ICAN's most important component of institutional capacity building has been its International MSW Fellowship. ICAN provides a two-year Fellowship to persons in the forefront of civil society and social justice in Jordan, Palestine, and Israel. More than 61 Fellowship alumni have built and strengthened partner institutions and RBCP centres in their respective societies. Some have moved on to other institutions across the Middle East to advance social justice, leading major local and international NGOs and government ministries and serving as public interest lawyers, among other roles.
The Fellowship focuses on interdisciplinary practice in the fields of social work and social welfare, access to law, and respect for human rights. Fellows participate in the program as representatives of the rights-based community practice centres in the Middle East. They spend their first year in Montreal at McGill University and their second year working and conducting research in one of the Practice Centres in the region. At the end of the two-year program, Fellows obtain graduate degrees in social work through the ICAN Special International MSW Fellowship Program at McGill. After this two-year commitment, Fellows are expected to spend at least four additional years working in the practice centres. Alumni, of which there are now more than 50 (including non-academic Community Practice Fellows), remain connected to the program through their ongoing promotion of the values of the program in their professional lives and their commitment to advancing social justice.
A unique and specialized program of study is designed for the cohort of students in this Program. It is further individualized for each participant in order to best meet the objectives of each Fellow, and his or her sponsoring partner institution and Practice Centre.
ICAN recently received its 2014-2016 ICAN Fellowship cohort in Montreal. Please read their fascinating bios and get to know them.
Recruitment and selection process
The ICAN Fellows are selected through a collaborative process between McGill University and local partners in the region.
Since the first cohort of four fellows in Montreal in 1997, the program has steadily drawn an increasing number of highly qualified applicants from backgrounds in social work as well as from other fields as diverse as architecture, law, and medicine, a factor that has greatly enriched the program.
Candidates are selected based on a combination of factors, including academic performance, professional experience, and proven commitment to the principles of the program.
Criteria for selection and application guidelines can be found in the application packet on the right.
