Wheeler Senior Project

Wheeler High school seniors are required to participate in a highly demanding Senior Project involving research and writing on a topic stretching them to learn something new that must include a mentor and spending time at the mentor's work site. Each student's project is completed by making an oral presentation describing what they learned to a public panel of judges including members of the community as well as their teachers. Panel members are scheduled to serve from 5:00 to 9:00 pm with dinner served by the school's culinary arts department, a training session on how to judge the presentations, and then the judging of four to six student presentations. According to both teachers and students this project is a meaningful and powerful experience in the lives of the approximately 500 seniors involved.

The Rotary Club of East Cobb has been a mainstay of this project since its inception fifteen years ago. Five to twelve club members can be counted on each November and April to serve as judges. Eleven (11) East Cobb Rotarians (17% of the club) served as judges at the November 17, 2016 event for a total of thirty-seven (37) volunteer hours. Sign-up for the April 20, 2017 event for the second half of the senior class is currently in process as this report is written. All community judges, including East Cobb Rotarians, who have participated in prior years are invited via email to do so again, and internal club announcements also solicit participation.