The senior project at Lutheran High School (LHS) is a portfolio based project that provides students with opportunities to examine their skills and abilities, as well as articulate their plans for the future. The project actively promotes college readiness by asking students to fill out college applications, apply for scholarships, and complete a resume. It also promotes career readiness by asking students to find and shadow a mentor in a career field they want to pursue. This will give the student the opportunity to develop meaningful relationships with professionals in their chosen field of study.
The senior project also serves to give students the opportunity to demonstrate their understanding, as it relates to LHS’s School-Wide Expected Learning Results (ESLRs) These ESLRs are four characteristics the school has committed to developing in students during the course of their time at LHS. These characteristics are; faith, stewardship, citizenship, and productive life and career skills. Thus, various portions of the senior project touch on each of these characteristics.
The project follows an intentionally created and logical sequence. First, the student secures a mentor in their chosen field of study and shadows them for twelve hours. During the course of this time the student gains first-hand knowledge of, and experience in, the career field. Through this experience and in consultation with the mentor, students choose a demonstration of learning project. This second portion of the project is a tangible product created or developed by the student which is related to the career field and meets the time requirement of twelve hours. Some examples are; as a teacher a student might create lesson plans, as an engineer a student might create a blueprint and scale model of a bridge, or as a crime scene investigator a student might create a model of a fingerprint and explain its variations. The third part of the project consists of a research paper related to the career field. This is an opportunity for students to conduct research in a specific aspect of the field and write an academic paper sharing their knowledge. The last portion of the project is the panel presentation. In this culminating activity, the student shares what was accomplished in the shadow hours, the demonstration of learning project, and applies the ESLR areas to their chosen career in front of a panel of judges consisting of members of the Lutheran High community such as Board members, staff, and parents.