STORY BY DANIEL BRNJIC (’17)

ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY JORDAN GUMMERE (’17), CORTEZ YANNIE (’17), AND MEGAN COFFEY(’18)

In an ever shrinking world, global competence is the key to success.  Every year seniors have an enormous project about foreign countries, and some of the most challenging problems in the world.

For the first time Granville students have traveled to Ohio State University in order to accomplish a more well-rounded project for the senior class. They have also joined together with Denison University to help students have resources at their disposal. Granville senior English classes took a field trip to Denison to create library cards initially for their research papers for English class, but also to give students connections to more information for the senior project.

“Ohio State has provided more help than ever this year,” Gummere said.

Ohio State University provided first person interviews with people who have lived or visited the student’s countries at Ohio State University.

“It is a great opportunity for these students to come here and learn about different cultures through the eyes of natives,” said Hamze Ahmed, a Somali student at Ohio State. “You cannot understand the culture by simply reading books. You have to talk to people to understand their point of view.”

The facility at the high school are very excited to have so much support from the local universities.

“This is the first year that we have traveled to Ohio State,” English teacher Elizabeth Simmons said. “They have given us more opportunities to reach out to guest speakers, and it has really enhanced the project.”

Teachers consider the senior project a final hurdle before graduation for students to get the most experience they can under their belts.

“It’s a great project to end their high school career,” said librarian Sally Gummere. ” I love seeing how these students have grown academically over the years. With the help of local universities we can really propel this project to be very insightful for the students.”

Each world region has so far made one trip the Ohio State campus in Columbus for an in-depth experience.

“I think the OSU connection for the senior project is a great opportunity to work with professionals and prepare us for life after high school,” senior Destiny Braden said.

On the first meeting for the Senior Project students were paired together to figure out what country they would like to research. Each group was randomly chosen by school faculty in order to make sure that each group wasn’t just best friends put together so that students learn how to work with people they don’t know. They groups were all arranged within English classes, where AP English students are put together and regular English students are put together.

Then the next meeting the students had a lottery system pick for what country they would get, each group had a number associated with them and they were chosen at random to keep it fair. Some students got countries that they had on the top of the list and some got countries they would never thought of wanting, but at the end of the day each group has the same goal to come up with a feasible solution to a problem in their country. The solution can either be something already in place, something needing more encouragement and support, or a plan that is new that would be sustainable to implement within the country.

“It’s a nice way to end my high school career,” senior Chad Davis said. “I really enjoyed learning about other cultures.”

Afterwards students wrote one individual paper and then combined each individual paper with their other group members for a conjoined paper. While this paper was in the process of being made, Denison University was kind enough to provide Library cards to their university library which gave students access to their computer and book resources. Students are able to check out and return any resources they need from Denison, which allows seniors to be more rounded in the information gathered for the project.

INFOGRAPHIC BY JORDAN GUMMERE (’17)

This project once consisted of just English and social studies classes. Now the project includes global studies themes that make the project much more international. It includes all different aspects of Granville Education now by recruiting a more rounded and diverse group of teachers for the project such as statistics, environmental, and economics alongside English and social studies classes. Working with Ohio State has further enhanced the expansion of the project.

The senior project will soon come to a close towards the end of the year, but the students are still steadily at work on their designated countries. Each group of students have extensive work on seeing the world through a different lens, helping the senior class understand that they can make changes in the world. Whether those changes are small are big, is up to the students commitment towards the cause. But in the end, the senior class will graduate as better human beings ready to take on the world.

“The senior project is allowing our generation to go out and make a difference. By researching and learning about different cultures and countries we have opened our minds to wanting to impact the world,” senior Carley Barrett said.

INFOGRAPHIC BY JORDAN GUMMERE (’17)