Leadership Development

The Massachusetts Promise Fellowship is committed to training emerging community leaders and our Fellows have access to a variety of professional development opportunities throughout their year of service!

“The Fellowship has helped me to develop professionally in a range of areas from marketing to event planning, to public speaking and website development. At 23, I have already made contacts in so many different sectors of the community. On any given day, I could meet with politicians, child advocates, homeless shelter workers, hospital administrators, police officers, nonprofit directors, teachers, entrepreneurs, or a really cool group of proactive youth! Every day is something new and there's no time to get bored!”
-Amanda Trask, Class XII Fellow

Monthly Meetings

Fellows are convened monthly for training, teambuilding, and networking. Teambuilding activities, including ropes courses, team challenges, and peer advising, allow for Fellows to build rich relationships with each other leading to productive professional networking. The training curriculum is designed each year to meet the needs and interests of the current class of Fellows. Trainers include Fellowship staff, Fellowship alumni, Northeastern University staff, community partners, and external consultants.

Training topics include:

  • Community Asset Mapping
  • Project Planning & Implementation
  • Youth Development
  • Facilitative Leadership
  • Civic Engagement & Social Capital
  • Networking
  • Career Development
  • Social Justice
  • LGBTQ Safe Space
  • Disability Inclusion & Awareness
  • BE SAFE partnership with the Boston Area Rape Crisis Center
  • Volunteer Recruitment & Management
  • Social Media
  • Mandated Reporting

Skills-Based TRAINING

Additional skill-building opportunities are offered each month by way of optional trainings. These half-day trainings are designed based on requests from Fellows and focus specifically on hard skills. Training areas have included:

  • Computer Applications
  • Public Speaking
  • Grant Writing
  • Curriculum Development and Design
  • Program Evaluation

Non-Profit Leadership Institute

The Massachusetts Promise Fellowship’s Non-Profit Leadership Institute is a training program geared towards Fellows interested in a long-term non-profit career. The design provides Fellows with the opportunity to explore different aspects of leadership, learn how these leadership techniques can be applied to the non-profit sector, and network with local non-profit leaders. Fellows meet monthly for three hour sessions to engage in discussions on different aspects of leadership, including organizational culture, coaching, leading teams, strategic planning, and strength-based leadership. Each leadership topic concludes with a networking session with a local non-profit leader. Our 2012-2013 non-profit leader speakers included:

  • Jon Feinman, Executive Director & Founder, InnerCity Weightlifting
  • Imari Paris Jeffries, Interim CEO/Partner, Boston Rising
  • Idit Klein, Executive Director, Keshet
  • Toni Elka, Executive Director & Founder, Future Chefs
  • Taylor Woods-Gauthier, Executive Director, Emerge Massachusetts


"Participating in the Non-Profit Leadership Institute has been one of the most rewarding aspects of my participation in the Fellowship. I have been able to learn new skills that I have been able to turn around and apply to my host site. Additionally, it has offered me access to some of the most respected leaders of Boston's non-profit sector. I am exceedingly happy that I applied to participate in this program."
-2010-2011 Non-Profit Leadership Institute Participant