Summer is a time of hanging out with friends at the beach and relaxing in the warm weather, but there is always something that swoops in to mess it up: a summer project. Summer projects are not all bad, for they are designed to ensure that students continue to learn during their three month getaway from school. However, who should design the summer project the student or the teacher? Summer projects should be teacher-designed because teachers have more experience with projects than students, and students will lean toward designing a quick and easy project.

Teachers have had more encounters with school assigned projects in their lifetime than their students. Most teachers have college degrees. They have done the twelve plus years of primary school to graduate, and then gone on to college and done two to four more years to get their degree. Through all that schooling many projects have been assigned and completed. All of this gives teachers the proper experience and background to come up with a well designed summer project for their students. Just this past summer my computer system networking teacher, Mr. Generic_Name, assigned us a project. It was a review project incorporating all of the course material from my sophomore year that he did not want us to forget during the summer. I remember how well rounded of a project it was, so much so that I had to ask him how he come up with it. Mr. Generic_Name told me that the project was inspired by all the projects he encountered during his four years at William and Mary. Due to Mr. Generic_Name having plenty of experience with higher education projects, it allowed him to design a well developed summer project for my peers and I. I can only imagine the toddler like projects that would have been produced if my peers and I were allowed to design our summer projects instead of Mr. Generic_Name.

More than likely if a student is given the opportunity to do less work they are going to take that opportunity. Throughout my years of high school I have seen this exact manner take place over and over. Students will take the easy way out by selecting courses that have a history of demanding very little from those enrolled. This same mannerism repeats itself once the student is enrolled in a course and it comes time to actually work. Just this past marking period my Math Analysis teacher, Mrs. Generic_Name, gave us a take home test for winter break. This test consisted of 47 problems. The more problems you did the higher grade you got, but students did not seem to take advantage of this. More than half of my class chose to only do 30 of the 47 problems. This was because completing 30 of the 47 problems earned the minimum for a passing grade, a 70 percent. My peers had full control of their grades and chose to only work for the minimum passing score so that the rest of their winter break would be free of math. This is what will occur if a student is allowed to design their own summer project. Once a student realizes that they get to design their project they will make it something simple, lousy, and childlike. The student will design something just good enough too pass, so that they can return to their more practical summer.

Some argue that a student would be more inclined to do their project if they got to design it. However, this is not true as someone's interest in something does not determine whether they will do it or not, but their work ethic is the true determining factor. Summer projects serve a meaningful purpose; to make sure kids maintain learning and strengthening their brains even when school is out. Something with a strong purpose like that should not be taken lightly and should be handled by someone who can produce the best project. This is why summer projects should be teacher-designed, so that students can take away as much information as possible when the project is all said and done.