White Lake High School Senior Experience

Senior Project Overview

The Senior Project Consists of 4 Components:

1. Research Paper (August through October)

2. Product (November through March)

3. Portfolio Binder (August through May)

4. Presentation (April and May)

**You must log at least 40 hours of work on your Senior Project outside of class, with at least 15 of those hours being with your Specialist Mentor (expert on your topic).**

**If you choose to shadow someone for your project, you will be required to complete 20 or more hours of shadowing and complete each of the following as your final product:
Keep a detailed job shadowing journal with an entry for each time you shadowed (which will be included in the senior project binder)
 Write a job shadow reflection essay (which will be included in the senior project binder)  Complete an interview with the mentor (which will be included in the senior project binder)
 Include Job Shadow Verification Form filled out by mentor (which will be included in the senior project binder)
Research the occupation and create a presentation with facts such as average pay, education required, etc.

**IMPORTANT: All components of your Senior Project must be directly related. Because you will be working with Mrs. Stekly for the research paper and Mrs. Nightingale for the rest of the project, you must have your topic approved by both of them. Try to choose a topic that you are interested in so that you will enjoy doing it, but it has to be a “stretch” for you. Choose something that you don’t know very much about, but would like to learn more. Keep the above components in mind because you will need to choose a specialist mentor within a reasonable distance, choose a related topic to write your research paper, and create a final “physical product.” Again, I can’t stress enough that all the components must be related to one another and must be approved by both Mrs. Nightingale and Mrs. Stekly. Another important consideration is that you will be responsible for all costs for the project, so choose something that you can afford.

**You will start your research paper early in the school year, so try to think of 2-3 different ideas over the summer in case one of your choices does not get approved.