Summer projects have always been a sticking point for students and teachers alike. The battle has raged on for years about if summer projects are an effective way for students to learn, or if they are just a waste of time. Most students do not like summer projects at all because they aren't designed for the student specifically. Instead, teacher's design a project that they think will satisfy the most people in a given class, and for that reason my position is that summer projects should be student-designed. This is because it gives more tailored assignments to fit the students wants and needs, it lets them explore something they may be interested in, and it lets students choose their own workload.

Rather than designing a project specifically for one or two people, the teacher's goal is to make a project that is designed to be completed by an entire class. While this is less work for the teacher and students, since they are not creating their own assignment, it has many drawbacks. For one, it is very likely that what the students need and what the teacher thinks they need don't line up. This causes conflict between the two groups, with students coming to hate summer projects because in their mind, it's just another generalized school assignment for them to finish up at the one time they feel they can get proper rest. It also causes conflict between the student's current teacher and their teacher next year. These teachers are very likely not working together to make a summer project, so your teacher next year could completely disregard the project that the other teacher gave, and you would have done all of that work for nothing. If it was a student-designed project however, not only would it be something that the student is actually interested in and wants to work on, it would lessen the workload of the student's teachers, as they have one less thing to worry about in their giant pile of stuff they have to do. On top of that, the project can be fitted to that student's wants and needs, by removing certain sections that they wouldn't be able to remove if it was made by a teacher. They can also add their own spin on the project and do it the way that they want to. Those are just a few examples of how a student-driven project can be adjusted to fit them specifically.

For many teacher-designed summer projects, students are usually given one topic to work on. Students do not have a choice: whether they like it or not, they have to work on that one topic. With a student-designed project, they get the freedom of choosing their own topic. This opens up worlds of possibility for that student, as they can now choose something that interests them, not their teacher. This is very important because many students note a major lack of interest in summer projects, so this could be a way to get students more involved. Of course, this subject has to be in the scope of the class. For example, you can't work on a project about the anatomy of a polar bear in a US History class because that topic has nothing to do with US History. So while students aren't given complete freedom with their topic choices, they get a lot more than if the teacher made the project. That's why its important that students work on something that they're interested in.

Teacher-designed summer projects are designed to be finished in one way only. Usually, there is no room for students to cut a section out or do the project a different way because if they don't follow the teacher's instructions then they could lose points for it. With a student-designed summer project, the workload and structure of the project is chosen by the student, not the teacher. This means that students have more power to change the assignment in a way that they believe they can finish it more effectively and churn out the highest quality project that they feel that they can produce. They also have more power when it comes to revising and editing their projects, as they have no guidelines set by the teacher on what they can and cannot do. For those reasons and more, control over workload is a valuable asset for students that is only had with student-designed projects.

In conclusion, summer projects may always be a sticking point for both students and teachers, but there are ways to improve things on both sides. That was is through student-designed projects. Because they are tailored to the students, are interesting to the students, and allow students control over their workload, they are the far superior way for summer projects to be done. It may not be the perfect solution to an issue like this, but it is far better than teachers deciding what they feel is best for students. Teacher's may think they know what is best for their students, but at the end of the day the students have lived with themselves their whole life, while their teacher has likely known them for less than a year. The student knows themselves inside an out, while the teacher gets a surface view of that student. Something needs to change, and the only people that can make that change are me and my fellow students.