- Deadline
- Passed
Open Society-U.S.’s Soros Justice Fellowships fund outstanding individuals to undertake projects that advance reform, spur debate, and catalyze change on a range of issues facing the U.S. criminal legal system.
We are taking a moment to pause and analyze the future of our three U.S. based fellowship programs. This means we will not be issuing a call for proposals for 2025 fellows, as we would have done this fall.
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Ashley Rojas
2023Ashley Rojas will educate movement leaders and cultivate power between the movement for #PoliceFreeSchools and the broader culture of abolitionist organizing efforts to end harm and punishment. -
Avalon Betts-Gaston
2023Avalon Betts-Gaston and Lloyd Gaston will research the scope and impact of Illinois Worker Rights amendment on incarcerated workers -
Betty Washington
2023Betty Washington will create OASIS (Our Aging Seniors Incarcerated Society), a project focusing on advocating for the needs of justice-impacted seniors. -
Bridgette Simpson
2023Bridgette Simpson will educate the public and create The Protected Class Network, seeking to make justice-impacted people a protected class. -
Cheryl Fairbanks
2023Cheryl Fairbanks will educate native Indigenous people and strengthen concepts of justice through an Indigenous peacemaking lens. -
Dominique Branson
2023Dominique Branson will educate, document, and destabilize anti-Black ideologies that legitimize pretrial dangerousness predictions and harm Black communities. -
Jenani Srijeyanthan
2023Jenani Srijeyanthan will establish a counter-narrative to carceral child sexual abuse prevention through the amplification and technical resourcing of a nationwide prevention movement that does not prioritize policing, criminalization, or surveillance. -
Jordan Martinez-Mazurek
2023Jordan Martinez-Mazurek will educate the public and start local and regional dialogues around fighting the expansion of mass incarceration in the South and in Appalachia. -
Lloyd Gaston
2023Together, Lloyd Gaston and Avalon Betts-Gaston will research the scope and impact of Illinois Worker Rights amendment on incarcerated workers. -
Mary Baxter
2023Mary Baxter will, through an art piece entitled “Reimagining Dignity: A Love Letter to Ourselves,” educate the public to reimagine racially charged and gender-oppressive historical events. -
Matt Nadel
2023Together, Matt Nadel and Wendi Cooper will organize a statewide screening tour of the documentary film “CANS Can’t Stand” to educate the public about the archaic 1805 Crimes Against Nature by Solicitation statute and the harsh punishments it imposed. -
Omisade Burney-Scott
2023Omisade Burney-Scott will curate a multidisciplinary initiative and educate the public on reproductive justice, radical Black feminism, gender liberation, and pathways to normalizing menopause and aging for the marginalized Black population. -
Rachel Gilmer
2023Rachel Gilmer will educate the public and build a united front of survivors and health care providers with the goal of creating non-carceral solutions that address the root causes of violence in our communities. -
Talila Lewis
2023Talila Lewis will educate and create media and art that highlights how ableism informs and drives racism, anti-Blackness, capitalism, and other forms of oppression, violence, and inequity. -
Toshio Meronek
2023Toshio Meronek will educate the public and justice advocates about the expansion of involuntary medical conservatorship in Arkansas, with a focus on its potential human and financial consequences. -
Wendi Cooper
2023Together, Wendi Cooper and Matt Nadel will organize a statewide screening tour of the documentary film “CANS Can’t Stand” to educate the public about the archaic 1805 Crimes Against Nature by Solicitation statute and the harsh punishments it imposed. -
Alicia Amezcua
1997Alicia Amezcua will represent young people accused of crimes, to ensure they receive prompt social and educational services, and to conduct workshops on legal rights and responsibilities targeted to students, parents, and school administrators. -
Amy Hirsch
1997Amy Hirsch will explore the impact of Federal legislation that denies food stamps and government assistance to mothers and their families if the mothers have a history of felony drug convictions, even if they are now in, or have successfully... -
Andrew Block
1997Andrew Block will establish a child advocacy project, Just Children, to provide civil legal services and sentencing advocacy for low-income children in the juvenile justice system, and to teach parents effective methods for protecting their... -
