WIDA Fellows

wida fellows logo

Expert classroom teachers are serving multilingual learners in all corners of WIDA 

Honoring the process of collaboration and inquiry, the WIDA Fellows program brings expert educators and WIDA staff together in a collaborative effort to enhance the development of WIDA products and services. WIDA established the WIDA Fellows program in 2019 to 

  • Recognize the contributions of excellent teachers
  • Leverage their expertise to provide guidance and feedback in the development of WIDA products and services
  • Create a collaborative professional learning community among expert practitioners and WIDA professional learning specialists

2024-2025 Cohorts 

In 2024-25, WIDA Fellows will participate in either one of two cohorts: the Instructional Experts cohort or the Educational Leaders cohort. Instructional experts have direct classroom experience with multilingual learners, while educational leaders bring together both emerging and experienced leaders in education who work with multilingual learners. Read the 2024-2025 WIDA Fellows news article to learn more. 

Participation

Selected candidates to the WIDA Fellows program serve for one year and have the option to continue for a second. Benefits and participation requirements include 

  • Receiving $1,000 honorarium and a waiver of the registration fee to attend the WIDA Annual Conference to learn and collaborate as a group 
  • Acting as a thought partner and collaborator on both the development and improvement of the professional learning resources and opportunities that WIDA provides for teachers
  • Providing valuable practitioners’ feedback to WIDA on the design of products and services for educators serving multilingual learners
  • Participating in a monthly on-line professional learning community with other WIDA Fellows and WIDA staff members

Requirements 

All nominees must be exemplary teachers to multilingual learners in the WIDA Consortium who are willing to provide constructive guidance and feedback on the development of professional learning offerings. Nominees must also be willing to participate in the WIDA Fellows annual meeting held during the WIDA Annual Conference. Self-nominations are not accepted. 

Nominations for the 2024-2025 cohort are now closed. Nominations for the 2025-2026 cohort will open in late winter of 2025.