Research Ideas for High School Students
Research ideas put students in the driver seat of their education.
Rather than following a prescribed curriculum, students doing research get to decide what topics most interest them, create and execute a plan for expanding their knowledge, and select the best method for sharing what they’ve learned.
In the increasingly test-optional world of college admissions, research ideas help distinguish truly exceptional, self-motivated students from hordes of applicants with stellar grades and similar extracurriculars.
Types of Research Ideas
Not all researchers wear lab coats. Performing your own experiments is only one option in a world of possibilities for exploring your passions through research. Polygence has expert mentors equipped to guide students through writing research papers, creating blogs, recording podcasts, composing music, designing video games, and so much more! No prior experience is required - just a passion for learning.
Research papers
Research papers are the gold standard for making a rigorous, concrete contribution to the advancement of any academic field. When you publish a paper in a peer-reviewed journal, what you learned in your project becomes publicly available to other researchers whose own work may benefit from your insights. There are many peer-reviewed journals that publish outstanding papers from researchers of all levels, even high schoolers!
Creative art projects
Research is an inherently creative process, which is why we welcome students who want their output to reflect their artistic talents. You can channel what you learn through research into a poem, a painting, a musical composition, a photography portfolio, a fashion design, a multimedia collage, and more!
Passion projects
Research papers are geared towards an academic audience, but you may have a different target audience in mind. If your focus is sharing what you’re passionate about with your friends, family, peers, and community members, you have a vast array of media formats to choose from.
Design projects
Research is inventive! Sometimes a proposed solution to a problem can take the form of a design for a product, a tool, a policy, an algorithm, and more. Design can serve specific social purposes like making education fun through a game or advocating for positive change through policy proposals.
