Our fellowship program supports two-semester practicum-internships designed to provide students exceptional professional-level experience in NYC’s world-class institutions.
Our fellowship program supports two-semester practicum-internships designed to provide students exceptional professional-level experience in NYC’s world-class institutions. Fellowship recipients for academic year 2024/2025 include:
- Brooklyn Museum Archives Fellowship – Georgia Troch
- Brooklyn Museum Data Analytics Fellowship – Riain Fitzsimons
- Brooklyn Museum UX Design and Innovation Fellowship – Tingtong He and Nidhi Gowda
- Brooklyn Public Library Children & Young Adult Services Fellowship – Tyler Vargas
- Brooklyn Public Library Center for Brooklyn History User Services Fellowship – Jake Gibson
- Franklin Furnace Archive Fellowship – Mia Greenberg
- Frick Art Reference Library Fellowship – Adrian Oh and Lila Milgrom
- Lesbian Herstory Archives Fellowship – Meg Carroll
- Met Museum Watson Library Fellowship – Aisha Khan and Sylvie Freedman
- MoMA Product Design Fellowship – Richa Shah
- MoMA Library Fellowship – Shy Adelman
- MoMA Linked Open Data Fellowship – Emily Cunningham
- Museum of the City of New York – Leewon Seo
- Pratt Center Mapping, Data Analysis & Visualization Fellowship – Yuanhao Wu
- Pratt Institute Department of Exhibitions Fellowship – Nicolas Lord
Past recipients can be found on the Past Fellowship Recipients webpage.
Our fellowship program is made possible through donations from our generous community and occasional grants. Supporters include:
- Bogardus Scholarship
- Dorothy M. Cooper Endowed Scholarship Fund
- Morton D. Flaum Memorial Scholarship
- Ford-EEOC Scholarship
- Hart Scholarship
- Hauser and Wirth Institute
- Hoffman Scholarship Fund
- The Institute of Museum and Library Services (grant #s: ARPML-250555-OMLS-22, RE-71-12-0023-12, RE-01-08-0012-08, RE-01-10-0018-10, RE-01-05-0036-05)
- Library School Graduate Association Scholarship
- Scilken Endowed Scholarship
- Donors to the Fund for Pratt: School of Information
Application Information
Students can apply for the fellowship program starting in their second semester of study. Partnering with NYC museums, libraries, and other institutions, we offer students fellowships that support tuition scholarships in the amount of $7,730 ($3,865 in fall 2024 and $3,865 in spring 2025).
Fellows are required to carry-out two-semester practicum/internships, requiring 120 hours per semester of on-site work at one of the partner institutions. To fulfill the fellowship requirements, students must enroll in a course related to their practicum (the course varies by fellowship). Students must also either enroll in INFO 698 Practicum/ Seminar in the spring 2025 semester or present their fellowship projects at InfoShow. The practicum and internship site work and supervisor must the same for both the practicum and internship.
Please be aware that each of the fellowships have different eligibility requirements which are detailed in the application.
Fellowship Opportunities 2024-2025
Fellowship opportunities for the 2024-2025 academic year are listed below. Students can apply for multiple fellowships but must apply to each fellowship separately and can only participate in one. Applicants must have enrolled at the School of Information no later than the spring 2024 semester and be graduating no earlier than spring 2025.
**The application deadline is Monday, April 15, 2023 at 5:00PM EDT.
Pratt Institute Department of Exhibitions Fellowship
Working within the Department of Exhibitions team under the supervision of the Director and Assistant Director of Exhibitions, the Fellow will work digital products based on interest and skills to support the gallery, such as: 1) website with respect to other academic galleries, 2) create social media plans and implements, such as creating clips with artists and curators, 3) write about exhibitions in newsletters and other media, and 4) providing organization and context/provenance for items in the permanent collection.
The ideal candidate will be a self-motivated Museums and Digital Culture student, be passionate about engaging the community through art, be a strong communicator especially through writing, excellent collaboration skills, and have interest and relevant skills around enhancing the gallery’s online presence. Being able to produce short videos for social media is a plus.
Application deadline: 5pm EDT, Wednesday, August 14, 2024.
Museum of the City of New York Fellowship
The Museum of the City of New York (MCNY) is a private, not-for-profit, educational institution that celebrates and interprets the city, educating the public about its distinctive character, especially its heritage of diversity, opportunity, and perpetual transformation. Founded in 1923, the Museum is located at the top of New York’s Museum Mile and fulfills its mission through exhibitions, public and school programs, collections, and publications.
Working within the Communications and Marketing team under the supervision of the Director of Marketing and Communication, the Fellow will work on Bloomberg Connects and create video content for the museum’s social media networks like TikTok that provide a digital extension to the museum.
