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St. Johnsbury Academy Senior Capstone Program Guidebook

Http://sites.google.com/site/stjacapstone

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   

Local  Watershed  Protection  with  Riparian  Buffers  

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St. Johnsbury Academy

Senior Capstone Program Guidebook

-Table of Contents-

I. Course Description and Expectations - 3 -

II. Choosing a Capstone - 4 -

A. Define and Prepare Yourself

B. Choosing a Project

C. Design Your Project

D. Initiate Research

E. Establish a Working Title

III. Proposing your idea - 6 -

A. Formal written proposal

B. Presenting the idea orally

IV. Capstone Day Presentation - 7 -

V. Completing the Capstone - 8 -

A. The Final Pieces of Writing

B. Suggested Timeline

C. Conclusion and Evaluation

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I. Course Description & Expectations Capstone is a mandatory one-semester course for Academy seniors. The culmination of all previous learning, capstone serves as an opportunity for you to demonstrate your mastery of Academy standards as you prepare to further your education, embark on your careers, and carry your overall Academy experience into your personal and professional lives.

The capstone curriculum is linked to the mission of the school. The development of a professional attitude sets the tone for character. The research and problem solving required to complete the program addresses inquiry and the sharing of your ideas with the Academy and local communities addresses community.

In addition to meeting the mission of the school, the goals of senior capstones are to help you:

• Broaden your academic capabilities.

• Embrace creativity and productivity to create a professional end product that reflects enhanced talents and passions.

• Prepare to be persistent problem solvers who are adaptive to change in a globally competitive society.

• Facilitate cross-community exchanges and communication both with young people and with elders by means of intergenerational interviews, conversations, and field research.

• Nurture leadership opportunities, community involvement, citizenship, team building, and collaboration with peers and professionals.

• Recognize the importance of technology integration, universal media tools, and state-of-the art presentations in the 21st century.

• Understand the essence of business management, competence, and professionalism, including the use of formal presentations, follow-through, and product outcome.

• Build self-confidence, perseverance, integrity, and responsibility.

EXPECTATIONS:

The principle expectations of a capstone student is that you will: enter into either a professional or an academic conversation about an idea/issue/topic, using research, problem solving, interpersonal, and communication skills; instill habits of professionalism and civil discourse; develop a portfolio of work that will exhibit your skills and dispositions as you enter adulthood.

From concept through completion, you will be guided through a series of tasks that enable you to do more than deliver a final presentation. Incorporating “real-life” experiences from the business and academic worlds and implementing innovative ideas, (as well as ideals), you should be left with a tangible product that you may use as a resource for the rest of your life.

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At a minimum, you will complete the following tasks:

1. An introspective autobiographical essay;

2. A formal project proposal;

3. A formal oral presentation related to your capstone idea to gain insight into, approval for or to provide instruction about your capstone;

4. A 20 - 60 minute oral presentation at the Senior Capstone Professional Conference day;

5. A formal piece of writing, related to your field, that furthers your work;

6. A digital research portfolio that includes an annotated bibliography, research notes, and research reflections;

7. A final reflection on your capstone process and outcomes;

8. Evidence that your work produced a tangible result;

9. A Digital archive of the above components.

II. Choosing a Capstone You and your instructor should begin by building a healthy learning community and identifying potential resources such as libraries, archives, subject experts, the Internet, museums, and professionals in the field.

A. Define and Prepare Yourself

Before initiating your capstone, you should take some serious time to think about your inner self, to seek out your “moral compass,” a personal measure you each have but that is rarely discussed or described. Who are you? What do you stand for?

Once you can evaluate yourself, in order to outline your own standards and foundation for your upcoming work, you will define PROFESSIONALISM and how your own characteristics will be transformed into a professional setting and one day, your adult lives.

B. Choose a Project

Selecting a project can seem overwhelming. Brainstorm some possible areas of interest. Use your work on defining what you stand for to help your mind wander toward your true areas of passion. Often personal interests, hobbies, curiosities, or passionate subject areas will surface. The most important criterion is that you find an area in which you are strongly interested; otherwise, you will experience an onerous semester! Once an area of interest is determined, it should be narrowed down to a specific, manageable idea. Some questions you might ask yourself are: What, exactly, is the problem that I wish to solve? Why is this problem important to me? Does my solution or hypothesis address the problem from a new angle? Do my secondary approaches/essential questions support my overall solution? Am I communicating my passion

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and the positive outcome I want? If you have quality answers for these questions and you have an idea that seems interesting, you must test its validity.

