The Benjamin Franklin Transatlantic Fellows Initiative is in its second year, providing two Summer Institutes: The Founders (ages 15-17) and the Diplomats (ages 17-19). Participants in the Benjamin Franklin Transatlantic Fellows Initiative will find opportunities to foster relationships among youth from Eurasia, Europe and American in order to advance links and awareness of shared values, encounter principles of freedom and cooperation as challenges of the global 21^st Century. Inspiring the Institutes is American statesman and diplomat, Benjamin Franklin, who prized religious tolerance over intolerance, social mobility over class privilege, and was a firm believer in free speech. We will seek an environment that encourages individual expression, communications, and information sharing in an effort to advance positive relationships among the various ethnic, religious, and national groups. Video descriptions below.

See State Department Announcement of the Ben Franklin Program

2007 Diplomats

2007 Founders

Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs, Daniel Fried, discusses the rationale for the Ben Franklin Program.  EEA web page

Secretary

Allan Louden, Director of the Ben Franklin Institute discusses the Program’s implimentation at the conclusion of the 2006 inaugural session.

BFTF 2006