Something rare appears on every Cascades Academy student’s college application: a full-year, professionally mentored internship in a field of their choosing.
That distinction matters.
Consider what most high school transcripts look like. Roughly 37% of U.S. public high school graduates took at least one AP exam in 2025, according to the College Board. Meanwhile, College Board research found that nearly half of high school students were graduating with A averages, a figure that has climbed nearly 10 percentage points over two decades even as SAT scores declined. AP courses and grade point averages are the traditional currency of college admissions, and both are increasingly crowded and difficult to interpret.
Cascades Academy takes a different approach. Rather than traditional letter grades, students earn a Mastery Transcript that documents what they've actually learned and demonstrated. But perhaps the most concrete differentiator of all is that while only about 2% of U.S. high school students have completed an internship, according to a study by Britebound (formerly American Student Assistance), every Cascades Academy graduate has one.
That's a different kind of education, and it's one you won't find at most schools, public or private.
Inside the Internship Year
The 11th grade Internship Project is a full-year course that fulfills a graduation requirement. It asks students to identify a professional working in a field that interests them, reach out, make the ask, and show up week after week, October through May.
Students aim to average about two hours a week with their mentor, though the structure is flexible enough to accommodate intensive work periods alongside more regular visits. The range of placements reflects the breadth of Bend's professional community and the curiosity of our students. Internships have spanned aviation, architecture, engineering, equine therapy, computer graphics, journalism, culinary arts, healthcare, guitar making, and much more.
Students meet weekly as a cohort to reflect together and explore the broader context of their individual experiences. They maintain a running blog throughout the year, and by spring, each student completes an 8–12 page research paper that weaves together direct experience, professional interviews, and independent research related to the organization they've worked with. The year culminates in a 10-minute public presentation where students share what they've learned in front of their school community, families, and mentors.
When a college admissions officer reads that file, they're not seeing a student who checked a box. They're seeing a student who spent a year doing real work in the real world, who can speak knowledgeably about a professional field, and who has a mentor willing to vouch for them.
Student Spotlight: Alice at Jim Dailing Designs
Alice arrived at her junior internship with more background than most. For her culminating eighth-grade project, she raised $600 for NAMI by making and selling wire jewelry. After taking sheet metal classes at DIY Cave in Bend, she wanted to go further and found her mentor in Jim Dailing of Jim Dailing Designs.
Working in Jim's studio, Alice moved well beyond the basics to soldering and refinishing repair pieces, hammering melted gold from a grandmother's jewelry into a new ring, carving and engraving, and creating wax molds for casting. She also helped with photo and video for the studio's social media, getting a real look at what it takes to run a one-person creative business.
"I get to turn a piece of metal into a piece of jewelry," Alice says. "It gives me the control to express my creativity in a hands-on way."
Jim, who has mentored apprentices before, describes Alice as someone with a phenomenal work ethic and a rare balance of analytical and aesthetic instincts. "It's a balance of science and aesthetics," he says. "Head and heart." His goal wasn't to teach her one technique, but to expand what she sees as possible. "Living as an artist can be difficult," he says, "but there are so many paths to take."
Alice is still weighing metalworking against other directions like music and film. But she's doing so with real skills and a mentor who genuinely invested in her. That's exactly what this program is designed to give.
Student Spotlight: Ezra at The Source
For Ezra, the internship year was a chance to test-drive a future he's envisioning. "Journalism seemed like the perfect fit for me," he says, as someone drawn to person-to-person interaction, storytelling, and current events.
Ezra spent the year working with Nic Moye, managing editor at Bend's alt-weekly newspaper, The Source. He wrote a range of stories, from profiles of local artists and a feature on a science lecture series, to a children's book review, and a summer concert preview. The lecture series stretched him most. "I was able to talk to professors and organization executives about complicated topics," he says. But his favorite was the children's book piece, which felt like "an important local story."
From Nic, Ezra learned that good writing is only part of the job. "She showed me that it's vital to know your community, and be able to work with all the media associated with journalism, like photos, videos, and printed vs. digital," he says.
His favorite moment was seeing his byline in print for the first time. "It felt like I was truly contributing to something that could impact my community." A staffer brought him a copy the following week and complimented his writing after reading it.
By the end of the year, the internship had been more than just resume-building; it was clarifying. "This internship at The Source has strengthened the vision I have for myself," Ezra says. "I was able to remove any doubt that it was the field of work I wanted to pursue in life."
He plans to study global studies, journalism, and foreign language in college. For him, these areas build a strong foundation for an engaged and educated journalist.
Where Internships Lead: Alumni Voices
The junior internship doesn't always send students straight into a career, but for some, it plants a seed that keeps growing into a college major, and eventually, a profession. Take Kiran Mapes '16, whose junior internship introduced her to architecture and became a turning point in her path forward. "That internship helped me discover my passion for architecture," she says. "It played a big role in my admission to the University of Oregon's architecture program and gave me confidence heading into college." Today, Kiran is an Architectural Designer at Gallaudet University, the global leader in education for Deaf and hard-of-hearing students, where she draws on both her professional training and her lived experience as a Deaf architect to design spaces that remove barriers and promote inclusion.
Joe Malamed ‘24 interned at Leading Edge Flight Academy at the Bend Airport, where a discovery flight confirmed that flying was his future. His mentor wrote him a letter of recommendation to Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, and he was accepted. After a semester, he realized the training program back home was the better fit, so he transferred into Central Oregon Community College’s aviation program, which pairs classroom instruction with flight training at Leading Edge. Now on track to earn his degree in Aviation by 2027, he has his sights set on Alaska Airlines. "I’m progressing quickly through my classes and flight training,” he says, “and I feel hopeful and excited about my future career.”
Most students across the country optimize for the transcript: AP credits, GPA, doing what's expected. But the most compelling application isn't the one that looks like everyone else's. It's the one that proves something a classroom can't. At Cascades Academy, the internship is not an add-on, but a promise that by graduation, you will have done real work, in the real world, with someone who believed you could.
If you're a Bend-area professional interested in hosting a junior intern, or a prospective family wanting to learn more, we'd love to connect. Reach out at wenger@cascadesacademy.org.