A Lemonade Circle – IDRA Fellowship Building the Classroom-Capitol-College Pipeline
IDRA and The Lemonade Circle are collaborating to build the next pipeline of young advocates in Texas.
The C3 Advocacy Leadership Program is a fellowship program designed by IDRA and The Lemonade Circle to develop the classroom-capitol-college pipeline, a framework that enhances and supplements classroom learning, encourages active civic engagement and prepares students for college. This two-cycle program amplifies the innate advocacy powers of Black middle school and high school girls in Bexar County, Texas.
We are in a critical moment: Young people are seeing their safety, dignity and rights threatened in their schools and communities in very real ways. They are also seeing the power of strategic movement building and civic engagement to push back against the systems that harm them and demand the future they want for themselves.
The C3 Advocacy Leadership Program extends IDRA’s commitment to cultivating powerful community and student advocates by building on proven models of policy-advocacy training and youth and family leadership, like IDRA Education CAFE, the IDRA Education Policy Fellows program, and the IDRA Civic Changemakers program. The C3 Advocacy Leadership Program stems directly from the IDRA Education CAFE for College Access project, which is funded through a grant from the Future Ready Fund of the San Antonio Area Foundation.
Critically, the program is rooted in the personal and collective development teachings at the core of Lemonade Circle’s Empowerment Circle Model, enabling the girls to engage in meaningful change by making a positive difference in their community, while envisioning a better world and embracing the chance to leave a lasting impact.
The first cohort consists of 21 girls who will:
- Learn how decisions are made in their schools, how policies shape their communities and how to advocate change;
- Create a leadership portfolio that prepares them for college and career;
- Build their personal leadership and advocacy identity; and
- Develop a policy agenda and advocate for themselves and their communities during the 2027 Texas legislative session.
Contact Information
For more information about the program, contact IDRA’s National Director of Policy, Advocacy and Community Engagement Morgan Craven, J.D. (morgan.craven@idra.org) or Brandi Coleman, Founder & CEO of The Lemonade Circle (lemonadecircle@gmail.com).