Application deadline: 5pm EDT, Wednesday, August 28, 2024.
Brooklyn Public Library Center for Brooklyn History User Services Fellowship
The fellowship recipient will assist the Reference Librarian in the reading room of an interior landmarked research library. Duties include staffing the reference desk, answering in- person and remote reference questions, facilitating appointments for archival research, gathering user services assessment data, and creating an online subject guide. Candidates may also suggest and initiate any special projects that may be of interest to them. The ideal candidate should have an interest in user services in a special collections environment while demonstrating reliability, punctuality, attention to detail, and follow-through. Competitive candidates will have already completed coursework in reference and user services. An academic focus or some experience with special collections and archives is preferred.
Brooklyn Public Library Children’s & Young Adult Services Fellowship
This fellowship is for MSLIS students who plan to work in children’s and young adult services at the public library. The fellowship offers the opportunity to gain hands-on experience in children’s and young adult services at the Brooklyn Public Library, a leader in traditional and innovative library services that reflect the dynamism of diverse communities. Specific projects and activities will be determined at the start of the fellowship but may include tasks such as the design and implementation of programming for children and youth, collection appraisal and preparation of readers’ advisory resources, and community outreach and library advocacy. Projects and activities will align with ALSC and YALSA core competencies for librarians serving children and youth.
Brooklyn Museum Archives Fellowship
One fellowship is available at the Brooklyn Museum Archives. As an encyclopedic institution almost 200 years old, the Brooklyn Museum has a vast collection with objects from all over the world and from all different eras. Our Libraries comprise one of the largest and oldest art museum libraries in the country; developed to encourage understanding of the Museum’s collections and history, they parallel our global collections. The Archives contain more than fifty collections documenting the history of the Museum from 1823 through the present day. Totaling over 3,200 linear feet of records, these collections include letters, photographs, exhibition catalogues, and ephemera created by employees in all the Museum’s departments, from Audiovisual to Visitor Services.
Working with Engagement and the Archives teams under the direction of the Senior Digital Producer and the Archivist & Records Manager, the Fellow will be digitizing cassette tapes of oral histories with former Brooklyn Museum staff, creating transcripts, and recording metadata to go into the Museum’s DAMS, NetX. In addition, the Fellow will be strategizing with the Engagement team about the presentation of the material online as we launch a brand new website for the Museum. This position may include writing descriptions and narratives about the content that will appear on the Brooklyn Museum website.
Brooklyn Museum UX Design & Innovation Fellowship
The Brooklyn Museum UX Design and Innovation Fellowship offers aspiring UX professionals a unique opportunity to make a significant impact in the cultural sector during an exciting time of transformation. In 2024, the museum will be rolling out a new visual identity, CMS, and website, along with engaging content initiatives focused on upcoming exhibitions and the museum’s 200th anniversary. Interns will have the chance to spearhead a project from conception to completion, contributing directly to the museum’s mission of enhancing accessibility and engagement through digital innovation while improving the visitor experience, both online and in-person.
Interns will choose between two focus areas:
- Content Strategy & Information Architecture:
- Refine the content strategy and information architecture for the museum’s new website, focusing on improving content discoverability, organization, and user engagement
- Apply knowledge of content strategy principles, information architecture, SEO best practices, and metadata standards while collaborating with various museum departments
- Accessibility & User Inclusion:
- Conduct ongoing accessibility evaluations of the museum’s newly launched website and digital platforms, identifying areas for improvement based on user feedback and usage patterns
- Develop and implement recommendations for enhancing inclusivity and accessibility throughout the internship
In both focus areas, interns will work closely with their museum mentor to define a project that aligns with the museum’s needs and priorities, drafting a proposal outlining objectives, methodologies, and timeline. They will execute their project plan, applying UX design and research skills to develop solutions while maintaining clear documentation. Upon completion, interns will present their work to museum staff and stakeholders, highlighting the project’s objectives, process, challenges, and outcomes.
Brooklyn Museum Data Analytics & Visualization Fellowship
The Brooklyn Museum is an art museum in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, welcoming over 500,000 visitors each year and containing an art collection with around 500,000 objects. Our mission is to bring people together through art and experiences that inspire celebration, compassion, courage, and the will to act.
The purpose of the Data Analytics and Visualization Fellowship at the Brooklyn Museum is to provide students with the opportunity to apply the skills and knowledge in statistics, technology, research, and design to a practical setting, leveraging raw data into meaningful information. Students who are interested in working across multiple systems and data sets to create a coherent picture of visitorship (past, present and future) are encouraged to apply.
