For eight semesters, WHS seniors trudge through blue and white halls on a seemingly never-ending walk to the same classes every single day. Just as they did at age 14, 18-year-old adults go from class to class, focusing on coursework that broadly applies to future career interests, if it even does at all. It is clear that at WHS we must better accommodate seniors’ need for real-world experience and help us learn in new ways before we leave WHS’s halls for the final time.
As we get deeper into our final semester, our motivation continues to decrease after experiencing repeated routines. This, in combination with warmer weather, college acceptances and plans for the future, reminds us of the life we will soon have away from WHS. Thus, it seems justified that we tend to fall off our high school initiative. As students tend to take more free periods senior year because of fulfilled requirements, why wouldn’t we want to encourage them to spend that time meaningfully as opposed to doing no work at all?
However, the administration and the BOE have a clear opportunity to mitigate this problem: a new type of senior project. While I may not be qualified to fully list the specifics of this project, I do know that connecting with local businesses and organizations to create a variety of school-supplementing internships could have the potential to be worthwhile for WHS seniors. They can leave school during their designated internship times and get a taste of flexible class schedules as they prepare for post secondary education.
Different from an “independent study,” which is a mentor-mentee program where WHS students expand their education in a specific field with the help of a teacher, the project would only be allowed for second semester seniors, and would expand beyond the walls of WHS and into the real-world.
For example, WHS could connect with the Westfield Police Department, allowing students interested in pursuing law enforcement to get hands-on experience. School Resource Officer Nicholas Calello agreed: “I think this would be awesome. Students could get real-world experiences and see how our department works during the school year.”
Similarly, for students interested in alternative professional fields like the arts, business or government, instead of bulking up their extracurricular time with internships like some students already do, WHS can be a part of the selection process and encourage an early start to professional development.
WHS Guidance Counselor Paul Valenzano believes a new project “is a good way for students to get real-world experience. I am 100 percent for a program of that nature. I feel like it would be a really good thing.”
As we transitioned from elementary school to middle school, we focused on switching classroom locations more to help us adjust to the change. Then, to ease the transition between middle school and high school, special programs are in place to acclimate to the new environment. If we had this much assistance in past years, why not now?