Step 1: find some professionals in the area of your interest and share your idea with them. Describe what you are thinking about and hoping to do. Do not use phrasing such as, “for my capstone... ” or “as a senior at the Academy, I have to….” Own your idea and share it for its own merits. Be sure to bring a notebook or recording device to note the responses of those with whom you speak. If you record your conversation, be sure you get informed consent from your subject.

Step 2: using your own questions and the comments you gathered from professionals in the field, do some skimming and scanning research into your idea (see more on the skimming and scanning method in the research section below). Use several different resources for this part of the project development. If you have found enough evidence that your idea has many possibilities and that it still piques your interest, you are ready to move on.

Step 3: schedule a one-on-one session with your teacher. You should share your rationale paragraph and describe your idea and its motivation. You should also be able to articulate why you are motivated to pursue your proposed idea. Finally, you should be able to show that ample research will allow you easily to explore your idea.

D. Initiate Research

You should understand the advantages and importance of primary and secondary sources and field research. The more reliable resources you utilize, the more credibility your ideas will have.

You should conduct research through a variety of mediums such as the Internet, books, magazines, professional journals, newspapers, subject experts, exhibits, field interviews, and/or various geographic sites where credible information can be obtained.

Methodology (the process by which you will approach doing research):

• Ask probing questions – questions should dig into particular ideas; they should be open-ended;

• Search for valid sources – look for credibility, reliability, and variety (both of type and perspective);

• Skim and scan – this is how you should start your research. Read only the table of contents and introduction to books, the abstracts of scholarly articles, or the first few paragraphs of articles without abstracts. Be sure to note the main themes/findings;

• Evaluate sources – create an annotated bibliography that addresses the credibility of the source, succinctly summarizes the main themes, and discusses how you use the source in your research;

• Take notes – identify the most important ideas and give full definitions to them; also, if you find valuable quotations, ensure that you record them directly and accurately.

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Synthesis:

• Identify trends in the data and organize data by those trends • Return to dig deeper into the best sources and add data to the appropriate categories • Draw inferences and recognize implications of the data trends

Application:

• Use data to tell a compelling story about what the research allows people to do or understand

F. Establish a Working Title

Although your capstone title may change, a working title will assist you with direction, lending depth to your goals and end results. Remember that a title should grab the reader’s attention and define your main theme.

III. Proposing Your Idea A. Writing the Capstone Proposal

A good proposal has an attractive, professional, inviting appearance. It is well organized, includes technical details, and persuades the reader with substance. It is a persuasive document.

1. Create an attractive title page:

• Grab the reader’s attention and define the idea

• Have an image that helps grab attention and establish the idea

• Include your name or the names of all team members

• Include the date (name(s) and date should be on the bottom right)

2. Executive summary (write this last)

• This is a brief summary of the whole proposal that is 1/3 to ½ of a page

3. State the problem (the why?):

• What is the background that created the problem?

• Why is the problem important to address?

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• How have others defined the problem already and what solutions have been proposed (literature review)? (This may include past capstones related to the same issue).

• Give a detailed problem description, as you now understand it.

4. Objectives (the what?)

• Describe your solution to the problem that you just identified

• What are you hoping to accomplish with your solution?

• What are the important design issues, constraints, and limitations of your solution?

5. Approach/Methodology (the how?)

• How will you implement your solution?

• What are the steps you will take to implement your solution (include a timetable)?

• What are the benefits/advantages of your solution?

• How will you analyze the performance of your solution (measurement of outcomes)?

6. Deliverables/Outcomes (the impact?)

• What will the result of your work be?

• Give a detailed account of when the work will be completed.

• Give a detailed description of how the impact of the work will be sustained. (adapted from PSU and James Bentley)

B. Presenting Your Idea

Once the formal proposal has been written and revised, you must gain the support/approval of the idea that you wish to pursue from a client or person of authority who can help ensure that your concept will be supported and completed. The pitch should be a 10-15 minute oral “sale” of your idea. Ultimately, you want the client or authority to “buy into” your idea.

Some basic steps to follow are:

• Be sure to know your professional contact. A preliminary interview will help you to understand any possible objections or skepticism that exists that you can overcome with good research.

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• Be ready to demonstrate how your project will prove successful, through the effective use of evidence.

• Be sure you remain focused. Stay on task.

• Be aware of the client/person in authority’s expectations and anticipate questions they are likely to have.

• Be realistic and truthful.

• Be ready with the basics of your pitch. Show the what, why, how, when, and who.

• Be sure to show your passion for your idea.