Students will bring a visitor-centered perspective and contribute to a project based on current museum priorities and the fellows’ skills and interest, such as:
- Mapping trends in visitor origins across time
- Analyzing the impact of digital initiatives in reaching new and existing audiences
- Forecasting exhibition performance based on available data and known influences
- Presenting data on visitor behavior and feedback in dynamic, clear ways
The student will work with a team that includes database managers and analysts. Applicants must be comfortable with data analysis tools and systems, such as Excel, SQL, Python.
Franklin Furnace Fellowship
Franklin Furnace’s mission is to present, preserve, interpret, educate, and advocate on behalf of avant-garde art, especially forms that may be vulnerable due to institutional neglect, cultural bias, ephemerality, or politically unpopular content. The organization provides physical and virtual venues for the presentation of time-based art, including artists’ books and periodicals, performance art, installation art, and unforeseen contemporary avant-garde artforms; and undertakes other activities related to these purposes. Franklin Furnace is dedicated to serving early-career artists; to cultivating appreciation of avant-garde art for all, and to fostering artists’ zeal to circulate ideas.
The School of Information fellow will work with our Archivists, under the supervision of Harley Spiller, Ken Dewey Director, to promote the discoverability of BIPOC artists whose work is represented in the Franklin Furnace Artists’ Books Collection and related vertical files. The major project for this fellowship is to publish the Franklin Furnace/ MoMA Artists’ Book Vertical Files Collection, which contains over 24,000 supporting materials for 3,600 artists who have donated their artists’ books to us. The online database will be hosted on CONTENTdm as a searchable, free resource for researchers and the public. Duties include metadata import, record clean up and maintenance, and outreach program planning to announce the release on various platforms. The fellow will also assist with digitization of the Event Archives – processing and scanning ephemera and slide documentations of performances and exhibitions held at Franklin Furnace since 1976.
Frick Art Reference Library Fellowship
Two fellowship opportunities are available at the Frick Art Reference Library working with the web archiving team for the New York Art Resources Consortium (NYARC). Fellows will contribute to a unique web archive collection devoted to born-digital resources for art history, including websites for New York City galleries, museums, artists’ websites, catalogues raisonnés, and auction catalogs. The fellows will evaluate candidate sites for web archiving; be trained in using Archive-It, Conifer, and Webrecorder tools to capture websites; create bibliographic records for websites using OCLC Connexion; perform review, maintenance and QA of archived websites; participate in discussions regarding web archiving policy and workflow for the Frick and NYARC; and assist with beta testing of new tools and research. Fellows will additionally have the opportunity to present at local and national professional events, contribute to NYARC blog posts, and become actively involved with the international web archiving community.
Lesbian Herstory Archives Fellowship
The Lesbian Herstory Archives is home to the world’s oldest and largest collections of materials by and about Lesbians and their communities. The Lesbian Herstory Archives exists to gather and preserve records of Lesbian lives and activities. This ensures future generations will have ready access to materials relevant to their lives. You can learn more about LHA at https://lesbianherstoryarchives.org/.
In the fellowship, we expect to structure it around the interests of the chosen fellow. Potential projects include:
- Imaging & Metadata Rehousing: Graphics, Buttons, Videos, T-Shirts, Banners
- Archival Processing: Music (Legacy Formats), Special Collections, Periodicals, Unpublished Papers
MoMA Library Fellowship
The fellowship presents the opportunity to participate in several aspects of MoMA library operations. The fellow will focus their time on reference, collection development, and acquisition activities. Particular projects will be determined at the start of the fellowship but may include such tasks as reading room staffing, assessing current reference tools, and backlog appraisal and remediation. Appropriate training and supervision will be provided for any tasks assigned. The ideal candidate will have demonstrated a knowledge of and interest in art history, particularly modern and contemporary art, and be excited to learn of the particular role the museum library plays within the institution.
MoMA Archives Linked Open Data Fellowship
The focus of the fellowship in the MoMA Archives is to expand, enrich, and explore as linked open data information related to MoMA’s ninety-three-year institutional history of collecting and exhibiting modern art. While projects will be worked out with the specific fellow, possible activities include: refining and enhancing exhibition data sets in Wikidata; connecting archives and library resources and creators to Wikidata and Wikipedia; creating data visualizations to demonstrate and interrogate the richness of the dataset; or exploring mapping software and other free tools for exploiting the data. Relevant skills that will be developed during the course of the fellowship include data analysis, reconciliation methods, archival research methods, and semantic web methods. The project’s ultimate aim is to create new research tools for art historical scholarship while also demonstrating methods for interlinking library archival resources online.
The purpose of the LOD for Museums Fellowship is to provide support for a student in the MS Museums and Digital Culture or MS Library & Information Science program to investigate the application of Linked Open Data (LOD) within a museum setting. The fellowship allows the student to apply the knowledge and competencies acquired from their course work in a professional setting while developing new skills through participation in an on-site internship.
