Graduate Fellows Program
The Graduate Fellows Program was founded in 2013 by graduate and professional students throughout the University of Pennsylvania, all of whom were united by an interest in bringing their respective disciplines into dialogue with the humanistic and Christian intellectual traditions. The principal features of the program are outlined below.
This program is made possible by the Ambassador’s Fund for Catholic Education.
A community of graduate and professional students who join together monthly for lively conversation and the pursuit of wisdom and truth.
The Pillars of the Graduate Fellows Program
1. Monthly Colloquia
In the spirit of the Catholic intellectual tradition, the monthly reading colloquia cultivate an ongoing conversation about the Christian tradition and modern scholarship at Penn. They present opportunities for graduate students to delve together into foundational, canonical texts, which in turn are harmonized with various disciplines of the modern academy in order to facilitate a fellow’s deeper engagement with them. Graduate Fellows will have opportunities to facilitate one colloquium per year and are invited to other colloquia and lectures. These monthly sessions are open to all graduate students.
2. Specialized Reading Groups
Graduate Fellows are invited to join specialized reading groups—or create their own—in addition to our monthly colloquia. These reading groups meet in a smaller setting to examine specific academic traditions more systematically. Past reading groups have included “Theory & Theology (2018), reviewing Foucault, Barthes, Derrida and others together with paired theological texts, and “Liberation Theology & its Responses (2020).
4. Intellectual Community
The Graduate Fellows Program also fosters a vibrant intellectual community for Graduate students in the wider Philadelphia area. Along with the Colloquia, there are often opportunities for fellowship, including post-discussion Happy Hours where the conversation continues. The Program also provides opportunities for private dinners with visiting scholars and speakers.
3. Research and Travel Grants
Graduate Fellows are eligible to apply for a limited number of travel and research grants available each year, and awardees will be determined by a Collegium faculty selection committee. These grants range from $250 to $1,000 for projects that advance the mission of Collegium Institute in a productive and compelling way. In order to apply, please send a proposal of up to 750 words that addresses the criteria above, plus your CV, to Quinn Moore (qmoore@collegiuminstitute.org).
2026-2027 Colloquia
2026-2027 Graduate Fellows Colloquia
Frontiers of Faith: Catholicism & the American Imagination
From sea to shining sea, the Catholic Church in America has been a formative influence upon–and formatively influenced by–major currents and events in American history. In the 2026-2027 Graduate Fellows Colloquium, "Frontiers of Faith: Catholicism and the American Imagination," we will explore the American Catholic Church’s rich history and often overlooked contributions to the nation’s broader story. We will travel across the country’s regions and from the pre-colonial era until the present as we explore urban and rural Catholicism from New England to New Mexico, the distinct Catholic literary tradition of the American South, Catholicism and the immigrant experience, and the influence on the Church of both the nation’s original Protestantism and its ascendant secularism. We will undertake this study throughout the year as we encounter figures such as St. Junipero Serra, John Carroll, Orestes Brownson, Flannery O’Connor, Willa Cather, Thea Bowman and more. And through this study, as we mark the semiquincentennial of the United States, we will explore the distinctiveness (if any) of American Catholicism within the broader Catholic tradition.
Past Colloquia Themes
2018-2019: Nouvelle Théologie
