What goes through the mind of a student who ceates a portfolio? Some thoughts from a High Tech High student

In 2014 I wrote to Ben Staley and asked "how do you put together your portfolio?"   His reply is part of a book called "Show Your Work"   TINYURL.com/ShowYourWork


In 2018, I contacted Ben to find out if he still makes a portfolio.  Here is his reply:

Hello!

Unfortunately I’ve been super busy and hadn’t had a use for a Digital Portfolio. I moved everything over to Weebly a while back when I was applying for jobs, but now that I am employed and attending school I haven’t had the time or need. That is also why I let my fancy URL expire. Now it’s just BenStaley.weebly.com. As soon as I start applying to jobs I will probably update it as an extension of my resume but this is as “long term” as it’s going to get right now :-)

Best,

Ben

I wrote the following:

Hello Ben,

Thank you for taking time to write back.  How stable is your weebly page?  IS it guaranteed to be around 10 years from now? 

1.  I like the idea that you kept the practice of DP going, even if you made only summary notes for some courses.   It's more than I made of my college courses.

2.  what is it that you like about Weebly?   I want to give my students a "user's" opinion.

3.  Is it okay to share your portfolio on Weebly with my students?  I am putting together an expanded explanation of "what a DP looks like" and I want to use your HTH and your weebly versions as examples. 

4. If you know of any other HTH students who would like to have their DPs looked at by kids in Florida, please put me in contact with those students.    

5.  GRADUATION BY PORTFOLIO -- the state of Rhode Island has an innovation:  Students can qualify to graduate by submitting a portfolio.   You might have heard that the state of Rhode Island is looking for examples of portfolios to show a standard that is expected.   Would you be interested in having your portfolio exhibited and made available to students in other states to look at?

Thanks for your time.   Steve McCrea

My students continue to ask, "What did Ben do?"  and "Where did Ben go?"   now I can say, "WPI" (west Pacific Institute) and show them his new weebly site

Ben wrote the following:

Hello! Sorry for the delay

Weebly as a company seems pretty stable but I’ll never really be sure. The internet is a constantly changing place and I need to be flexible to change with it. Hopefully I won’t have to remake it anytime soon though :P

1. Yeah right now I was more focused on the framework of my DP. That way when I am out of college I can use it as an extension of my resume (which as worked well in the past)

2. I am a fairly technical person so if I had unlimited time I would design my own website. However I do not have unlimited time and weebly simply offered me a template that I liked (I am very picky). I used adobe illustrator and photoshop to make custom graphics and that’s about it.

3. I am not sure if my hth DP still exists unfortunately, but if you have it you can share it. You can also share the weebly one but make sure everyone knows I don’t use it right now so it’s rough :)    NOTE:   It exists here

4. I don’t think any of my friends from hth keep up their portfolios anymore. Maybe when it’s time to start applying for jobs. You can always go on the hth website and there is a list of current students that you could get in touch with. You can also contact the staff.

5. I would be interested, but I would be curious to know the requirements of want an example should look like (as mine is incomplete). Is there a certain time they need to be done? If it’s far enough out I might be able to polish it up.

Additionally, if you have any advice for how I can improve my digital portfolio I am all ears. P.S. The contact page on my website does work but I would prefer email for back and fourth communication.

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Ben's advice appears in TINYURL.com/ShowYourWork

What goes into a Digital Portfolio?

Example of a "complete" Digital Portfolio.

Notice that the student includes comments in some of the pages as "reflections" about the work.

This blogpost is a form of "archive."  The work of Ben Staley is on a Google Site, but the site appears to be under the High Tech High Google Site.   To help students of the future, selections of Ben's digital portfolio are displayed here so you can get a quick overview of "what a large DP looks like."
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You can see these items in a Google Drive archive HERE

Ben Staley wrote two descriptions of the process he used to assemble his DPs.  The first is from 2014 (his last year at High Tech High school) and the second is from 2018 (when he was a senior at WPI).

Start a Center for Projects, Presentations and Portfolios in your school.  Click HERE
The Center's website (a tribute to educational pioneer Abraham S. Fischler)

"By our work you will know us" -- How High Tech High used to display links to student websites.

Here's how student work was displayed to
the world at High Tech High in 2014.
The feature of "open access" has been
turned off.

Hover over the name of a school (High Tech High International)
and you can select "HTHI Digital Portfolios"

The HTH website in 2014

Click on a school's grade and you could see
a list of "first name, initial of the last name"

This link was kept PRIVATE.
Students who wanted to "show the world" their
portfolio had the option to make their links public

Here's an example of a "public" student
website.  The student opened her work
for the public to view

The student didn't show much...

There were two projects in the 10th grade

This is the screen for this student's
portfolio for the 9th grade

This video shows a feature that no longer exists at High Tech High's websites. The school used to display links to student work open to the world. "By our work you will know us" High Tech High in 2017 did not show links to individual sites, They show only student work that has been published, often in ebooks.

Schools might consider the value of posting links to the sites created by students...

"You will know our school better by looking at the work of our students"

Why would High Tech High choose to turn off the links to individual student sites?
a) Quality of work
I have seen mispellings [this is intended] and typos.  Student work would have to be monitored.  It's just easier to keep the portfolios off of the general Internet.

b) Safety concerns
Some students might list a personal mobile phone number or a home address or show a photo that gave away facial features.   It's easier to have no access" to student work and avoid the risk of lawsuits.  "If the school had not allowed student work to be seen by the general pblic, then the pervert who attacked / kidnapped / targeted my child would not have had access to the information that allowed the pervert to get close to my child."

c)  Copyright and plagiarism
"Hey, another student at another school stole my essay and submitted the work as his work."

d) Concerns of teachers who might have to re-make some questions ... 
A student might post his final exam pages with the answers clearly shown.

This is the "Student Projects" page in 2017

High Tech High in 2017 does not display links to student websites.   You can see the current display at   hightechhigh.org   click on "Student Work" and the link to "Projects"

Example of a project

A 6th grade project

Links to supporting documents

• LanternProjectindividualresearchmindmappingformat
• Lantern Project Camp 3 Packet
• Camp 1 Lantern Packet

Why not go to this site and look at some projects?  It appears that actual student work is not shown but the projects (and the features of the projects) are shown.   Teachers at other schools could download these materials.  This website clearly pushes the value of digital portfolios and projects to a new level by sharing the methods of HTH with the world.

Still, I would like to see student work.  I have downloaded screenshots of parts of Abel Thun's website (made with weebly) and it is currently viewable at www.TINYURL.com/ABELSite

(who knows how long that link will be active?)

Add caption

This is the heart of the portfolio...
What did the kid do with the classwork?
What internship did the kid choose?

Would you click on this guy's resume?
I would.   I want to know more...

I heard that Abel received offers from four colleges for "full ride" scholarships for tuition ... His video has only 47 views and I was probably responsible for 20 of those views (since I showed the video to over a dozen students).   It doesn't take many views to push a student to the top of a college's list of "who to let in."

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I wrote to Abel Thon and asked if he had a larger Digital Portfolio (DP).

He replied that he indeed has another DP, but he chose to display highlights in the DP that he showed to colleges.  

I found a "larger" DP at TINYURL.com/ExampleDP.  The images from Ben Staley's portfolios are posted on another post of this blog.  CLICK HERE to see them.  

You can see more examples here TINYURL.com/ExampleDPs

Start a Center for Projects, Portfolios in your school