High School Capstone Project Examples Senior Project Art Capstone

A different way of thinking about passion projects and extracurriculars for college admissions

A capstone projects allows your child to turn their interests into milestones — A capstone projects allows your kid to turn their interests into milestones

Part 1: Introduction

If you're the parent of a vivid, motivated high schooler, you lot've probably been thinking about their extracurricular activities, which class a crucial component of a serious candidate's higher application. Yous're probable aware of the usual suspects equally far as later-school options go: athletics; theater, music, drama, or dance; debate; academic teams; robotics or scientific discipline competitions; customs service through school or religious organizations.

Yous've also probably heard the broad, true communication that it'south wise to let your child's natural interests dictate their choice of extracurricular activities, and that it's oftentimes better for an bidder to demonstrate a deep and passionate involvement in a handful of things than to be a shallow participant in a ton of different organizations.

If you experience similar you already know some of the basics of the extracurricular profile conversation, and you're equipped to help your kid choose the right clubs and activities for them, you might consider some "advanced" extracurricular tactics, namely working toward a capstone projection. In this post, we'll identify what a capstone project is, talk through developing capstone project ideas, and discuss how to carry out and evaluate a capstone project.

Everything that follows is a way of demystifying the ubiquitous questions that seem to grow in college admissions: What is your passion? What are you passionate about?

Most teenagers don't know the respond to these questions. (Many adults don't!) Merely pursuing a capstone projection is a manner of testing whether or not an interest runs deep enough to be a passion. If information technology does, your child might unlock something important about their future. If it doesn't, your child will still have learned how to own, develop, and execute their ideas.

Capstone projects vs. passion projects

Questions sometimes arise regarding the divergence betwixt these ii terms. Outset, let'south answer the question: what is a passion project?

A passion project is a self-driven and independent project your child undertakes to go deeper into a subject, hobby, or pursuit. It tin can, and probably should, exist carried out with the support of a mentor or advisor, merely information technology might exist outside of school frameworks—beyond the classroom, and beyond clubs. Still, a successful passion project will probably draw on existing resources in your child'due south academic and extracurricular universe.

Such a pursuit could accept identify over the course of 4 or more than years, or in a single weekend. We'll discuss timelines for capstone projects soon, and identify the ways in which they're distinct.

So, to recap, a passion project may be:

Beyond the classroom, but not apart from the support of a teacher; it might begin in a classroom
Beyond extracurriculars, merely not apart from the support of a double-decker, teacher, or other extracurricular mentor; it might begin through an extracurricular
Cocky-driven, guided by your kid's personal interests

That third bullet point may be the hardest. In an age when teenagers' lives are so hyper-scheduled, pursuing something outside the fold can be hard.

Here's an example. Mayhap your child began writing science fiction novels in their spare fourth dimension in heart school. The writing has no real showtime or end. You can assist your child nurture that passion by connecting them to mentors in and out of the classroom, sending them to summer camps or programs on that theme, taking them to readings and events at local bookstores or libraries, and encouraging them to write a few times a week.

What is a capstone project?

This post will focus on capstone projects, which yous might retrieve of as a type of passion projection or every bit a component of a larger passion project.

As we mentioned above, a passion projection tin can be pursued anytime. It can be something your child begins as a freshman (or fifty-fifty earlier) and it can follow them through college. On the other hand, a capstone project takes place during a divers period of time.

Some schools call capstone projects "senior projects" and expect all soon-to-be graduates to evidence off the depth of their noesis or skill in a item surface area earlier they caput into the world. In other cases, students pursue capstone projects entirely apart from official school requirements.

Here'south an example of a capstone project that is run through an extracurricular arrangement but all the same requires enormous self-motivation: the Eagle Scout Service Projection. It takes years to become an Eagle Scout. Your son must earn badges, proceed camping trips or summer excursions, get competent in the outdoors and in service, etc. Then, in society to go an Eagle Scout, he'll need to choose a item community need and run into it. He might organize a article of clothing bulldoze or build a community garden.

