The Scholar Program
One-to-one research mentorship for students in grades 8 to 12. Over eight to ten weeks, your child turns a subject they love into an original research paper, with a PhD mentor from one of the world’s top 50 universities beside them at every step.
Book a free consultationEight to ten weeks, one mentor, and a clear goal at every stage.
Your child meets their mentor online every week, and does 5 or more hours of their own work in between. Here’s what each stage looks like, and who does what. The thinking and the writing always stay your child’s.
Your child
Reads widely around a topic they already love and narrows it down to one question they can actually answer.
Their mentor
Helps sharpen the focus, points to the papers worth reading, and helps make the question original.
Your child
Chooses a method (a survey, a dataset, a model, a close reading) and plans what evidence to collect.
Their mentor
Teaches the method the way it’s used at university, and checks the plan fits the weeks available.
Your child
Collects the data or sources, runs the analysis, and starts to see what the evidence really says.
Their mentor
Reviews the analysis, asks the questions a real reviewer would, and helps the conclusions follow from the evidence.
Your child
Writes the full paper in the structure real journals use: introduction, method, results, discussion.
Their mentor
Gives line-by-line feedback across several drafts, so your child’s writing gets stronger each time.
Your child
Polishes the final paper and prepares it for a journal, a competition or a symposium.
Their mentor & our team
Help choose a credible venue, prepare the submission, and stay with them through reviewer feedback.
Skills your child builds along the way
- Asking a sharp questionTurning a big interest into something they can investigate
- Reading researchFinding, understanding and weighing academic papers
- Research methodsSurveys, data analysis, modeling or close reading, depending on the field
- Academic writingStructuring an argument the way university papers do
- Taking feedbackRevising through drafts, like real researchers do with reviewers
- Presenting their workExplaining what they found with confidence, in writing and out loud
From idea to finished paper
Over eight to ten weeks, your child's mentor guides them through each stage.
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Find a topic
Narrow a broad interest down to an angle your child cares about.
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Ask a strong question
Shape a focused, original research question.
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Review the literature
Read what others have written on the topic.
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Find the gap
Spot the part of the question still waiting to be explored. That’s where your child’s paper comes in.
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Choose a method
Pick an approach that suits the question and the time available.
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Collect and analyze
Gather the evidence and see what it shows.
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Write it up
Draft the paper in a clear academic structure.
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Cite and revise
Polish the paper through several drafts with mentor feedback.
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Submit or present
Share the finished work through a journal, a competition or a conference.
Finding the right question
Every great paper starts with a clear question, and your child's mentor helps them find one that is focused, original and achievable.
Too broad: A whole subject, like “social media and teenagers.”
Just right: One specific question your child can explore in the time they have, like “Does late-night phone use shorten sleep for 15-year-olds?”
Approaches that work for students
Survey and quantitative
Collect data and analyze the numbers.
Qualitative
Interviews, surveys and analysis of texts and media.
Secondary data
Explore existing datasets across many fields.
Systematic review
Bring together and assess existing studies.
Computational or modeling
Build a model, algorithm or argument.
Comparative analysis
Compare cases, texts or policies to find patterns.
What makes a strong paper
Focused
A clear question explored in depth.
Original
Built on existing work and adding something new.
Rigorous
Careful, well supported and written to a university-level standard.
Subjects we cover
Across STEM, the humanities and the social sciences.
STEM
Humanities & Social Sciences
How does sleep shape the teenage brain’s response to addiction?
- Interest
- Teenagers are famously short on sleep. Does that affect more than how tired they feel?
- Question
- Does losing sleep during adolescence make teens more vulnerable to addiction, and is the brain’s dopamine reward system the link?
- Approach
- A systematic review: a structured search of peer-reviewed medical research (PubMed, 2000–2026), selecting studies against clear criteria, then comparing experimental and long-term studies. First, a clear explanation of how sleep works and how the brain’s reward circuit connects to its decision-making centre.
- Finding
- Across the studies, less sleep (especially later bedtimes and shorter weekend sleep) went hand in hand with more substance use and stronger reward-seeking later on.
- Outcome
- A paper making the case for healthy sleep as a powerful, underused way to help prevent teen addiction, with ideas for schools and education programs.
Students in our mentor network have published in respected journals.
Every paper is written to be shared. We help each student choose the right journal, competition or symposium for their field, prepare the submission, and work through reviewer feedback, so they learn how real research gets published.
Journals
- The Concord Review
- Journal of Emerging Investigators
- Columbia Junior Science Journal
- National High School Journal of Science
- Stanford Intersect
- STEM Fellowship Journal
- Young Scientists Journal
- Journal of Student Research
- International Journal of High School Research
- Journal of High School Science
- Journal of Innovative Student Research
- Whitman Journal of Psychology
- IEEE
Competitions and symposia
- Regeneron ISEF
- Junior Science and Humanities Symposium
- John Locke Institute Essay Prize
Journals and competitions where students in our research mentor network have published or presented their work.
Start with what your child loves.
A no-pressure, 30-minute conversation with one of our enrollment advisors, where we learn from each other: you hear how the program works, and we get to know your child.
- 1We learn about your child’s interests and goals
- 2We share the program plan and how it supports those goals
- 3Next steps: mentor match, project idea and timeline