Washington, March 13, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The Dr. N. Joyce Payne Center for Social Justice at the Thurgood Marshall College Fund
is pleased to announce its selection as a host partner for the 2023 American Council of Learned Societies
Leading Edge Fellowship program. Twenty-two nonprofit organizations were selected as hosts for these two-year fellowships to pair recent PhDs in the humanities and interpretive social sciences with social justice organizations to advance initiatives including campaigns for voting rights, equal access to education, housing justice, and more. This program is made possible by funding from The Mellon Foundation.

Launched in 2021, the Payne Center for Social Justice is devoted to independent research that leads
to pragmatic and innovative ideas regarding the intractable problem of social justice facing society,
especially Black Americans. The mission of the Dr. N. Joyce Payne Center for Social Justice is
to influence public policy that improves the lives of Black Americans and all marginalized groups.
The overarching intent is to create a truly just society by conducting and commissioning rigorous
policy studies and collecting, supporting, and highlighting research from and about historically Black
colleges and universities (HBCUs) and the life experiences of Black Americans.

Formed in 1919, the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) is a nonprofit federation of 79 scholarly
organizations. As the preeminent representative of American scholarship in the humanities and interpretive
social sciences, ACLS holds a core belief that knowledge is a public good. As such, ACLS strives to promote the circulation of humanistic knowledge throughout society. ACLS is currently accepting applications for these positions via their online application system, with a deadline of March 15, 2023 at 9:00pm EDT.

The full list of organizations selected for the program, and fellowship position locations in 2023, follows:
American Friends Service Committee (Remote)
Asian Americans Advancing Justice| AAJC (Remote or Washington DC)
Campaign for Southern Equality (Remote or Asheville, NC)
Center for Cultural Power (Remote)
Children's Defense Fund (Washington DC)
Data & Society Research Institute (Remote)
Destiny Arts Center (Oakland, CA)
Gender Justice (St. Paul, MN)
Institute for Local Self Reliance (Remote)
Justice Action Center (Remote)
Movement Advancement Project (Remote)
Open Environmental Data Project (Remote)
PolicyLink (Remote or Oakland, CA)
Strategic Actions for a Just Economy (Los Angeles, CA)
The Afiya Center (Dallas, TX)
The Presidents' Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration (Washington, DC)
The Public Theater (New York, NY)
Thurgood Marshall College Fund (Washington DC)
University Settlement (New York, NY)
Vital Voices (Washington DC)
YWCA Metropolitan Chicago (Chicago, IL)

Zora's House (Columbus, OH)

For more information, contact Desiree Barron-Callaci at leadingedge@acls.org.