Danforth Mentor Access
Overview | Roles & Expectations | Forms & Resources
Welcome, Danforth Mentors!
This site will provide access to valuable resources to help you and your intern plan for the year ahead.
Introduction to the Danforth Internship Experience
The Danforth Education Leadership Program is characterized by three distinctive qualities that make our program unique:
- All students complete an intensive, half-time internship concurrently with their coursework;
- Faculty demonstrate a commitment to the core value set that guides the Danforth curriculum; and
- Mentors must have an excellent record of success as leaders.
Intensive, Half-Time Internship
The year-long intensive internship is a significant feature of the Danforth Educational Leadership Program. The internship is the “applied” element of the Danforth program and is closely integrated with the content knowledge and skills developed during modules and seminars throughout the year. The integration of internship and coursework helps our students to maximize their learning experience and actively make the connections between theory and practice throughout the program.
Danforth interns are required to spend a minimum of half-time in the schools throughout the school year; this translates to approximately 20 hours/week while school is in session. The intensive internship experience allows interns to participate in classroom observations, meetings with parents, students, teachers, central office leaders, and others within the community. As a result of the half-time experience, interns are well prepared to assume positions of leadership.
A set of working assumptions and belief statements guide the Danforth Educational Leadership Program. Since the beginning of the program at the University of Washington in 1988, faculty have been committed to offering an integrated curriculum which includes knowledge, skills, and application in the internship site that is built upon a solid foundation of values-based assumptions about what it means to be a school leader in a democratic society. The Danforth Program seeks as mentors those who share a commitment to these core assumptions and belief statements.
Mentor’s Record of Success as a LeaderMentor assignments are the result of a combination of factors. In some cases, students arrange for an internship within their current school or district. In other cases, we work with students to select the internship site(s) and mentor(s). In either scenario, the emphasis is on matching each student with a mentor who has a demonstrated history of successful leadership. Mentor principals and program administrators play a vital function as role models for interns, and as such they must possess strong and effective leadership skills from which our students can learn. Thank you for taking on this vital role in the preparation of a school leader.