Baton Rouge will become the first mid-sized city in the country to launch a new training program for recent college graduates who want to pursue careers in local government.

Both Houston and San Francisco have been participating in the City Hall Fellows program since its inception in 2008. Baton Rouge plans to kick off its City Hall Fellow Program in August with five to six Fellows.

Founded by Baton Rouge native and Episcopal High School graduate Bethany Rubin Henderson, City Hall Fellows grooms America’s best and brightest college graduates for careers in local government.

The nonprofit City Hall Fellows program offers paid Fellowships to outstanding recent college graduates with ties to its partner cities, Henderson said.  Fellows work full-time for 12 months on high-need, high-impact projects while serving as special assistants to senior city administrators and officials. Each Fellow also receives more than 300 hours of training through the program.

Henderson said she established City Hall Fellows in 2008 in response to the looming leadership crisis facing our cities.  A recent study by the International City/County Management Association showed that, within a decade, more than half of our country’s local government workforce will be of retirement age, she added.

Henderson will be in the Baton Rouge February 8-11 to recruit seniors and recent college graduates from local colleges and universities for Baton Rouge’s first group of Fellows. She will be joined by Niiobli Armah, a Southern University graduate and former student body president, who was a participant in the City Hall Fellows’ program in his native Houston. Application materials and instructions for applying to become a City Hall Fellow are available online at www.cityhallfellows.org. The deadline to apply for a position in Baton Rouge is March 10.