Leadership Rice Mentorship Experience (LRME)

The Leadership Rice Mentorship Experience (LRME) is a summer-long internship experience that students participate in through the guidance of a mentor, with engagement in a course, and among a cohort of fellow students. Placements for the internships are in different sectors- private, public, and nonprofit- with an foundation of civic professionalism to round out the entire program. Essentially, LRME Fellows engage in their professional, personal, and civic development through the program to better understand their motivations and goals going forward.

Each summer, the LRME Fellows come together as groups to focus on a common social issue of importance to them. While often this stems from what their internship entails, this is an opportunity to further explore a relevant social issue to them personally, professionally, and/or civically. These Common Interest projects include various activities couched within the civic practices of service, advocacy and activism, civic research, policy and governance, and philanthropy. With the LRME program being entirely virtual this year, the seven groups came together to develop a project that they worked on throughout the summer.

As a culmination of the project, each group has developed a presentation. These presentations highlight they work as a group as well as their individual experiences as an intern this summer. The seven focus areas for this summer were: social determinants of health; health and science literacy; housing security and inequity; educational inequity; criminal justice; voting and the pandemic; and domestic violence. We hope that the presentations and information below are helpful for all to understand a perspective on these social issues within the foundations of critical reflection, ethical engagement, and civic professionalism.

Given the intersectionality of so many social issues, the LRME Fellows are looking at these issues within the context of their work this summer, their understanding of the social ramifications, as well as how it plays a larger role in the upcoming election cycle. During the Showcase on Wednesday, September 16th, you will be able to engage with each Common Interest group to learn more about the work they did over the summer and its applicability to voting and voter awareness.