The School of Education has received a $400,000 grant from the M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust for the purpose of providing professional development and mentoring services to Christian Schools in our region over the next three years. Dr. Gary Kilburg, the director of the Mentoring Institute at George Fox, and Dr. Scot Headley, a professor in the Educational Foundations and Leadership Department, will direct the program and provide services to schools, associations and individual educators throughout the Northwest.
Primary activities include mentoring support to pre-K-12 Christian school leaders, potential school leaders, and beginning teachers who work in organizations with Christ-centered missions. Our desire is to help support educators who are growing in their professional roles as teachers and leaders in Christian schools. Through the grant, these services will be offered at no cost to the individual and the school.
Specific objectives of the Christian Schools Mentoring Institute include: a) the delivery of program design and consultancy services to individual regional Christian schools; b) identification and preparation of mentors to serve in the program; c) serving school leaders, potential school leaders and beginning teachers through mentoring services; and d) establishing a resource center for Christian school educators’ professional development.
We are currently in the process of building our mentoring program. We are interested in visiting with alumni who are involved in Christian school education if they have interest in serving as a mentor, desire mentoring, or would like to offer mentoring services within your school.
During the spring of 2009, we will be identifying and preparing mentors and identifying those who would like to receive mentoring during the 2009-10 school year. In the first two years of this program, we will be focusing on five categories of educators who will be offered mentoring:
In the third year of the program, in addition to mentoring services, additional professional development opportunities will be offered through the grant. Stipends, resources, and graduate credit are available for mentors and mentees who participate. For more information, please contact Sondra Creason at screason@georgefox.edu or 503-554-2842.