Creative Commons and the Open Policy Network are pleased to announce the first round of fellows for the Institute for Open Leadership. The Institute is a training program to develop new leaders in education, science, public policy, and other fields on the values and implementation of openness in licensing, policies, and practices. We received over 90 applications from around the world and representing a broad diversity of fields. Here are the fellows for this year.

• Dairo Alexander Escobar Ardila; Instituto Humboldt – SiB Colombia; Bogotá, Colombia
• David Ernst; University of Minnesota; St. Paul, Minnesota, USA
• Eric Phetteplace; California College of the Arts; Oakland, California, USA
• Fátima Silva São Simão; UPTEC – Science and Technology Park of the University of Porto; Porto, Portugal
• Georgia Angelaki, National Documentation Center/Hellenic Research Institute; Athens, Greece
• Jagadish Chandra Aryal; Social Science Baha; Kathmandu, Nepal
• Jane Gilvin; National Public Radio; Washington, D.C., USA
• Julian Carver; Land Information New Zealand; Christchurch, New Zealand
• Klaudia Grabowska; Polish History Museum; Warsaw, Poland
• Mohamud Ahmed Rage; Ministry of Higher Education & Culture, Somalia; Mogadishu, Somalia
• Nasir Khan; Management Information Services, Directorate General of Health Services, Bangladesh; Dhaka, Bangladesh
• Paul UE Blackman; Barbados Community College; St. Michael, Barbados
• Vincent Kizza; Open Learning Exchange Uganda; Kampala, Uganda
• Werner Westermann Juarez; Instituto Profesional Providencia, Santiago, Chile

The in-person portion of the Institute will take place in San Francisco, California in January 2015. The fellows will be develop, refine, and work to implement a capstone open policy project. The point of this project is for the fellow to transform the concepts learned at the Institute into a practical, actionable, and sustainable initiative within her/his institution.

Congratulations to the fellows, and thank you to all the applicants.