For this year's Project Innovate, our 7th Graders proposed solutions on a wide range of topics, from school-sponsored trips to programming to alumnae engagement. While practicing skills like research, collaborative work, public speaking and presenting, students had the opportunity to identify issues or questions that mattered to them and then dig into finding solutions.

Each year for Project Innovate, 7th Graders choose their topics of interest and work in small groups as they spend the week free from the regular class schedule doing market research, meeting with faculty, staff and alumnae subject matter experts, preparing proposed budgets and developing new initiatives and innovative solutions to present to a panel of judges in a Shark Tank-style culmination to the project. This year's judges included teachers, staff, administrators and Head of School Chris Hughes, who heard each team's proposals, had the opportunity to ask follow-up questions and, ultimately, chose the team whose idea seemed the most original and practical.

Project Innovate is a key component of the immersive and dynamic Middle School signature projects. These are projects in each grade that are in-depth investigations by nature, with an interdisciplinary approach that gives way to cross-curricular connections. These projects target specific 21st-century skills, create more fluidity within the curriculum and build a stronger foundation of authentic interdisciplinary learning.