Winter cohort — applications close November 9, 2026 Apply now →
Winter cohort — applications close November 9, 2026

Scholarship, not summer camp.

Ignite Fellows is a selective research fellowship for high school students. One mentor, one fellow, one original piece of research — taken all the way to publication.

Apply Now See Publication Results

Mentors drawn from research groups at Stanford, MIT, Berkeley, Johns Hopkins, and 30+ other institutions. Cohorts capped at 40 fellows.

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The Fellowship Difference

Built like a graduate program

Everything about the fellowship is borrowed from how real research training works — scaled to a term, not a weekend.

I

One mentor, one fellow

No group calls, no shared mentors. You work 1:1 with a researcher in your field, every week, on your project alone.

II

An editorial standard

Every paper passes through our internal editorial board before it goes anywhere. If it isn't ready, it doesn't get submitted.

III

Cohorts capped at 40

We admit two small cohorts a year. Small enough that the faculty director knows every fellow's project by name.

Programs

Choose your fellowship

Both tracks run on the same editorial standard and end in a submitted piece of work. They differ in field, length, and destination.

Flagship · 14 Weeks

Sciences Fellowship

$1,190 · full term
  • Weekly 1:1 sessions with a PhD researcher
  • Original project in AI, medicine, engineering, or the natural sciences
  • Destination: peer-reviewed student journal or conference
  • Editorial board review before every submission
  • Mentor letter of evaluation on completion
Apply for Sciences
10 Weeks

Letters & Policy Fellowship

$890 · full term
  • Weekly 1:1 sessions with a social-science researcher
  • Original analysis in economics, policy, history, or law
  • Destination: policy journal or briefing series
  • Data and citation coaching throughout
  • Mentor letter of evaluation on completion
Apply for Letters & Policy
How It Works

A term, in four movements

Weeks 1–3

Foundations

Meet your mentor, map the literature, and shape a question narrow enough to answer well in one term.

Weeks 4–8

Investigation

Run the study: gather data, build the model, or work the archive — with your mentor checking method at every step.

Weeks 9–12

Writing

Draft the paper section by section against our house style guide, with line-level feedback each week.

Weeks 13–14

Review & Submission

The editorial board reads your draft cold, you revise, and we submit to the venue matched to your work.

Outcomes

The numbers we hold ourselves to

89%
of fellows reach a submitted, reviewed paper
175+
fellow papers published to date
4.8/5
average end-of-term fellow rating
76%
of alumni at top-30 universities

Full venue list and selected fellow publications on the Publication Results page.

Admissions

Where our fellows go on to study

Recent fellows have been admitted to:

Stanford MIT Harvard Princeton Yale Columbia UC Berkeley Caltech Johns Hopkins Cornell Brown Duke Georgetown Carnegie Mellon
Mentorship

Learn from working researchers

Every mentor is an active researcher — a PhD, postdoc, or doctoral candidate publishing in their own field right now.

Machine learning mentor

Machine Learning

Faculty Director · PhD, Stanford

Researches interpretable AI systems; has guided 40+ fellows to their first publication.

Economics mentor

Economics

PhD candidate, MIT

Studies development economics and leads methods coaching for the Letters & Policy track.

Biomedical science mentor

Biomedical Science

Postdoctoral Researcher, Johns Hopkins

Postdoctoral researcher in computational biology; chairs the editorial board.

Meet the Fellows

Inside the program

A look at fellows in the current cohort and the projects they're working on.

Fellows

In their own words

"I came in with zero research experience and left with a first-author paper on flood prediction models. My mentor treated me like a colleague, not a student."
Portrait of Ishita Rao
Ishita Rao
Sciences Fellowship '25 · now at Stanford
"The editorial board rejected my first draft, and I'm grateful they did. The version that got published was a different paper — and a much better one."
Portrait of Chloe Tan
Chloe Tan
Sciences Fellowship '24 · now at Columbia
"My policy brief on digital privacy law ran in a national student briefing series. Interviewers asked me about it at every single university."
Portrait of Neha Kapoor
Neha Kapoor
Letters & Policy '25 · now at Georgetown
Questions

Frequently asked questions

Do I need prior research experience?

No. Most fellows have never done formal research before. The fellowship is built to take you from zero to a finished paper — your mentor guides every step.

How selective is admission?

Cohorts are capped at 40 fellows and we admit two per year. We select for curiosity and commitment, not a résumé — the application takes about 20 minutes.

How much time does the fellowship take each week?

Plan for 5–8 hours per week: one mentor session plus independent reading, data work, and writing. Milestones are spaced so the load stays manageable alongside school.

Are scholarships or payment plans available?

Yes. Need-based scholarships cover up to full tuition, and every family can split tuition into three installments at no extra cost. Details on the Tuition page.

Where do fellows actually publish?

Peer-reviewed student research journals, academic conferences, and policy briefing series — matched to each project by the editorial board. See the Publication Results page for the venue list and selected papers.

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Forty seats. One term. Your name on the paper.

The winter cohort convenes in January. Applications take about 20 minutes — your interests and ambitions, not essays about essays.

Applications close November 9, 2026
Apply Now Tuition & Aid

No prior experience needed · Three-installment payment plans · Need-based scholarships to 100%