Professionalism implies specific values. Make sure you address your client properly, dress appropriately, and thank him/her before you leave. (A hand-written thank you note mailed to your professional contact is always a nice touch).

Additional tips for pitching a proposal can be found on the capstone webpage, – http://sites.google.com/site/stjacapstone -- along with a separate document that details how to prepare an effective oral presentation.

IV. Capstone Day Presentation Remember that while this presentation is the most formal oral communication that you will do in your secondary school educational career, this is only one fifth of the entire project. You and your teacher will spend a good deal of time working on oral presentation skills for both the first oral presentation of your idea and for your presentation of your semester’s work at Capstone Day. You will use Garr Reynolds’ Presentation Zen along with other resources to develop your skills.

V. Completing the capstone Once you have completed the presentation portion of your capstone project, a wave of relief is no doubt in order. However, in order to maintain momentum and passion for the entire project on which you have thus far worked so hard, it is important to emphasize that a meaningful component remains – a professionally conducted wrap-up, in which a tangible product is delivered with final documentation.

You should remember the value of a hand-written thank you note or phone call to the people or organizations with whom you have worked. Perhaps there are copies of the presentation that need to be distributed. This should be done in a timely matter. You have completed, in essence, a business transaction. Your professionalism and courtesy should continue to be illustrated.

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Most of you will be conducting your capstones in “the real world.” Arranging for continued documentation of outcomes and “customer” feedback, and/or maintaining a record of statistics or consequences of the circumstances are very important.

Many of you will end up out in the community to fulfill your capstone later in the semester or even throughout the year. Since each capstone might warrant a different procedure and timeframe, your teacher should assist you with a proper follow-through method.

A. The Final Pieces of Writing

You are required to turn in a final written piece and a final reflection by the end of the semester. Teachers will detail an exact expectation, including a due-date of what you need to do to fulfill your full capstone requirements.

The final written piece should help your capstone reach a tangible outcome. Examples of final written pieces may be but are not limited to: a grant proposal, a course curriculum, a research paper, a journal article, a business plan, a professional research poster, a website, or a wiki.

In the final reflection, you need to use your own words to briefly express your main capstone idea and its relevance.

Consider reflecting on the following items:

1. Are there any tangible results that can be reported or are the issues still speculative?

2. Will/did your work actually come to fruition?

3. What are your projections for future outcomes from your work?

4. What was your personal take on your presentation and where does your work go from here?

5. What have you learned from the process (personal strengths and weaknesses)?

Reflections that you will write need to be just as effective as the compilation of your proposal, pitches, and presentations.

B. Suggested Timeline

It goes without saying that we all tend to procrastinate when given an ample amount of time to complete a task. Discipline is key; setting “time goals” and receiving constructive feedback along the way not only enforces but also strengthens responsibility, a valuable character life skill for you.

You have about sixteen weeks from beginning to end to complete your capstone. A suggested timeline is as follows (note that this is suggested – each person’s may be a bit different):

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Weeks 1 – 3: Define who you are and what you stand for. Define professionalism and how you see yourself fitting in to this definition. Define a problem. Decide on an individual or team project. Begin preliminary research.

Weeks 4 – 5: Prepare an oral and written proposal of your project.

Weeks 6 – 7: Revise your oral presentation as suggested by your professional contact(s) and gain final approval for your project.

Weeks 8 – 11: Do most of the work required to implement your proposed solution to the problem that your project identified.

Weeks 12 – 13: Design and practice your capstone day presentation of your semester’s work.

Week 14: Capstone Day Presentation

Weeks 15 – 16: Complete the capstone with final written work and archiving of your project.

C. Conclusion/Evaluation

In addition to the group roundtable and feedback from your peers, you should have a one-on-one meeting with your instructor and, if possible, a professional in the field who worked with you on your capstone. Making time to “personalize” your capstone can potentially open doors and encourage further motivation for capstone projects to continue.

Where some of you are confident about yourselves and your capstone, some might easily be looking at your capstones simply as a homework assignment that has finally come to a close. Then again, there is no doubt some of you have “fallen” into a deep passion for your projects. Confidence has surfaced as you have come out of your cocoons, and perhaps have realized, maybe for the first time, you have strengths, convictions, and even a gift to move forward with your work – long after graduation from the Academy.

The achievement of capstone project goals is a highlight of the St. Johnsbury Academy student journey. Capstone is a realization of the Academy’s mission to provide a foundation in character, inquiry, and community -- a realization  that  can  provide  many  success  stories.