gujjar Community in Mumbai, India

Image

Shiara Navarro

The Mayan Train: The Environmental Impacts of Expanding Cultural Tourism in Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula

Image

Anaya Olivas

30 Years Post Apartheid: Life as a "Coloured" Girl in South Africa

Image

Arielle Trakhtenberg

Two Years Gone: Lives of Ukrainian Refugees in Krakow

2023 Junior Summer Fellows:

Image

Leo Craig

Coal, Gas, and Transmission Lines: The Energy Transition Playing Out on the Uintah and Ouray Reservation

Image

Zoe Fribourg

Weaving the Social Fabric of the Philippines: The Survival of Ancient Filipino Textiles

Image

Diego Sebastian Godoy

Pok-ta-pok and Lacrosse: Ritual, Power, Life, and Death in Indigenous Sport in the Yucatan Peninsula and North America

Image

Iona Yunhee Lee

From Poverty to Entrepreneurship in Mwika, Tanzania: The Effects of Microfinance on Rural Women in Africa

Image

Jack Solomon Limor

Recovering the History of Mediterranean Jews: A Comparative Study of The Islands of Cyprus, Crete, Malta, & Sardinia

Image

Arely Monterroso

The Growing Reach of Education In Guatemala

Image

Peijin Wu

Single-Room Occupancy Units (SROs) in San Francisco: Examining the Chinese Immigrants’ Living Condition and Debunking the Model Minority Myth