Project summary
Blurb
Build a world class fellowship program for top tier emerging leaders from low income countries who have a plausible chance of becoming powerful national and international leaders, educate them on AI safety, pandemic preparedness, great power competition, and other EA-aligned cause areas, and provide them with meaningful opportunities to more deeply engage with EA programming.
Rationale
For global issues like AI safety and pandemic preparedness, treaties and international regulations play a pivotal role in mitigating existential risk. At the UN, smaller countries have disproportionate power on voting bodies (UN General Assembly, rotating members of the UN Security Council, Economic and Social Council, etc.), and the same dynamic comes to play with the EU, ASEAN, AU, and other key bodies. At the same time, leadership development programs in small, low-income countries are incredibly resource-constrained with the exception of the US State Department which runs several large programs through its Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA), and none that I am aware of have a focus on effective altruism. And although EA Anywhere, remote EAGs, and 1 Day Africa are trying to fill this gap, the most elite spaces for the most promising leaders in countries in Latin America, Asia, and Africa are run by non-EA-aligned programs like the Obama Foundation, the Mandela Washington Fellowship, African Leadership Academy, Ashoka, Acumen, etc.
This is where Mountaintop comes in. As a serial social entrepreneur who has already built a selective fellowship program with a $9m/year budget in the United States, I believe that I can build a program that engages thousands of incredibly smart and talented future leaders in the Global South with the issues of AI safety and pandemic preparedness, ensuring they are better equipped to work thoughtfully on these issues and building a pipeline for many of them to enter these fields directly.
Mountaintop’s flagship program is a paid, one-year, full-time fellowship for exceptional emerging leaders to stay in or return to their home communities and contribute to systems change in lower-income places around the world. Mountaintop matches Fellows with locally led NGOs, social ventures, and government agencies to lead high-impact projects, strengthens the capacity of Fellow hosts, and amplifies Fellows’ potential through mentorship, grants, a lifelong community of inspiring peers, and a two week leadership institute hosted at Harvard University's Edmond & Lily Safra Center for Ethics.
In less than a year, we have confirmed funding for 15+ Fellows to serve in 8+ countries, partnered with the Aspen Institute for part of our leadership development, have already received 157 registrants in less than a week, and are receiving high-quality applications from candidates who have won some of the most prestigious youth change-maker fellowships like the Mandela Washington Fellowship and Obama Fellowship, showing there is major potential for this initiative to become one of the premier fellowship programs for young leaders, especially in low-income countries. By Year 5, we plan to place 100 Fellows per year and continue scaling to thousands of Fellows per year in the coming decades.
What are this project's goals and how will you achieve them?
By engaging a unique population on these issues, it will help to diversify perspectives on AI safety and pandemic preparedness, leading to new ideas, added credibility in policymaker circles, and global coordination efforts.
Creating an elite program for future leaders in countries that will become increasingly important in the coming 50+ years (Nigeria, India, etc.) -- global networking leads to potential to address global coordination problems.
Perfect time to invest because Mountaintop is in very early stages where it is harder to raise funds, but financial model is strong because hosts are paying cost of fellowships and there is additional earned revenue potential longer term through having hosts pay for executive education programs (already two customers paying $10k for this as part of a pilot).
Proven opportunity for EA aligned organizations to access the talent, networks, and resources of elite institutions like Harvard, Aspen Institute, etc.
This provides an opportunity to amplify and reinforce the important research and organizing work of Mountaintop partners working on AI and pandemic preparedness, including the Council on Strategic Risks, 1 Day Sooner / 1 Day Africa, and Wilmot James, Shadow Minister of Health in South Africa and Senior Advisor to the Brown Pandemic Center.
Spread AI safety and pandemic preparedness focus beyond the current geographic hubs to contribute to larger global movement.
To achieve these goals, Mountaintop plans to:
Place 15-25 Fellows total in 8+ countries in Year 1, 100 total Fellows per year by Year 5.
Partner with high-impact EA-aligned organizations who design a one-year, full-time project requiring a smart, talented young person. Mountaintop recruits outstanding talent through existing collaborations with groups like Harvard, Aspire Institute, African Leadership Academy, and EA communication channels, among others. Candidates who are not selected will be channeled to other EA initiatives.
