The Atlantic Fellowship programs are entering a phase of double-digit birthdays. The next year or so will see a wave of 10th anniversaries across our global ecosystem. I was privileged enough to be invited to attend the recent celebration held by the Equity Initiative, also known as the Atlantic Fellows for Health Equity in Southeast Asia, in Bangkok in January. My physical baggage was slightly overweight due to a collection of VR headsets for the premier of Living in Water. Mentally, I was also carrying two things with me: a sense of celebration and a quiet curiosity about what ten years of working in equity actually looks like when you sit in a room with the people who’ve lived it.
Over 200 people attended, most being Atlantic Fellows, including the 2025 graduating cohort. I felt privileged to connect directly with the Fellows and learn more about their journeys before, during and after their introduction to the Atlantic Fellowship. What struck me most over those days was not just the scale of the program’s achievement but the texture of the programming, too. The conversations were deeply personal at times, with Fellows revealing how they had been personally impacted by the program. They explained how it had slightly changed their cerebral DNA in the way they now approach a challenge or reframe a problem.
The 2025 cohort spoke of their pride in having the greatest number of Fellows who had quit their jobs after the program broadened their horizons. Rather than returning to the old ways, they felt compelled to pursue their equity work, urgently and with a renewed sense of purpose. Discussions were also hyper-local and unmistakably global at the same time, reinforcing the nature of how civic and social change often occurs from the ground up. Stories of policy change, movement-building, institutional reform and personal risk sat alongside shared moments of laughter, care and hard-earned trust. This felt like equity work as it is: slow, relational, contested, and, arguably, more essential now than at any point since the Second World War.
The Atlantic Fellows for Health Equity in Southeast Asia program/ Equity Initiative has seen dramatic changes in the world since it was founded ten years ago. Inequality has deepened, democratic norms have been tested, and the language of equity itself has become more politicized and, in some places, more fragile. And yet, what I saw in Bangkok was a program that has not retreated but is adapting to meet the evolving global challenges. The program has continued to invest in people, ideas, and the spaces between disciplines and geographies where new possibilities emerge. In that sense, the Equity Initiative tells a wider story about the Atlantic Fellowship: as a whole. As the community grows, we need to think differently about how connection, learning and action happen over time. Less about single moments and more about going on an ongoing journey as an Atlantic Fellow who not only participates but also contributes. All the while ensuring we remain responsive to a rapidly changing world.
For me, this landmark anniversary also underscored the quiet but vital role of the Atlantic Institute as it evolves its offerings to support, connect and amplify the work of the programs supporting their Fellows. To act as connective tissue between the programs, Fellows and partners, and to help create the right conditions in which work carried out by programs like the Equity Initiative can continue to develop and flourish.
If the past 10 years have shown us anything, it is that equity is not a destination but a practice. One that demands we keep learning, keep adjusting and keep showing up for what comes next.
About the author
Owen Pringle is the Director of Community Engagement and Global Impact at the Atlantic Institute.
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