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ICANN Fellowship Program

About | Eligibility | Requirements | Apply | Dates & Deadlines | Program Status | Important Links


ICANN Fellowship Program

About

The goal of the ICANN Fellowship Program is to strengthen the diversity of the multistakeholder model by fostering opportunities for individuals from underserved and underrepresented communities to become active participants in the ICANN community.

Fellows are exposed to the workings of the ICANN community, are assigned a mentor, and receive training across different areas of knowledge and skill building before, during, and after an ICANN Public Meeting. Travel assistance to attend the meeting is also provided.

Fellowship participants come from a variety of backgrounds. Check out program participants and statistics for more information.

Eligibility

Candidates from all regions and sectors are welcome to apply to the ICANN Fellowship Program.

Participants of the Fellowship Program must:

  • Be at least 21 years of age
  • Be interested in, or already engaged in, the various components of ICANN's work in policy building, the operation of the Domain Name System and the security and stability of the global Internet
  • Complete mandatory ICANN Learn course(s); learn more here
  • NOT be involved in or associated with other ICANN supported travel programs at time of selection
  • Policy Forum applicants must have successfully completed an ICANN Fellowship
  • Have previously received no more than two fellowships; second and third time fellows must prove their involvement and engagement in one of the ICANN communities (learn more here)

Returning fellows will be considered for the Tarek Kamel Fellowship Recognition. The award recognizes outstanding contributions of fellows in furthering ICANN's capacity development efforts in their respective regions. Learn more here.

A selected Fellow, who lives or works in African region with technical background will be considered for Paul Muchene Fellow Award. The Paul Muchene Fellow Award is a tribute to Paul Muchene, an ICANN Fellowship Program participant and ICANN organization staff member who passed away in August 2022. To learn more here.

For more information, please see the program's Terms & Conditions and Selection Criteria.

Requirements

Fellowship recipients are expected to:

  • Engage in Fellowship Program Mentoring processes
  • Complete additional required ICANN Learn courses
  • Attend the ICANN Public Meeting and required activities, including but not limited to ICANN Fellowship sessions during the ICANN Meeting
  • Network and interact with program alumni and community members
  • Complete the post-meeting survey

Participants are encouraged to actively contribute to ICANN policy development processes and Fellowship alumni network upon completion of the Fellowship Program.

Apply

The Fellowship application round for ICANN80 Policy Forum* is now closed. The next application round for ICANN81 will be opened on March 19, 2024 at 23:59 UTC time. Please note, that you need an ICANN Account in order to apply for the Fellowship Program.

If ICANN meeting is held virtually, the Fellowship Program will also be held virtually.

For more information please see program's Frequently Asked Questions, Terms & Conditions, Selection Criteria and Selection Committee.

Application Dates & Deadlines

ICANN Meeting

ICANN Region

Meeting Dates

Opening of application round

Closing of application round

Announcement of selected Fellows

ICANN80 Policy Forum in Kigali, Rwanda * Africa 10-13 June 2024 Closed Closed 12 February 2024 at 23:59 UTC
ICANN81 Annual General Meeting, Istanbul, Türkiye Asia Pacific 9-14 November 2024 19 March 2024 at 23:59 UTC 19 April 2024 at 23:59 UTC 2 July 2024 at 23:59 UTC
ICANN82 Community Forum in Seattle, USA North America 8-13 March 2025 18 July 2024 at 23:59 UTC 18 August 2024 at 23:59 UTC 31 October 2024 at 23:59 UTC

* Only those who have successfully completed an ICANN Fellowship Program (Fellowship Program Alumni) are eligible to apply for a Policy Forum fellowship.

Current Program Status

The Fellowship application round for ICANN80 Policy Forum* is now closed. The next application round for ICANN81 will be opened on March 19, 2024 at 23:59 UTC time. Please note, that you need an ICANN Account in order to apply for the Fellowship Program.

If ICANN meeting is held virtually, the Fellowship Program will also be held virtually.*

*Virtual participation will incorporate all of the key elements of the Fellowship Program.

ICANN80 Fellowship Program Successful Candidate Announced – The following individuals had been selected to participate in ICANN80 Policy Forum to be held from 10-13 June 2024 in Kigali Rwanda.

The Fellowship Program Post-Meeting Report for ICANN78 is available here.

Important Links

Apply to the Fellowship Program

Submit an application during open rounds

Terms & Conditions

More information on the program's Terms & Conditions

Upcoming Application Dates & Deadlines

Planned launch dates for future application round

FAQs

Check out frequently asked questions and answers about the Fellowship Program and Fellowship Application Instructions

Fellowship Selection Criteria

See Fellowship selection criteria

ICANN Fellowship Program Mentoring

More information about the mentoring process

Fellowship Selection Committee

More information about the Fellowship Selection Committee.

New Fellowship Program Approach

More information about the community consultation and public comment process to review the Fellowship Program

List of Fellowship Participants

See list of Fellowship Program participants for each ICANN Meeting

Fellowship Program 10 Year Survey Report [PDF, 981 KB]

Check out the results of the 10 Year Fellowship Survey with program alumni (28 June 2017)

Program Statistics

Check out statistics on Fellowship participants

ICANN Fellowship Program Promotional Flyer

Tarek Kamel Fellowship Recognition

More information about the Tarek Kamel Fellowship Recognition.

Paul Muchene Fellow Award

More information about the Paul Muchene Fellow Award

Post-Meeting Reports

Read reports written by the fellows about their experiences and future plans.

2021 Fellowship Alumni Survey Report

Check out the results of the 2021 Fellowship Alumni Survey (17 February 2022)

Archive

For more information, please contact fellowships@icann.org.

Domain Name System
Internationalized Domain Name ,IDN,"IDNs are domain names that include characters used in the local representation of languages that are not written with the twenty-six letters of the basic Latin alphabet ""a-z"". An IDN can contain Latin letters with diacritical marks, as required by many European languages, or may consist of characters from non-Latin scripts such as Arabic or Chinese. Many languages also use other types of digits than the European ""0-9"". The basic Latin alphabet together with the European-Arabic digits are, for the purpose of domain names, termed ""ASCII characters"" (ASCII = American Standard Code for Information Interchange). These are also included in the broader range of ""Unicode characters"" that provides the basis for IDNs. The ""hostname rule"" requires that all domain names of the type under consideration here are stored in the DNS using only the ASCII characters listed above, with the one further addition of the hyphen ""-"". The Unicode form of an IDN therefore requires special encoding before it is entered into the DNS. The following terminology is used when distinguishing between these forms: A domain name consists of a series of ""labels"" (separated by ""dots""). The ASCII form of an IDN label is termed an ""A-label"". All operations defined in the DNS protocol use A-labels exclusively. The Unicode form, which a user expects to be displayed, is termed a ""U-label"". The difference may be illustrated with the Hindi word for ""test"" — परीका — appearing here as a U-label would (in the Devanagari script). A special form of ""ASCII compatible encoding"" (abbreviated ACE) is applied to this to produce the corresponding A-label: xn--11b5bs1di. A domain name that only includes ASCII letters, digits, and hyphens is termed an ""LDH label"". Although the definitions of A-labels and LDH-labels overlap, a name consisting exclusively of LDH labels, such as""icann.org"" is not an IDN."