Using Project-Based Learning to Build College and Career Readiness Among Diverse Learners

In an attempt to merge current state learning standards with college and career readiness skills, some educators have turned to project-based learning (PjBL). Its emphasis on collaboration, critical thinking, collective problem solving, communication, creativity, and deeper learning through real-life, authentic projects, make PjBL an attractive option for learner-centered engagement, developing students’ natural curiosity, and applied practice. Components of PjBL align well with features of special education, including high leverage practices and universal design for learning. In this article, the authors apply design principles of PjBL throughout the Car Project, an instructional unit on the car-buying experience for diverse high school learners, offered as an example of the potential PjBL holds to engage and educate secondary students with diverse learning needs. Project-based learning may hold particular promise for motivating diverse learners at the secondary level who have become disengaged from education.