As we prepare to graduate, and as Senior Project creeps closer and closer, the idea of real life and a career are on my mind.

During Senior Project, seniors are given freedom to discover what interests them. Many students take this opportunity to do their Project in a potential future field.

Senior Project is such a profound way of learning outside of the classroom, and it teaches us valuable lessons about life after high school that we can’t learn within the walls of a classroom.

I feel very fortunate to be able to attend a school that is able to provide students with the choice to spend their final month of their high school education learning in the real world.

It adds a zestful twist to our childhood education, and gives us something genuine and substantive with which to graduate high school.

I think that every high school senior should have the chance to learn bona fide life lessons before they’re forced to figure it out in the real world.

Senior Project gives seniors a chance to get real life experience in a field of their choice, which could ultimately prove to be an asset when students are looking for jobs or internships.

Though we may not see it now, we’re provided so many remarkable opportunities at New Trier that we will carry with us for the rest of our lives.

High school shouldn’t be the best four years of your life. We still have so many incredible milestones to accomplish, and we’re still so young in the grand scheme of things.

New Trier is pretty unique. Though my four years here have been filled with many ups and downs, the school continues to amaze me with the excursions, immersion trips, and projects.

A lot of these extracurriculars are availablebecause of our ability to fund such programs. Also, there’s a certain wave of determination among New Trier teachers and alumni that  seems to be the driving force to equipping students with these life skills. They know the beneifts that the programs can give students, and they see the reward in investing in them.

These type of programs are a sustainable form of education. We probably won’t remember much from sophomore geometry, but by providing the option for students to gain life experiences, they’re being educated in a lasting and truly influential way.

Now is your time to try programs before graduation day with only a GPA to determine our intelligence, and we’re left wondering what we’re supposed to do or where we’re supposed to go.

Though high school isn’t the end of our lives, it is the start of a new one. We have the chance to enter that new life backed by so many great experiences that the school offers us.