All Fellows attend a 2-week leadership institute hosted at Harvard Kennedy School in Cambridge during which they will receive: 1) education on the biggest global challenges, EA, and AI safety and pandemic preparedness (includes workshop with Mountaintop Partner Council on Strategic Risks); 2) professional and leadership development; and 3) networking opportunities with global leaders.
Each Fellow will be paired with a world class leader from their field of interest who will provide monthly mentorship sessions to support their leadership trajectory.
After their fellowships, alumni will receive ongoing support to run for office, launch policy-oriented or movement-building ventures, and advance into positions of public leadership equipped with a strong understanding of AI safety and pandemic preparedness.
Fellows and the much larger pool of candidates will receive ongoing communications regarding opportunities in AI safety, pandemic preparedness, and other high-impact cause areas to get more deeply engaged in key areas of importance.
Metrics of Success
Compare Fellow and alumni impact to the counterfactual impact of those who were Fellow finalists or who were selected but did not participate in the program (use LinkedIn, survey, and interview data to track career trajectories).
Ask hosts what impact they had through the fellowship.
Since starting to work on Mountaintop full-time in September:
Mountaintop has 10+ host NGOs and social ventures in 8+ countries who are covering the cost of the Fellow stipend (the bulk of the program expenses), with dozens more interested.
Harvard University's Edmond & Lily Safra Center for Ethics has agreed to a formal partnership to provide their classroom space free of charge for two weeks.
We have confirmed recruitment partnerships with groups with strong talent networks like Aspire Institute, Millennium Campus Network, and World Economic Forum.
We have incorporated the organization, set up a Board (includes former CFO of the Peace Corps and Director of Programs for the Ellen Johnson Sirleaf Presidential Center for Women and Development) and received 501(c)(3) status.
We have confirmed a training partnership with the EA-aligned Council on Strategic Risks, have monthly mentorship sessions with EA-aligned Sid Efromovich, and have received advising from several other EA-aligned leaders such as Jan-Willem van Putten and Jonas Vollmer.
How will this funding be used?
$10,000 to cover the cost of bringing EA-aligned speakers to Cambridge, Massachusetts during the two week leadership institute and to purchase relevant books such as The Precipice and What We Owe The Future. If there is additional funds available, they will be used to support the cost of general operations, such as my salary. Right now, I don't have enough funding to do Mountaintop full time for more than another 9 months without additional funding, so additional funding flexibility here would be instrumental in allowing me to grow this program.
Who is on your team and what's your track record on similar projects?
I have built and scaled a highly successful EA-aligned leadership fellowship (LFA) over the past 4.5 years with a $9m/year budget and $750k in EA funding, and am planning to utilize much of the same playbook for an international leadership fellowship called Mountaintop. I have significant experience with every facet of building leadership fellowships.
I transitioned to Mountaintop last September because 1) I believe focusing on global challenges like AI safety and pandemic preparedness can be more impactful from an ITN lens; 2) My replacement value at LFA is lower than it used to be now that we have grown out of the startup stage; and 3) I am deeply passionate about international causes.
I became interested in leadership after two formative events my junior year of high school: 1. My father passed away after a years-long battle with leukemia; 2. A tornado ripped through the neighboring town and killed nine elementary school children when their school collapsed on them. Whether related to funding for cancer screening or building storm shelters in schools, I learned from these events that ethical, effective leadership is literally a life or death matter.
In college at Harvard, I launched a lobby day that took 50+ volunteers to the State House each semester to push for legislation supported by young people. After a family friend committed suicide, I talked with the mother and drafted two bills to protect mentally ill individuals from accessing firearms, helping one of those bills get signed into law. However, my senior year I saw many of my classmates who had come to college wanting to make the world a better place take jobs at the biggest companies in the biggest cities in the world. Disappointed, I wrote an op-ed describing the structural Brain Drain that, in a world with so many important challenges, was pushing many of the country’s best and brightest to leave behind the communities and cause areas where they could do the most good.
After this op-ed, a student at UNC whom I had never met asked me to join his founding team with Lead For America (LFA). LFA’s flagship program is a selective, one year, full-time fellowship program for high-potential young professionals to address critical challenges and build collective leadership in their hometowns before advancing to state and national leadership.
As Lead For America has grown past the startup stage and we have hired several world class staff to handle many of the responsibilities I previously held, I began thinking about the numerous friends and colleagues over the years that had shared how deeply needed a similar initiative was needed in their home countries. I wanted to learn more, so starting in September 2022 I spent eleven months learning from international development experts, executives from peer nonprofits, and leaders of all ages from 60+ countries about global brain drain. It is with the inspiration and lessons learned from these conversations that I founded Mountaintop.
