As the end of the school year approaches, I began to grow with excitement. Finally, I have a break from the stressful school work. However, as I thought I would be free from the chains, I am held back once again as teachers began to assign tedious summer project. Tired and with my strong desires of a break, I waited till the last couple weeks of summer before starting on the time consuming project. Recently, an argument has risen about whether summer projects should be student deigned or teacher designed. People who believe that the projects should be student designed may argue that student designed projects would increase the percentage of participation on these projects. Others, who believed that it should be teacher designed, argue back that the knowledge teachers have on the curriculum allows the projects to be truly designed for its main intention. Teachers should be designing these summer project because of their knowledge of the future curriculum and their understanding of the mindset of students.

Teachers are well equipped with the knowledge of the future curriculum, thus they have the ability to adjust their lesson plans to help assist their students for the upcoming years. Seen by many students, lessons or skills learned in the previous school year are used in the present school year. For example, math facts, such as addition and subtraction, are constantly being referred to in all math courses. Acknowledging this reality, teachers would try to shift their lesson plans around for the purpose of trying to strengthen their students ability to understand such skills. Similar theory is applied to the designing of summer projects. Teachers, with the knowledge of what is expected in the next couple courses of a students life, would be able to shape projects into helping the students prepare for the upcoming school year.

Teachers' understanding of the mindset of typical students causes the summer projects to be unbiased. People who believed that the summer projects should be student designed may argue that student designed projects will encourage for more participation, due to the fact that these projects will have a more simple design and be more easier to understand. However, lowering the difficulty of a project doesn't cause a dramatic shift in student participation. As seen in several classrooms, in regards to homework, regardless of the difficulty in the assignment, many student willingly choose to not complete their assignment. Therefore, attendance or participation is an irrelevant factor when designing these projects.

Having a easier summer project not only doesn't shift the percentage of participation, but also causes a strain in the development or knowledge of the student over the summer. Almost all teachers have witnessed students who refuse to complete homework, thus, they understand that lowering the difficulty would not change participation. This observation causes the teachers to not design the projects in favor of student's emotions, but rather design the projects according to the theory of helping their students.

Summer projects should be designed by teachers because teachers have understanding about future curriculum and understanding about the actions of a typical student. One of the main goals of a teacher is to assist students or help students succeed in life. Therefore, logically, everything a teacher does is to benefit the students. Teachers, unbiased about the emotions of a student, will challenge their students into achieving high goals. In their best efforts, teachers would try to assist their students in trying to acquire beneficial skills. Teachers understand that some students will try to challenge authority by refusing to complete assignment, instead of signing in defeat, they will persistent in their teaching methods because they understand that defeat wouldn't help the student. Thus, teachers should have the opportunity to design summer projects because they are guaranteed to have design projects that benefit students. Many successful businessmen, doctors, or scientists, credit their success to teachers. The profession of teachers have existed for many generations and have been known as the source of many successful people's success. Therefore, their ability to create a summer project should not be questioned.