With winter break under way, I know that many students are thinking about graduation coming up in just a few short months and considering options for what to do next year. Should you go into academia? Should you try to find a job in the for-profit world and make a lot of money? Should you take an indefinite leave of absence from life and backpack through Europe? All of those options sound like good ideas, but there is one other option I would encourage every student who is thinking about their long-term career to consider: the Koch Associate Program (KAP) run by the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation.
KAP is a year-long nonprofit management fellowship where associates spend 4 days a week working at a pro-liberty nonprofit organization to gain experience in the nonprofit world and 1 day a week learning about Market-Based Management(R) (MBM). MBM is “a framework for understanding how an organization survives, prospers, and grows in the long term” based upon the principles underlying the framework of the free market. The purpose of this program is to develop leaders of liberty (primarily in the nonprofit sector) by giving them the experience and education to be effective managers and organizers. As I like to put it, KAP is the Teach For America of the liberty movement: a one year stint to become immersed in the world of nonprofit work for liberty to learn the fundamentals and develop leaders who will one day transform the entire system.
I can attest to the value of KAP from personal experience as I was a Koch Associate placed at the Cato Institute in the 2008-2009 program. I applied to KAP in the midst of the founding of SFL, just a few weeks before the inaugural SFL Conference at Columbia University was held. At the same time that I applied for KAP, I was waiting to hear back from PhD programs in philosophy, going through the application process with Teach For America, and engaging in the traditional recruitment process for consulting and general business as most students do at the start of the Spring Semester. I didn’t know if I’d accept KAP over any of these other choices I was considering. All I knew at the time was that I was interested in nonprofit management, I was passionate about liberty, and I wanted the year after my undergraduate experience to be a meaningful experience that would help shape the rest of my life. That’s exactly what I got.
In working at the Cato Institute, I had the opportunity to work in the same building as some of the most intelligent and ardent advocates of liberty in the world. Instead of doing research, I worked on spreading Cato’s message and work to students via Cato’s new student outreach program, Cato on Campus. I was able to draft proposals, implement new projects, and see the inner workings of a large nonprofit organization. But working at Cato was just one part of the program. Every Thursday I would visit Koch for a day of management training, lectures, and workshops. Some days we would receive a lecture from the President of Americans for Prosperity. Some days we would have several hours to work on a Social Entrepreneurship Project to come up with a new way of promoting liberty that we would not only pitch to an organization to own, but begin implementing as well (my group’s project was to create SFL’s E-Leadership Program). Every week we would have a reading group to discuss both the values of the free market and the latest articles on organizational management. My experience in KAP may have been unique since I was in the process of starting/growing SFL at the same time, but I don’t think so. Many other KAPPERS were immersed in their own projects and the Social Entrepreneurship Project required everyone to think about new ways of promoting liberty.
Participating in KAP was one of the most worthwhile experiences of my life. It gave me the skills to help build SFL up from a one-time conference to a long-term institution. It gave me connections and networking opportunities I could only have dreamed of before. And it gave me the diversity of experiences and backgrounds to prepare me for a variety of opportunities in the future. Some of my fellow KAPPERS stayed at their nonprofits. Some transitioned to new nonprofits. Some joined political efforts. Some went into business. Some became teachers. Others, like me, went back to school to learn more before choosing a definitive career path (I began my PhD in philosophy at Georgetown this Fall). The great thing is that I know there are many options available to me as a result of working at Cato via KAP, not only from the network that I am now part of thanks to KAP, but because of the experience and education I received.
KAP is a competitive program, accepting less than 100 associates out of over 1,000 applications last year and this year looks to be even more competitive. Koch is looking for particular individuals with particular interests. Many good candidates are not accepted, so you should not be let down if you apply and do not get accepted. However, if you are given the opportunity to participate in KAP, I would highly recommend that you take the opportunity. It is a decision you will not regret.
As a final note, SFL is planning to expand our staff from 1 to 3 full-time members by hiring people to fill our Internal Operations Manager and Communications Manager positions. If you think you’d be interested in working for SFL for at least a year (the positions will run from June 2010-May 2011 with the possibility of renewal), I’d highly recommend applying for them ASAP.
