I’m writing about a project i did in high school, as gaining some time and distance from it has produced some reflections I think can be framed in terms of the questions asked in class. I spent the last two years of my high school career working on a program at my public school to help students find networks of other students and improve their studying skills and ultimately their school performance. This was meant to break down barriers to entry, whether financial or emotional, to more institutionalized programs like tutoring or even informally asking for help from teachers or other students. I researched and produced a proposal for an open peer learning space held in a couple of classrooms after school each week where high-performing and experienced students would volunteer to staff group study sessions and be there to answer any questions that people might have. We even produced study guides on popular subjects with notes and practice questions that we placed around the rooms for students to take home. My idea was guided by proponents of social learning and a desire to produce materials to help our huge and understaffed school population gain the resources to succeed as much as possible given our circumstances. This was the scope of my problem: within the bounds of my school, connect students with each other and enable them to get the help they need.

Who is best positioned to address the problem? Upon first reflection, the answer to this question is students at my high school, which included me! However, part of the problem was that there was a pretty clear divide on the amount of resources my school invested in the honours versus the regular program, and I wanted to break down barriers between students in those programs so they could help each other. So, to be more specific, a non-honours student who is struggling in school would be best positioned to address the problem. This is the demographic who would be affected by the program in the first place.

What are predictable consequences of the proposed solution? The most predictable consequence was simply that this project would fail to be adopted on a large scale by students and/or cease to exist after I graduated. I had read extensively about this kind of study program being used at other schools and universities, which improved my hopes about participation. But as with most clubs and events hosted on high school or even college campuses, participation rates are often a basic thing and a real worry.

While the study program really did help some people I was trying to help and was adopted by a number of students (and a lot of volunteers from the honours program), the rooms weren’t always full and I’m not sure if it continues to exist today. While the program was on the whole successful and its disappearance wouldn’t cause much direct harm, I continue to think about my own motivations in creating it, since in truth the development of the program was geared towards college admissions. I wonder about the ways I could have approached the program’s development if I had not been so bent on making this program succeed since I had dedicated so much time to it — perhaps I would have been willing to make major shifts in the structure based on student feedback, or share the direction and leadership of the project with the people I was actually trying to help. And I think this kind of problem continues to happen with justice-oriented work past high school, no matter how wholesome the original intent. What kinds of reflection are we missing when we’re trying really hard to get some grant, or some type of recognition for our work, or even just personal fulfillment?