Some schools require students to complete projects over summer vacation. The reason that many schools do this is to ensure that the student is somewhat engaged academically so they can return to school with a drive to learn. However, many students cannot bear the task of a project during the summer, as many want to be as far from teachers or school authority as possible over the 2-and-a-half month break. This pattern of avoiding summer projects could be fixed as quickly as a blink of the eye. These summer projects should be student-designed. These student-designed projects would be much more beneficial because students would be self-motivated to complete the project, and the student would have much more fun completing the project due to the fact that it is designed by the student.

When being told by someone else to do something, more times than not can decrease a person's will to actually complete the task asked of them. This is why many students sometimes fall behind on classwork or struggle in school in general, because they lose the motivation to complete the task due to someone else giving them a designated time to complete work. When people set their own goals, they tend to work harder and want to get the best score possible. This is called self-motivation, and you need to be self-motivated in life to complete tasks. However, people are normally more self-motivated when they set goals for themselves. If students were able to design their own summer-projects, they would actually be self-motivated to complete the task at hand. Also, it would give the student a higher sense of achievement knowing that they picked their own project and worked hard to complete it.

Everyone knows that self-motivation is the key aspect to complete tasks, however it is very hard to be self-motivated to complete a task you are not interested in. This is the biggest reason of why children and teenagers struggle in school. Many teenagers are just not interested in the topics that they learn about in school, thus decreasing their drive to work hard in school. Summer projects are no different, and are almost identical to the other examples given, except it is given in the summer. If a student wouldn't be interested in conquering the project in school, there is absolutely zero chance that the student would put their full effort into the project. That would be disastrous, the student would receive a bad grade and would hurt his/her chances of getting a good grade for the quarter, and would not properly prepare the student for the upcoming school year. If the student was passionate about the project, he/she would spend time completing the project, and would put 100% effort into what they were doing.

An assignment given by a teacher compared to a student-designed project has many different outcomes. A teacher-designed project would most likely not be beneficial due to the lack of effort given. A student-designed project would show the student's potential and would actually most likely be enjoyed by the student. These student-designed projects would be much more beneficial because students would be self-motivated to complete the project, and the student would have much more fun completing the project due to the fact that the topic is chosen by the student.