Senior Project Pros and Cons
Senior year is an exciting time in a high school student’s life. After four years of hard work, seniors enter the homestretch to finally move on and start their independent lives. Many students believe their senior year will be easy, with little work and teachers giving them a break.
At SKHS, however, this is not the case.
The Rhode Island Department of Education requires each public high school graduate to complete a “graduation requirement” that reflects the student’s high school career. Previously South Kingstown High School students were expected to complete the Graduation Portfolio, a compilation of a student’s work that best reflected their learning throughout their time in high school.
During the year 2020, the school switched its graduation requirement to include the Senior Project, a project with more creative freedom, where students could choose a topic they find interesting and work with a mentor to learn more about it and create a product based on their topic. To prepare to complete the project, students also are required to write a Senior Paper, a research paper loosely based on their selected project.
Some SKHS seniors, however, fail to see the point of some aspects of the Senior Project and Senior Paper curriculum.
One SKHS senior Sierra Silversmith believes “The senior paper experience felt like a watered-down version of much of what I tend to interact with pretty regularly, so the scaffolding that was likely helpful for other students may have just felt constraining for me.”
Silversmith said she is enrolled in AP English and often writes more in-depth pieces with more freedom to write in her own expressive ways. The senior added that she felt stifled as a writer during the research paper writing process.
While this project may seem more engaging than the previous Graduation Portfolio, many students say that they would prefer the Portfolio. Others contend, however, that the Senior Project seems like a better option compared to the Graduation Portfolio, as it gives students an outlet to show their interests.
When seniors are asked about the project, the general consensus appears to be negative yet most say they prefer the Graduation Portfolio because it requires significantly less work.
While the senior project can be a stressful experience, some seniors enjoy the process. While Silversmith failed to embrace the research paper process, she appeared to be engaged and excited about her project. for her Senior Project, Silversmith is making her own prom dress, a very big undertaking. Throughout the process, she says she has had a positive experience and enjoyed spending time with her mentor and learning many new sewing and garment-making skills.
SKHS junior Victoria Olsen believes the project to be an obstacle that gets in the way of seniors focusing on their college applications and finishing off high school with good grades in the rest of their classes.
“Time should be used in order to help seniors do college applications,” Olsen said, adding that “perhaps there should be classes designated for seniors to apply to colleges and complete that process.”
Olsen said that she knows that senior year is quite daunting. Applying for college and figuring out the next steps, Olsen added, is a stressful time, and she thinks that the Senior Project is yet another stressor that is put on seniors’ plates.
Senior Project and SKHS social studies teacher Mrs. Colao has a more positive outlook on the project. Colao believes the project is a learning process that can help students build professional relationships outside the school and enrich their writing skills.
When asked about the impression she gets from students dealing with the senior project Colao pointed out that it “depends on when or who.” Colao said she has noticed that juniors seem to have a more positive outlook on the project, especially since it is a new concept that they have not truly delved into yet. Seniors, however, Colao noted, have been working on completing this entire process for a year, and many simply seem to be done with it, just wanting to get to graduation.
Colao said that she believes the project to be an important piece of the high school experience.
“Having something that is yours, that you come up with is very important and students should take pride in the work they have accomplished and value what they have learned throughout the process, regardless of how much they want to do it,” Colao said.
Staying positive about tasks and assignments can make processes like the senior project much easier to handle, and can make it seem less daunting.
Silversmith said that at first she was intimidated by the thought of completing the project, and if she would have enough time, but added that she was also very excited to start and learn something new.