Development and Implementation of An Administrative Internship Program

Abstract

This article describes the development and implementation of a pilot program to prepare teachers seeking New York state certification as school district administrators, by assigning them as administrative interns to a school district. The superintendent of a large urban school district and the director of a college program to prepare school district administrators partnered to design a pilot experiential course in which candidates for a master’s degree and state certificate would have an opportunity to develop skills and learn by experiencing situations that support new learning (Kolb, 1984), to take the place of an existing internship course for eight candidates. The dual purpose was to provide an authentic learning experience for the candidates and to provide actionable information for the superintendent for improvement of the district instructional program. To identify areas of academic concern, the candidates reviewed the New York State District Report Card1, conducted research, and interviewed district personnel in order to be able tomake actionable suggestions and recommendations to the superintendent that might result in academic improvement. Findings and recommendations to inform district improvement efforts and for improvement of the existing course were presented to the superintendent and his administrative staff. Recommendations are included.

Keywords

• Authentic learning
• experiential learning
• school administration
• school district improvement
• supervisory internship