Values

1. America can and must rise to the challenge of achieving racial and economic justice. The key to a more equitable society lies in neighborhoods and communities and the voluntary organizations that build them up.
   
2. Collaboration between community-based, social change organizations and the major institutions of society is not only desirable; it is achievable in the short term. Leaders of those major mainstream institutions can be as motivated to equitable practices and as committed as community leaders.
   
3. DTI is committed to the growth of the whole person: ethical values, worldview, personality and emotional intelligence, knowledge and skills.
   
4. Training must be eminently useful, but techniques and training geared only to immediate practice is dangerous and short-lived without the underlying body of knowledge that supports it and the value system which frames it.
   
5. A strong, supportive community is not only the path to a humane society, it is one of the best instruments of learning. Therefore, DTI promotes a strong learning community through all of its programs.