Hannah Hanson & Erica Oliveira/Global Mission Fellows
Global Mission Fellows is a 2-year mission service opportunity and leadership development program for young adults 20-30 to engage in social justice ministries. They offer two tracks: US-2 for U.S. participants to serve in the U.S., and International. They have grown from their first US-2 class in 1951 of 43 participants to currently having 108 participants. Fellows come from all over the world and serve all over the world. They are currently from 32 countries and serving in 24.
The Global Mission Fellows program grew from the historic US-2 and Mission Intern programs. They celebrate their dedicated alumni and their more than 60-year legacy of young adults in mission.
US-2 Program since 1951: Immediately after World War II, the Methodist Board of Missions set up programs that allowed young adults to spend three years volunteering in Africa, Japan, and Latin America. The US-2 program, which was modeled after these programs, began as an “us too” appeal to have young adults serve in the United States. It was established in 1951 by the Women’s Division as an opportunity for young women to serve.
Over time, the US-2 program came under the umbrella of Global Ministries and became available for young men as well as women. In 2000, the program celebrated its 50th anniversary with a retrospective article in their bi-monthly missionary publication New World Outlook.
Mission Intern Program since 1977: The Mission Intern program was designed to give young adults an opportunity to serve both abroad and in the United States. Ruth Harris, one of its first directors, said: “Our approach was to let the Third World teach us, instead of the other way around.” The 1977 class of Mission Interns contributed 18 essays as curriculum for the 1979 mission study on “Human Rights and the International Order,” and they also helped to teach the study. A New World Outlook article from 1987 celebrated the program’s 10th anniversary. Since then, the program has expanded to provide service opportunities for young adults who are not from the United States. Today, the program reflects Global Ministries’ commitment to sending missionaries “from everywhere to everywhere”.
