Participants of WR DLTA are provided housing and live in community with their fellow students and apprentices under the supervision and guidance of their house mentors. Participants are often challenged with living outside their parent’s home for the first time- grocery shopping, meal preparation, keeping a tidy living space, and caring for their personal needs all while living and learning together amongst other believers. This can be one of the most challenging and rewarding aspects of DLTA and the Christian walk. We believe discipleship does not healthfully exist divorced from community. We must have one to have the other. Participants learn from one another and grow in practical adult skills by living in community.

Participants are encouraged to get jobs locally to grow in their personal, professional, and leadership skills. We believe getting a part time job gives our participants real life experiences and access to those who may be in need of an encounter with a Christ follower. Jobs also provide the necessary funds to cover practical aspects of life such as food and gas expenses. This is also a way our participants can begin to grow into the responsible adults we hope to see them become! Note that gas and food are not covered by the WR DLTA tuition at this time.

Something we firmly believe in DLTA is that leaders, by definition, go above and beyond what is required of their peers. You must lead yourself before you can effectively lead others. This is why leadership club is a peer led group where students are met with those basic challenges to overcome just to meet. This opportunity in itself is a life-long lesson!

Students have the optional opportunity to join a student-led leadership club. This is led primarily by DLTA apprentices, but students will also be empowered to lead sessions as the semester progresses. The leadership club will cover material from books as well as lessons provided on Google classroom. Students complete the assignments and meet to discuss the information.

Every Friday we provide a time to care and practice assessing the needs of the class, connecting with each other. DLTA apprentices will lead this time, helping students manage interpersonal care and creating fun ways to connect with and enjoy one another. Eventually the apprentices begin to empower the students to take the responsibility of leading Fellowship Fridays.

Students are expected to serve the local community (outside of DLTA or the Adventures Campus) for one hour each week. This reinforces the necessity to look around and find needs of others that we can fulfill as followers of Christ.

Participants will be paired with an alumni mentor to meet with during the course of their time at WR DLTA. Participants may meet 1-1 or in triads (2 participants with one mentor). These mentors are available to process with participants on an individual level, pray for them, and exhort them towards Jesus and what He is asking of them.

These mentors are intentionally outside of the DLTA program to give participants an outside perspective and hopefully keep them more grounded. We hope that having an outside perspective will help our participants as they move out from DLTA. Our goal is to move participants out into the world more successfully and more equipped than when they arrived!