PERSONAL PROJECT IDEAS

The Personal Project is a rare opportunity for students in Grade Ten to exhibit aptitude, flair and passion for a given topic. The choices are endless, but students are asked to demonstrate that they have incorporated at least one of the Areas of Interaction into their work.

All students are assigned a faculty advisor who will guide them through the process of developing ideas, researching, designing and finally exhibiting the project. The advisor will also use published rubrics to assess the students overall performance (formative and summative).

EXAMPLES

The range of work submitted by students in recent years has been overwhelming; some examples are shown below. In all cases, the students must submit a working joiurnal citing the development of their project through time and a final reflection piece in which the student relates what the experience has meant personally.

Photojournalism - A study of a Lower East Side (New York) neighborhood and how it has changed culturally since the student's relatives first emigrated to the city

Engineering Design - Using a knowledge of design technology, a student designed and engineered a model of a wind turbine of high efficiency

Emotive Artwork - The student researched and chose suitable media to visually express his feelings about the experience of emigrating as a refugee from Bosnia to the United States having lost his parents in wartime

Original Screenplay - A student wrote a full -length social drama which was then performed by IB Diploma Theatre Arts students. This student went on to become a professional filmmaker. The Personal Project itself helped this student win a national filmmaker's competition

Short Story - A student wrote an evocative short story that was actually published the next year

Original Musical Piece - A student wrote an original piece for chamber orchestra which was set to lyrics from the student's own poetry