This is a classic capstone project: it certainly completes the process of becoming an Hawkeye Scout, simply it's part of a long-term relationship that your son is developing with service.

(Note that the Girl Scout equivalent of the Eagle Scout is the Aureate Honor Girl Scout.)

To continue our outset example, your sci-fi-savvy child might have whatever number of possible capstone projects. They could:

Sign up for NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Calendar month) and try to write a draft of a novel during Nov.
Write a brusk story during their senior twelvemonth that they effort to publish in a journal or mag that features young people's writing (for instance, One Teen Story).
Write a story on a specific scientific topic, collaborating with a local scientist or doing significant research. Perhaps your kid is interested in climatic change. They might practice enough inquiry on climate modify that they sympathise how the surround in your town will shift. Then they can write a story prepare 100 years into the future most the impact of the environmental crisis in your community. In this instance, the project is the capstone, and publication might not be the goal. Perhaps your child instead presents their story at a local environmental fair.
Interview several authors virtually the futurity of science fiction. If your kid loves science fiction only doesn't want to put pressure on themselves to write something in a specific time period, they can instead simply learn more past speaking to authors. Mayhap by attention readings at local bookstores, colleges/universities, or libraries, they can inquire each author 1 question—due east.g. "How practise you lot become nigh world-building another reality?"—and, with the authors' permission, create a website or submit an article compiling several bully science fiction authors' wisdom on a topic that is extremely interesting to other scientific discipline fiction fans.

Whichever of these capstone projects your child chooses, it would stem from their broader passion projection, writing science fiction.

What's the betoken of a capstone project?

Some students are engaged in extracurricular pursuits that accept a natural finale or milestone. A competitive varsity athlete can aim to become land champion. An actress tin can hope to star in her senior play.

But what if your kid'south interests don't fit neatly into a preexisting club?

That'south where a capstone project can assistance a high school educatee go from being a tinkerer to someone accomplished in a particular field or area. By learning how to direct their personal interest into a physical project with measurable results, your child will abound immensely, and volition enter college prepared to tackle more adult challenges from internships to major papers to lab inquiry.

Call up a few things:

A capstone project may not be for everyone.
A capstone projection is a mode to deepen and test interests. If your child finds out during the course of the pursuit that they don't love what they're doing, that'due south okay. They might do good from staying committed to what they've started, just to see it through, or you might be able to assistance them taper things off early so they still reach one milestone only don't have to devote a whole year to the project.

Function two: Brainstorming capstone project ideas

Encourage your child to begin reflecting on their major interests in three areas:

Academics
Extracurriculars
Everything else

For instance, here's what one example student, Joey, jotted downwardly:

Academics: Loves civics and history, especially history of state of war and geopolitics
Extracurriculars: Model United nations, summer courses at Duke on American foreign policy, summer course at Yale on international relations
Everything else: News junkie

In add-on to these major interests, Joey is besides on the soccer team and plays the flute.

Joey doesn't write for the school newspaper—he was never much interested in covering the affairs of his loftier school—simply he does read The Economist and a few other great news outlets regularly. He has some designs on combining the above interests in some form, anytime. He'd beloved to report history or international relations in higher, and would ideally pursue some interdisciplinary studies that permit him to become multiple perspectives on global issues. Maybe one twenty-four hours he'll become a foreign correspondent, a contributor to a foreign policy think tank, a diplomat, or an international lawyer.

We can start in each of the areas to brainstorm. How might Joey button himself in one of these areas?

Academics: Civics and history
- Write an essay or a paper on a topic of interest. Ask teachers about submitting it for awards or prizes.
- Host a debate at school among the honors and AP students most a current event.
Extracurriculars: Model United nations, summertime courses
- Win a major Model Un tournament.
- Combine information from the two summer courses into a seminar for students from his high schoolhouse and/or nearby high schools, which he'll lead.
Everything else: News
- Write researched op-eds and letters to the editor about issues that he is excited near.
- Launch a YouTube channel or a podcast about an issue he is excited about.
- Kickoff his ain magazine or newsletter at his schoolhouse, or in combination with a few other nearby schools, in which students tin write reportage or opinion pieces near national and global political bug.

