2,893 Inspirational Passion Project Ideas
Turn inspirations into your passion project.
This collection of project ideas, shared by Polygence mentors, is meant to help inspire student thinking about their own project. Students are in the driver seat of their research and are free to use any or none of the ideas shared by their mentors.
- AI/ML
- Animation
- Arts
- Biology
- Biotech
- Business
- Cancer
- Chemistry
- Cognitive
- Computer Science
- Creative Writing
- Dance
- Dentistry
- Economics
- Engineering
- Entomology
- Environmental Science
- Ethics
- Fashion
- Finance
- Game Design
- Healthcare
- History
- Illustration
- Languages
- Linguistics
- Literature
- Math
- Medicine
- Music
- Neuroscience
- Nutrition
- Organizational Leadership
- Philanthropy
- Philosophy
- Photography
- Physics
- Psychiatry
- Psychology
- Public Health
- Quantitative
- Social
- Social Science
- Sports Analytics
- Statistics
- Surgery
Write, Direct, Produce, and Edit a No-Budget Film
A no-budget film is exactly what its name suggests: a project that is created on a very small or even non-existent budget. Did you know that The Blair Witch Project and Night of the Living Dead are both no-budget movies? In order to create and produce a short film or tv show pilot episode on no budget, thinking outside the box is imperative: you may have to learn skills like the basics of screenwriting or filmmaking, or you may want to get your friends on board to help with the project. No matter how you decide to produce your audiovisual piece, this project would be the perfect challenge for you if you are an individual with a story that you think belongs on the big (or small) screen!
Philosophy, Literature, Languages
Experimental, Mixed Methods, or Qualitative Research
Do you have a question you want to explore scientifically? We can partner to plan and execute a research project, that you can present at a conference or submit for publication. Expand your understanding of research design and methods. Learn to clean, analyze, and synthesize data results into scientific reports. I have rigorous experience managing survey and database designs, report writing, and the following methodologies: quantitative methods (ie key statistical concepts and application in statistical software), qualitative research methods (ie design, data collection, analysis and qualitative meta-synthesis), and systematic reviews, quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods, (ie synthesizing the best available evidence).
Music, Philosophy, Psychology, Creative Writing, Social Science
The Youth Perspective
Oftentimes, many issues that are decided in legislative bodies most affect children and young adults, yet Congress is one of the oldest in history. Do we have a gerontocracy? How can those under 30 use their firsthand experience to create change within our political system on issues like gun control, school systems, and drug use? This project could either be a proposal or a collection of op-eds.
Philosophy, History, Economics, Creative Writing, Social Science
Haikus in Idleness
Did you know haikus (5-7-5 syllable poems) were originally written back and forth between multiple people? One person sends a 5-7-5 and the recipient responds with a 7-7 and another 5-7-5 and they go back and forth in a collaborative anthology of sorts. This haiku exchange is through letter writing and journaling, a bite-sized way to capture the world in a 5-7-5 grain of sand.
Philosophy, Psychology, Literature, Creative Writing
The Qur'ān and Literary Narrative
This project would engage how the semiotics (meaning-making narrative) of the Qur'ān is structured. The Qur'ān is often thought to be a disconnected and 'non-linear' text. This project would engage how, while discursive, the Qur'ān displays coherent thematic connectivity (i.e ring composition) and rhetorical structure. The learning outcomes would be applicable to different literacy genres in general, not simply sacred scripture, and could highlight how semantic shifts, pronominal shifts, shifts in narrator voice, and other features of 'post-modern' literature can still create a thematically connected 'text'.
Philosophy, Languages
Hollywood vs. History
With this project, students can watch popular movies that are based on historical events and compare the depictions and characterizations against the actual accounts found in primary sources. This allows students to learn how popular legend and the mythologizing of history takes place.
Philosophy, Literature
Literary or Philosophical Analysis--Project of Your Choice!
Critical reading of any text that sparks your interest.
Music, Philosophy, Linguistics
Art Interpreting Art: Where One Medium Meets Another
Though my own work is mostly about the interface between music and literature, we can explore any kind of art that combines art forms, such as music and painting, painting and poetry, drama and music, and so for. The possibilities are endless!
Music, Philosophy, Linguistics
Monuments, Morality, and Memory: Exploring the Intersections of Ethics and Aesthetics
This project explores how monuments (or other kinds of public art) preserve important historical events and considers the ethical implications of that preservation. First, we’ll explore how a physical object like a carved stone represents historical moments and moral values. We’ll ask questions about where ‘the ethical’ is located in a physical object and in what ways the ‘meaning’ of a physical object can change over time. We’ll explore who determines the ‘meaning’ of an art piece and its interpretation. How much should we weigh the artist’s intention, the values held by the community at the time of the monument’s creation, or the community in which the monument exists at present when considering what virtues or meaning a monument represents? Finally, we will explore what to do about monuments that might be unethical or no longer representative of the values a community currently hold, whether that be moving the monument, destroying the monument, erecting a plaque, or leaving it alone.
Philosophy
Policy Analysis and Persuasion:
We can identify policies and programs that could solve a given problem. We can then craft a policy memo or prepare an oral presentation depending on the decision maker.