MoMA Product Design Fellowship
The purpose of the Pratt SI Product Design Fellowship at the Museum of Modern Art is to provide students interested in the arts and culture sector with the opportunity to work on UX and product design projects in a practical museum setting. Students will work within MoMA’s Digital Product team alongside a team of designers, developers, and product managers on projects aimed at better understanding the museum’s diverse audiences and reshaping digital engagement both in the museum and virtually. The student will learn to execute design and research projects within the context of the product development lifecycle and informed by MoMA’s digital strategy. They will be introduced to a variety of approaches and methodologies that the UX team at MoMA employs while conducting audience research, designing and prototyping digital products, and testing solutions with users. Students are also invited to bring their experience, interests, and perspectives to the team and its work.
Applicants must be comfortable with at least one of the following design tools: Figma, Sketch, or Adobe XD. Familiarity with at least some of the following UXR methodologies is required: Generative audience research, moderated/unmoderated usability testing, card sorting, tree testing, and survey design. A strong desire to pursue a career in a non-profit and/or arts institution is expected, as well as an enthusiasm for visual art and museums.
Pratt Center for Community Development Mapping, Data Analysis & Visualization Fellowship
One fellowship opportunity is available at the Pratt Center for Community Development for a MS Data Analytics and Visualization student. The 2024-2025 fellow will work on a variety of projects to support affordable housing, climate justice, and equitable economic development in NYC. Projects can include geospatially projecting data, such as producing city-wide maps of different types of building and housing stock, various legislative boundaries, and other types of data in support of affordable housing policy campaigns.
Watson Library Fellowship
Two opportunities are available for Pratt MSLIS students at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Thomas J. Watson Library. The goal is to provide students with guided learning experiences across the key activities of art librarianship. A sincere interest in a non-profit and/or arts institution is expected, as well as an enthusiasm for visual art and museums. Selected participants will be considered Met Graduate Interns, and part of The Met’s Undergraduate and Graduate Internship Program cohort. They will participate in Met internship programs to learn about museum practice broadly and meet with Met staff from across the Museum.
Over two semesters, fellows will participate in several areas of the library: technical services, digitization, and systems. This will take place in the context of hands-on work whenever possible, but also through meetings and demonstrations with staff members. At the same time, there will be a project which will be an opportunity to focus more deeply on several of these areas, developed in consultation with library staff to meet both library needs and intern interest and aptitude, while maintaining some continuity of core duties. Participants will have the option to give a presentation to library staff on their project at the end of the second semester.
Participants will learn best practices from a workflow level down to a personal level, working with competencies already in place for Watson Library staff. These can include:
- hands-on work with technical services workflows;
- importing and editing bibliographic records in Sierra and Connexion Client;
- gain familiarity with how Python, SQL, Javascript and HTML/CSS are used in a live environment;
- learn how to perform basic book conservation procedures (making enclosures, plastic covers, etc.);
- carry out basic acquisitions functions such as placing orders, selecting and receiving;
- learn the basics of creating metadata in CONTENTdm and work with our cutting edge scanners on digitization projects;
- record loading and data transformation.
Whitney Museum Collection Information & Data Fellowship
The purpose of the Collection Information & Data Fellowship is to provide an opportunity for a MSMDC student to gain first-hand experience in multiple areas related to the management of permanent collection information, data, and records in a museum setting. The fellowship will take place in the Whitney Museum of American Art’s Permanent Collection Documentation Office, which is part of the Museum’s Research Resources Department.
The Research Resources Department supports the research needs of museum staff and members of the academic and museum communities by providing access to primary resources, published resources, and other research material relating to the Museum’s history, collections, and programming. Comprising the Research Resources Department are the Permanent Collection Documentation Office, Library, Archives, and Licensing division.
The Permanent Collection Documentation Office collects, preserves, and makes accessible records pertaining to the institution’s permanent collection, oversees the Museum’s collection database (The Museum System/TMS), and creates and maintains the Content Standard Element Sets (CSES) for cataloguing and describing works of art in the museum’s jurisdiction. Its primary role is to document the history of the permanent collection and to provide primary source material (located in the object files and artist files) for staff, interns, and visiting researchers seeking further knowledge on the objects and artists in the Museum’s collection.
Responsibilities include:
-Assisting Museum staff, interns, and outside researchers with research inquiries
-Assisting with collection information and data fact-checking, as needed
-Data entry, including assigning descriptive subject terms to permanent collection object records, and entering provenance data, into TMS
-Drafting and entering published reference citations into TMS
-Organization of primary source documents and filing