AGENCY

STEWARDSHIP

Youth Social Enterprise Fellowship

AUTUMN on HVAR

Fishing boats line Jelsa’s harbor, a bucolic, seaside village on the island of Hvar. The valleys and hillsides are quilted with family vineyards and olive orchards. The island produces countless beautiful, specific things - but this heritage is fading in the face of mass tourism.

The Field Store is our attempt to reinvigorate the traditional skills and products that make Hvar so special. Over the fall, our students - fifty children ages six through fifteen - will research, prototype, brand, and sell a small collection of edible island products: sun-dried tomatoes, herb salts, fermented vegetables, foraged teas. The goal is not a school project. We want to establish a real venture driven by the creativity and capacity of our kids, combined with the indescribable beauty of our island.

We are looking for someone who can mentor our faculty in the entrepreneurial aspect of this project (rather than the craft dimension), staging the complex underlying skills of successful venture design and leadership in chunks that students can absorb.

The Fellowship

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    Role

    Field Fellows join our community in a dual role: as a participant — enrolling your own children in the program alongside other Field School families — and as a contributing expert. You will be expected to contribute about one active day each week of organizing, problem-solving, and direct instruction. In addition, this Fellow will probably be inclined to do additional research and exploration of the island’s entrepreneurial ecosystem.

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    Reciprocity

    In return, we offer a full scholarship covering your children's tuition for the term. We aren't able to cover travel or accommodation, so this works best for families who have the flexibility — whether that's a homeschooling lifestyle, a sabbatical year, or simply the appetite for an unconventional fall.

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    Storytelling

    We'd love to be part of your story if this experience moves you, and we ask for one long-form piece (a podcast episode, Substack essay, or video) within 90 days of your residency, provided that it feels like a natural fit.

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    Dates

    The fall session runs September 7 through November 28, 2026. A shorter summer session is available August 8–22 for those who can't commit to the full term.

THE PROJECT

The accelerator runs across age cohorts — six- and seven-year-olds, and ten- through twelve-year-olds — with programming adapted to each. The younger group focuses on the fundamentals: what is a customer, what is a problem worth solving, how do you make something worth buying. The older group goes further, working through branding, budgeting, customer research, and impact assessment as a full cohort.

Both groups culminate in a Shark Tank-style pitch event and an internal fair where products are presented — and sold — to families, faculty, and members of the Jelsa community. The strongest products may find a permanent home in the Field Store.

The project has rich natural tie-ins to math (budgeting, pricing, volume) and literacy (market research, pitch writing, storytelling). The Fellow's job is to help our teachers make the most of those connections — and to push the work further than a generalist educator could on their own.

WHO WE’RE LOOKING FOR

The right fellow is a practitioner first — someone who ferments, preserves, forages, or works deeply with the food traditions of a particular place. You might be a cookbook author, a food educator, a culinary historian, a chef, or someone with a teaching practice built around seasonal and traditional foodways. We're drawn to people who have a passion for food as cultural memory, and a desire to celebrate food artisanship with children as well as with adults.

NOMINATE

If someone comes to mind when you read this, please share this page or send us their name and a line about why you think they'd be a good fit. If this sounds like your kind of autumn, we'd love to hear from you directly.

There's no formal application — just reach out to Field School Director Carolyn or book a call.