Here's a summary of my track record:
Fundraised $750k in EA funding to integrate EA principles into LFA, which has meant facilitating a “Grand Challenges Day” on EA and existential risk for our Summer Institute (in partnership with Guarding Against Pandemics, Rethink Priorities, the Institute for Progress, and the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security), recruiting EAs to apply for the fellowship, and connecting current Fellows and alumni to EA partners to help them run for office.
Built and scaled LFA from 2018-2022 to a $9m/year budget. Now on the LFA Board.
LFA has placed more than 300 full-time Fellows in 30+ states, became one of the earliest-stage nonprofits to receive a national AmeriCorps grant, and have partnered with organizations like Land O’Lakes, Microsoft, and the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials to launch fellowships in broadband connectivity and Covid vaccine equity.
Hired and oversaw the management of a team of 20+ full time employees, led the recruitment and selection process for the fellowship which has received over 6,000 applicants in four years, managed the launch and growth of six regional fellowship affiliates, managed the leadership curriculum and Summer Institutes, and directed the finance, administration, operations, and grants management for a complex, federally funded organization. Managed a world class team, including the former CFO of the Peace Corps, the former Director of AmeriCorps, and the former Head of Public Affairs at the State Department.
Built a world class administrative back office from scratch, including overseeing a clean single audit and managing a 150+ person biweekly payroll.
Fellows have included Truman Scholars and dozens of student body presidents and vice presidents. Fellows have gone on to be the youngest City Councilors in their hometowns, run for State House, receive Schwarzman Scholarships, and advance into senior city government leadership positions.
One Fellow alumna raised alongside her community almost $20m to distribute food, supplies, and PPE to over 500,000 people in the Navajo and Hopi Nations during the Covid-19 pandemic, raising $20m from small donors and Mackenzie Scott, and was featured in a commercial during the Academy Awards.
LFA has had features in the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, and CBS This Morning, among dozens of other media stories.
Graduated with a degree in Social Studies from Harvard College magna cum laude with highest honors. Reed was named a Rhodes and Mitchell Scholar Finalist, a Marshall Scholar Alternate, and a member of the Sigma Squared Society.
EA Engagement
Signed the Giving What We Can pledge and donates all excess annual income (20%+) to GiveWell.
Vegan.
Anonymously donated part of my liver last year, and now work part-time as Chief of Staff on an impactful organ policy advocacy team called Organize (funded by Federation for American Scientists and Schmidt Futures).
Attended EAG SF and EAG DC in 2022.
What are the most likely causes and outcomes if this project fails? (premortem)
As we already have initial funding, host contracts, and applicants, the project is highly unlikely to completely fail to get off the ground. However, it may fail to reach scale or significantly increase the number of high potential leaders working directly or indirectly on AI safety or pandemic prevention if:
We don't receive enough philanthropic support.
We are unable to convince most of the leaders in our network to work directly or indirectly on AI safety or pandemic prevention.
In these cases, the worst case outcomes are:
Not very many new leaders working directly or indirectly on AI safety or pandemic prevention, but still hundreds of top tier leaders in the Global South who are at least somewhat more informed about AI safety and pandemic prevention issues.
What other funding are you or your project getting?
None of our work would be possible without the exceptional generosity of our donors, and the trust and partnership of our Fellow hosts who pay fees equal to the stipends of their Fellows (only hosts where contracts have been fully signed are included, others are pending). Due to privacy considerations, we only publish names of our partners if given explicit permission.
Centre for Effective Altruism: October 2022, $42,000
Interfaith America: November 2022, $2,500
Individual Donor: January 2023, $1,000
Individual Donor: May 2023, $100,000
Harvard Edmond & Lily Safra Center For Ethics: June 2023, In-Kind Training Space, ~$15,000
Individual Donor: June 2023, $1,000
Individual Donor: July 2023, $10,000
Individual Donor: August 2023, $15,000
Host: August 2023, $27,000
Host: August 2023, $1,224
Host: August 2023, $1,560
Host: August 2023, $5,700
Host: August 2023, $2,400
Host: August 2023, $6,392
Host: August 2023, In-Kind Stipend, ~$12,228