Philosophy
Create a Literature Blog
This project would be a great way to familiarize yourself with literary critique, and to push yourself to think both as a reader and as writer. By creating and running your own literary blog, you will gather and polish skills such as analytic writing, basic web design, and social media outreach and advertising. This project would also be highly customizable, as you may choose to write brief reviews or longer scholarly essays. Either way, it will allow you to craft your own online space as an emerging literary voice!
Philosophy, Literature, Languages
The Impact of Tolerance on Mental Health
This project could take the form of a research study proposal with goals of looking at how being generally tolerant or intolerant (e.g. of differing viewpoints, of certain experiences) could influence depression, anxiety, anger, or other areas of mental health. Some examples of how this study could look is: -An online survey that included measures of tolerance and mental health symptoms such as depression, anxiety, anger, or others. -A study with an experimental design where, after degree of tolerance is measured at the beginning of the experiment, a person is exposed to a newspaper article or some other stimulus that reflects a view they oppose. Mental health symptoms could be measured before and after the person is presented with this stimulus, and statistical analysis could be conducted to see if people with higher degrees of tolerance experienced less distress/mental health symptoms than those with lower degrees of tolerance. The goal of this project would be to produce a complete research study proposal that would be ready to submit for review by an institutional review board/ethics committee (which is a requirement for all research studies involving human participants). This could then be used by the project leader (you #:) ) in the future to conduct this study, and provide an opportunity to learn skills essential to creating and carrying out research.
Philosophy, Cognitive, Statistics
Ethics of AI
Artificial intelligence is promising many big changes in our world. In this project, we will spend some time understanding the technical underpinnings of things like generative AI and then dive into literature on the ethics of it. Students will come away with a deeper understanding of generative AI from both technical and societal standpoint.
Biology, Philosophy, Engineering, Computer Science, Photography
How to do Nothing
Activities and reflections geared around "doing nothing". To find cracks and gaps in a busy day to be nothing: not a student, not a sibling, not a friend, not even a member of society. Just be nothing. Just exist and everything else with unfold by itself. Do "nothing" and see what "somethings" can happen!
Philosophy, Psychology, Literature, Creative Writing
Music and Poetry: Song, Opera, Lyrics, Fiction, and More
In my dissertation, I took a personally and politically reflective look at the relationship between poetry and music in the songs (or Lieder, in German) of Schubert, Schumann, Beethoven, Brahms, and so forth. We can do something similar for anything that interests you at this interface between what writers and composers do, and how performers and audiences mediate these inter-artistic conjunctions. I'm most comfortable with music in the tradition of European classical music, but we can explore any genre that interests you.
Music, Philosophy, Linguistics
What Can Games Teach Us About Politics?
Politics is often described as a game, where competing "teams" try to score political "points" against each other. This project explores how far the games-politics analogy can take us. In particular, it considers what lessons thinking about sportsmanship and game design might have for political ethics and the design of political institutions. As a final project, students will attempt to create a board game that captures the rules of the political game, both as they are and as they would need to be for the game to be worth playing. Note: Politics is complicated, so be ready to unleash your inner board game geek!
Philosophy
Conference Paper/Presentation
As an undergraduate, I produced 2 academic papers a year which were presented at international conferences and published in academic journals. Conducting an independent research project will allow you to explore a personal area of interest in more depth and demonstrate your dedication to pursuing knowledge for the sake of learning. Together we will explore your interests, develop the scope of the project (qualitative or quantitative), and learn how to navigate the landscape of current literature to produce a focused, applicable, and professional article of original research.
Music, Philosophy, Psychology, Creative Writing, Social Science
Nature's Past: Let's Do Environmental History!
History isn't all wars and presidents—it's also the material world! From climate, food, and microbes to mosquitos, horses, and fire, this project provides an opportunity to explore the relationship between people and the natural environment. After picking a topic that is meaningful to you, we'll break the research and writing process down into manageable steps. Along the way, we'll learn a little about what environmental history is—and why today's environmental problems are also historical problems.
Philosophy, History
Cognitive Compensation Strategies for Individuals with Cognitive Impairment
This project could be a review paper on research-based strategies to help people compensate for cognitive difficulties that may be a result of different physical or mental health conditions. Tasks involved in this project would include exploring current research studies in fields such as clinical psychology, rehabilitation psychology, or others that apply these kinds of interventions and discuss their effectiveness. This could be specialized to a certain population or diagnosis, such as dementia, traumatic brain injury, or others. Ideally, the findings of these studies would be summarized and discussed in a written review, with the goals of professional presentation or publication in a peer-reviewed journal. This could also be a more practically focused piece that could be published in an academic blog or other formats more easily accessible to the general public.
Philosophy, Cognitive, Statistics
Thinking about minds
When we look out at the world, we can immediately tell which kinds of things have "minds" and which ones don't. (We'd be shocked if the garbage can started moving itself across the floor.) What's more, we have beliefs about what kinds of minds others have --- e.g., toddlers can have desires but can't think rationally; bugs seem to feel less pain than dogs and cats. These are incredible inferences to make: Humans are the only creatures on earth that are capable of thinking this way. In this project, we'll start off by reading and discussing papers about how people make these kinds of judgments, and we'll work towards developing a project. We could even run a study together and analyze the data! I'm open to whatever your interests might be --- we can do some research, or we can do something totally new.
Philosophy, Psychology, AI/ML, Cognitive
