The main focus for students in the course is to carry out their individual fieldwork projects successfully. However, there is also a strong accent on collaborative learning as students share progress reports on their project with their peers in the program and respond to each other with comments and suggestions. In addition, students continue their exploration of portfolio as a mentoring tool, by compiling the mentorship component of their portfolios. Students are also expected to reflect on their overall progress in becoming master mentors as they apply their skills and insights to independent work.

Pedagogy
Success with this project is really determined by the thoroughness of preparation work that has gone into setting up both the concept and the details of execution. However, the structure is in place to support students as they work through unexpected events that may occur. The main supports are, as always, faculty and the cohort of peers with whom they share the progress of their own projects, and their insights into internship in general.

Students work independently on a day-to-day basis but they also have e-mail access to the instructor to support them in handling any issues that may come up. They are also provided with some structure to help them balance out the workload of an unfamiliar task. They must log the hours they work and are encouraged to complete about half of the course hours allotted by about the end of October. They are counseled to spend an average of two to three hours a week on group discussion and performance reports and eight or nine hours a week on their project.

Internship students are also invited to make some connections with the incoming cohort of students. This opportunity is provided partly to bolster interns’ own sense of how far they have come in their skill development and in part to provide mentors and models for incoming students.

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