Site Visit, September 2024
The Association of Research Libraries (ARL) is accepting applications for the 2025 cohort of the Leadership Fellows Program (LFP). The LFP is a 13-month hybrid experience designed to prepare the next generation of senior and executive leaders in research libraries and archives. The fellows develop the knowledge, awareness, skills, and attitudes necessary for innovative and successful leadership of complex organizations by participating in a multifaceted curriculum, peer and individual mentoring, self-assessment, executive coaching, and site visits.
Program Components
The Leadership Fellows Program components include:
- Learning Summits: Fellows will attend two in-person learning summits, one at the program start and another at the end of the program.
- Site Visits: Fellows will attend two multi-day, in-person site visits at host institutions.
- Monthly Virtual Sessions: Fellows will participate in monthly educational sessions.
- Mentor-Sponsors: Each fellow will develop a mentor-sponsor relationship with a library director or senior staff member.
- Self-Assessments and Career Coaching: Each fellow will complete self-assessments, coupled with career-coaching sessions.
- ARL Association Meetings: Fellows will attend two ARL Association Meetings.
Eligibility
To be eligible to participate in the Leadership Fellows Program, you must be an established senior or emerging executive leader of a library, archive, and/or library system:
- “Established” is meant to describe one who has served in your position for approximately five years or more; “emerging” is one who has served in your current position for approximately three years or less.
- Titles may vary as administrative structures differ by institution (senior titles may include assistant/associate director/dean/university librarian; executive titles may include director/dean/university librarian).
- Responsibilities should include direct contributions to the oversight of the institution and informing high-level, broad strategies and organizational management.
To Apply
All applicants are required to submit the application form, which includes five brief writing prompts, and confirmation of institutional support by the institution’s executive leader. The application deadline is 11:59 p.m. Hawaii–Aleutian time (UTC–10:00) on Thursday, June 12, 2025.
For more details on the application process, see the ARL website.
Informational Session
ARL hosted an informational session about the Leadership Fellows Program on Monday, May 12, 2025. View the recording (passcode: +i?+N1.e) and slides.
About the Association of Research Libraries
The Association of Research Libraries (ARL) is a nonprofit organization of research libraries in Canada and the US whose vision is to create a trusted, equitable, and inclusive research and learning ecosystem and prepare library leaders to advance this work in strategic partnership with member libraries and other organizations worldwide. ARL’s mission is to empower and advocate for research libraries and archives to shape, influence, and implement institutional, national, and international policy. ARL develops the next generation of leaders and enables strategic cooperation among partner institutions to benefit scholarship and society. ARL is on the web at ARL.org.
