Summer is an important time of the year for students; it is an good time for rest, but it is also an good time for further education. Some schools require students to complete summer projects to assure they continue their learning during their break. These projects should be student-designed rather than teacher-designed because, by designing their own projects, students can learn more about what interests them, express themselves creatively, and gain more responsibility.

However, some people who disagree with this point of view may say that teacher-designed projects can be designed to fit into the next school-year's curriculum allowing students to prepare for their next year of learning. For example, if environmental health is a significant theme in the 10th grade science curriculum, teachers can design summer projects for rising 10th graders about the environment so they get a head-start in understanding the subject. While this argument may be true, specific, teacher-designed projects take away the many positive effects of student-designed projects, including the ability to learn more about personal interests.

Student-designed summer projects allow students to learn more about the interests they have. For example, if a student is very interested in government, he or she can complete a summer project about the two-party system in the United States, the bicameral system in Congress, or even the differences between government at the federal and state levels. Discovering more about personal interests is essential to students. By finding out more about what they like, students have many more opportunities in front of them. Personal interests lead to college and career interests, which lead to structure in adult life.

Students can express themselves and use creativity when designing their own projects. For example, if students are allowed to decide how they present their projects, they can express themselves through drawing, painting, photography, or even web-design. If students can express themselves creatively, they can free their minds, decrease stress, and become further engaged in their learning. Teacher-designed projects would destroy this creativity, and students would be stuck in a non-creative box. If this were the case, students would become bored, and the negatives would far outweigh the positives.

Student-designed projects give students more responsibility. For example, if a student was assigned a teacher-designed summer project, he or she would only be responsible for completing the project; but if he or she was told to design and complete a project, he or she would have to research possible topics, search for relevant information, find ways to present it, create a plan, and execute the plan. This shows that students have significantly more responsibility when designing projects themselves. This responsibility will train students and teach them how to work independently, which is an essential life skill. If students completed a teacher-designed summer project, they would not learn this skill as well as they would when designing a project on their own.

Simply stated, teacher-designed summer projects do not provide the many benefits of independent summer projects students design on their own. If a student was assigned a teacher-made project, he or she would miss out on personal interest discovery, creativity, and responsibility. More schools should replace teacher-designed summer projects with student-designed projects.