The Mellon Environmental Stewardship, Place, and Community Initiative (MESPAC) is seeking nine graduate students to mentor undergraduate students at the Humanities Futures Workshop (April 13-15, 2023) and to participate in two planning meetings in advance of the Workshop.

MESPAC focuses on centering Indigenous epistemologies and other ways of knowing to shape how we think about relationships with the planet and each other. One goal of this multi-campus grant is to introduce Indigenous and other underrepresented undergraduates to the possibilities of graduate education in the humanities for advancing their own commitments and careers. Undergraduate mentees will primarily be drawn from three Humanities Futures Lab courses in Native American and Indigenous Studies offered in Spring and May terms, 2023. 

The Humanities Futures Workshop April 13–15, 2023 will be held on the University of Minnesota Twin Cities campus alongside the MESPAC Initiative Capstone Symposium and offers undergraduates opportunities to explore graduate education and see how Indigenous ways of knowing are being incorporated in the humanities.

The role of the mentors will be to help plan the Spring workshop and to work with small groups of undergraduates during the workshop, sharing their experience in graduate school. 

A $500 honorarium will be provided, as well as 2-3 meals during workshops. Commitment will not not exceed 20 hours of work.