When it comes to teaching students, working with mentors from outside the classroom can be invaluable. Studies show that high school students who have been mentored are more likely to be engaged in high school overall and to graduate from college or other post-secondary training. 

To encourage this kind of student growth and confidence, High School District 214 has launched a program to connect students with mentors who can help them succeed in high school and beyond.

Wheeling High School students in December worked with rising film director Jon Whalen to create a study guide for his film “Stink!,” a documentary that shows how certain companies aren’t completely revealing what is in their products due to a loophole in the Food and Drug Administration’s rules.

Kacper Mocarski spent over a year developing an app for Prospect High School students with IEPs, or Individualized Educational Plans, to help them discreetly request special accommodations for assessments.

For confidentiality reasons, Kacper will never know who is benefitting from his work. But that doesn’t bother Kacper.

“If you have accommodations, you shouldn’t be afraid to use them and I wanted to make something easy for students so they had more access.”

In just under a year, Mustangs Organizing for Social Transformation, or M.O.S.T., has spurred action among students at Rolling Meadows High School.

Members of M.O.S.T. have organized a variety of social justice-focused activities that have drawn hundreds of students, from hosting a candidate’s forum prior to the November election to collecting hygiene products for women in poverty and holding a 17-minute walkout in March to honor the victims of the Parkland shooting.

Why was 2018 the year for the Rolling Meadows boys cross country team? Read the journey of each runner and learn how determination, perseverance and consistency, among other life skills, helped the team reach the state finals for the first time in the school’s 48-year history.

Buffalo Grove High School student artists chose to highlight environmental issues in the school’s student-run art gallery this year. Their goal? Start a dialogue through art about the world’s climate problems.

Inside the Automotive Technology classroom at John Hersey High School, students are performing tire repairs, building cars and discovering their futures.

Zoe Axelrod plans to pursue a career in the graphic design industry after building her skills in and out of the classroom, and creating work that has been featured at the national level.