Have you ever been assigned a summer project by your teacher? Imagine if you, the student, could design the project. A student-designed project would allow students to base the project off of their personal traits or hobbies, unlike a teacher-designed project. Some argue that summer projects should be student-designed, but others believe it should be teacher-designed. A student-designed project is better than a teacher-designed project because it allows students to incorporate their personal values and it gives students the opportunity to make new friendships.

Students are able to incorporate their personal values in a student-designed project, unlike in a teacher-designed project. Incorporating personal values makes the project more intriguing and fun for students, and it will prevent students from going through the motions while completing the project. For example, in

The Crucible by Arthur Miller, John Proctor is accused of witchcraft. He is found guilty after his trial and is forced to sign a document that states he used witchcraft to bestow evil on the town of Generic_City. John refuses to sign the document believing that it will cast a bad look on his name. This shows the importance of personal values and how they impacted John's decision. A student-designed project allows for students to create a project based on their personal values, which will make the project more meaningful and important to the student.

A student-designed project is better than a teacher-designed project because it allows students to connect with one another through collaborating on an idea for the project. A teacher-designed project does not allow for such collaboration. For example, in

Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, Clarisse McClellan and Guy Montag create a unique friendship by sharing their ideas about the society that they are living in. At first Guy is very timid around Clarisse, but by sharing their ideas of the world around them they become very close. This shows how collaborating on a shared idea can create a friendship. In a student-designed project this is achievable because students will be interacting with each other to design a project.

Many people believe that a teacher-designed project is better than a student-designed project because students could take advantage of a student-designed project, but that just isn't the case. A student-designed project allows for students to incorporate their personal values and gives them the opportunity to create new friendships. Summer projects should be student-designed, don't allow teacher-designed projects to take away a great opportunity for students to learn something new about themselves or their peers.