How do we create meaningful projects for students that gives them an audience outside of the walls of the classroom? There are of course many ways to do this, but one might be to encourage the creation of educational competitions. It can be challenging for a teacher to come up with a good idea for a project, all of the parameters and scoring guidelines. Pre-made competitions set everything up so that the teacher can focus on helping students refine ideas and creating a great product.
Educational competitions already exist today. Google science fair, national history day, spelling bee and many others. I would like to see schools hosting a competition, students can even be the judges. This allows schools to share project ideas and reduce the burden on individual teachers of coming up with a lot of really good projects for students to do.
For high school teachers, look to your CTSO (Career Technical Student Organizations). FFA, SkillsUSA, FHA-HERO, FBLA, DECA, HOSA (there are others, but these 6 operate in California). Great experiences for kids!
Thank you for those resources David.