Angela Browne
1997Angela Browne will write a book analyzing the lifelong effects of trauma that North American women and children face most often, such as physical and sexual violence in the home. -
Anne Kysar
1997Anne Kysar will engage in litigation to prevent the incarceration of children for non-criminal offenses. -
Barbara Fedders
1997Barbara Fedders will represent young people residing in two low-income, multi-racial Boston neighborhoods in delinquency and youthful offender proceedings, and to conduct legal workshops informing them of their rights and responsibilities. -
Christa Gannon
1997Christa Gannon will reduce recidivism among first-time offenders by providing mentoring and rights education to juvenile offenders placed on probation in Santa Clara County. -
Corinne Carey
1997Corinne Carey will represent current and recovering drug users, conduct workshops to inform them about the repercussions of new drug laws, help them resolve complex civil and criminal legal problems and organize advocates seeking more effective... -
Jaribu Hill
1997Jaribu Hill will organize a campaign highlighting the use of the death penalty in Mississippi and Louisiana on inmates with mental retardation and inmates convicted of crimes committed as juveniles, and to inform families of death row inmates...
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Brandon Brown
2024Brandon Brown and Catherine Besteman will educate, coordinate, and interrupt the flow of people into prisons through building a robust, reparative, healing alternative to incarceration in the wake of harm. -
Catherine Besteman
2024Catherine Besteman and Brandon Brown will educate, coordinate, and interrupt the flow of people into prisons through building a robust, reparative, healing alternative to incarceration in the wake of harm. -
Claudia Muñoz-Castellano
2024Claudia Muñoz-Castellano will educate and create a Texas statewide legal empowerment program to combat the alarming rise in criminalizing policies and practices that target immigrants. -
Deborah Small
2024Deborah Small will study the impact of local efforts to “reimagine public safety,” focusing on the effectiveness of the initiatives, enhancing trust between law enforcement and the community, and addressing systemic issues. -
Elizabeth Kennedy
2024Elizabeth Kennedy will research deportees to El Salvador and Honduras, focusing on youth, Indigenous and Garifuna communities, the LGBTQI+ population, and survivors of sexual and gender-based violence. -
George Morton
2024George Morton will establish an initiative that elevates the vast expanse of Black narratives and fosters the transformation of Black people as artists and art subjects. -
Gina Jackson
2024Gina Jackson and Lea Wetzel will build a national model of peer support and best practices for missing and murdered Indigenous Womxn (MMIW/G). -
Kelly Davis
2024Kelly Davis will research the needs and experiences of pregnant people who have been incarcerated, to inform and advance a broader policy agenda based on gender-based violence, reproductive justice, and criminal justice reform. -
Lauren Faraino
2024Lauren Faraino will engage in legal and storytelling advocacy to investigate, and expose, and halt the unlawful practice of harvesting organs of people who die while incarcerated without family permission. -
Laverne Thompson
2024Laverne Thompson will craft a dynamic community archive of the groundbreaking efforts of Louisiana’s advocates and visionaries who paved the way for criminal justice reform in Louisiana. -
Lea Wetzel
2024Lea Wetzel and Gina Jacksin will build a national model of peer support and best practices for missing and murdered Indigenous Womxn (MMIW/G). -
Nia Lee
2024Lee will spearhead a national series for justice-impacted Black and Brown queer women, femmes, trans, and gender-expansive individuals to create a platform for dialogue, community building, and transformative justice spaces. -
Temi Mwale
2024Temi Mwale will examine how technology produces state violence and harm through the criminalization of Black communities, with a unique focus on the parallels between the United States, the United Kingdom, and Brazil. -
Tijanna Eaton
2024Tijanna Eaton will support authors who have served time in United States prisons, jails, and immigration detention centers, with wraparound coaching and services to develop books sharing their vital stories.