Project Fail

http://www.newsobserver.com/news/story/1495581.html



The whole graduation project is STUPID. The sophomores are the highest class required to complete the project. The seniors and juniors don't have to complete it anymore. IT'S SO STUPID!
Ok, so why they make us do this in the first place is completely ludicrous. First of all, it costs about half a million dollars (http://www.newsobserver.com/news/story/1495581.html) to fund this thing, and that's money that could be spent WISELY elsewhere. I mean, no one wants to do this project. Everyone I've asked or heard indirectly from says they don't want to. I even bet some people won't decide to do the project. If $500,000 is going into this thing, then the Wake officials need to know that some of this "wisely spent" money is going to be wasted. Second, there's a budget cut next year(http://abclocal.go.com/wtvd/story?section=news/local&id=6739377), and that means teachers' jobs and even some programs-- art, music, PE, and foreign language-- will be eliminated. And yet there's enough money to spend on plasma screen TVs for EVERY CLASSROOM and new flat-screen computers for the library. But there's not enough money for teachers and special programs? Third, it's a pass/fail grade(http://www.wilkes.k12.nc.us/wwhs/graduation/GradProj/GradProj.ppt#281,24,Slide 24), meaning that if you pass you graduate, and if you fail, you don't. So if someone decided not to do the project and he/she was a straight-A student with high honors, they couldn't graduate. It makes no sense.

My proposals:
1. Cut the graduation project. Spend that $500,000 on more important things like teachers' salaries. Teachers don't get enough money, and yet some officials get pay raises.
2. If the elimination of the project just isn't possible, have the school educate its students better. Freshman year, all we did was spend fifteen minutes every week trying to think up a topic. Sophomore year, we spend fourty-five minutes every two weeks thinking up an "essential question" as a thesis statement, of sorts. Junior year, we're supposed to actually research the project topic and start the paper. And senior year, we're supposed to complete the presentation and gather the portfolio. In my opinion, junior and senior year we spend lots of time preparing for college, the SATs, and AP exams. We don't have the time to complete a paper, portfolio, and presentation. We haven't been given enough preparation and guidance other than a few pieces of paper and ink.


So that's all I have to say. I'll just say, even my parents disagree with the idea.

Ruined

Why do you have to do this?
You've perverted
Something so beautiful
And innocent
And turned it into
A statement
A slogan
A way of life...
The opposition
Feel the censorship
In what colors we wear
And when we speak

Why did you pervert it?
An innocent rainbow