Evaluating potential capstone projects

At present Joey tin can look through his options—which, call up, came from him asking how he tin push himself in areas he's passionate about—and make a decision. Here'southward what he should ask himself equally he assesses his brainstorm.

Do I need to go outside the standard premises of my classes and clubs? Am I trying to lead or beginning something for its own sake, or could I get what I want out of my existing commitments?
Are any of the options I've written down something I'g truly excited most spending several hours a week on for a chunk of my inferior or senior year?
Do I have the support I would need to carry out one of these ideas? For instance, do I have a faculty advisor in mind, and/or other students to come on board?
Are any of these areas in which I can encounter myself spending more time in college and after?

In the terminate, Joey's conclusion is nigh whether or not he really needs a new projection to devote his attention to. Soccer takes up most of his time when he's in season, and when he's out of season he likes to stay in shape by working out with friends.

But in the stop, he decides he hasn't quite been challenged enough past his existing intellectual outlets, and he misses the intensity of the summer courses he did at Duke and Yale. In order to resurrect that feeling, he decides to practise a version of the last brainstorm bullet point: he launches a web magazine that his classmates from the Knuckles and Yale programs agree to contribute to, and he asks the AP Civics teacher at his school to serve as an advisor.

Another example pupil, Alexia, got injured during her sophomore year on the basketball team. Feeling downward, she wants a way to stay engaged with athletics merely tin can't excogitate of finishing out her high school years without a state or national title to shoot for. After discussing things with her school counselor and coach, she decides she'd similar to acquire more than near photography and technology. She takes photographs for the school paper to comprehend basketball games at kickoff, and and then eventually branches out into filming and editing her quondam teammates' highlight clips, starting a small-scale but thriving business.

A tertiary example student, Younmee, has been interested in healthcare for a long time. There'south no natural guild for her to invest her fourth dimension in, and she isn't fatigued to lab research—she wants to be around people. And so she works with her church and a local nursing home to set up the Buddy Project, which sends teenagers to spend time with older residents whose families can't visit equally often every bit they'd similar.

Function 3: Executing the capstone project, including a timeline for capstone projects

It might be hard to imagine getting from the brainstorm phase to the execution of a capstone project. After all, this is probably the showtime fourth dimension your kid has had to undertake something so large and under their own direction.

Here's a proficient process to follow, with a suggested timeline for a project that might begin in junior fall and comport over through senior jump. Of course, your child can also launch into this procedure earlier.

Junior fall:

Brainstorm (run into to a higher place process) to decide whether a capstone project might exist the right choice.
Meet with trusted faculty advisors and mentors to get input later on initial brainstorm.
Past the end of junior fall, reach a decision on whether or not to exercise a capstone project, and be able to explain it in about a paragraph (the style we've explained Joey'south, above).
Set several goals, with the help of an advisor:
- Long term goal: What do you lot desire your long-term impact to exist?
- One-yr goal: What needs to happen in the course of ane year to make that long-term impact possible?
- Vi-month goal: What needs to happen in the get-go half dozen months to brand your one-year goal possible?
- Three-month goal: What needs to happen in the first three months to make your six month goal possible?
- I-month goal: What needs to happen in the showtime month to make your three calendar month goal possible?

… and then on

Junior bound:

Your child won't take to do all of the following, just they may need to do some.

Recruit other students, contributors, or teammates. Brainstorm holding meetings, if necessary.
Fundraise, if necessary. Enquire parents and team members for assist connecting to sponsors, or develop a business program in conjunction with an advisor. Volition you fundraise past selling physical trade at school? Past seeking local advertisers? By running events?
Meet first milestone goals (iii month; six month).

Rise senior summertime:

Spend several hours a calendar week immersed in capstone project, baking it in alongside college essay writing, camps, or summertime institutes, etc. It'due south crucial that your kid not lose momentum over the summer. Repeat the goal-setting practice from junior fall so you have month-past-month or even week-by-week goals.
Stay in touch with advisor over email or over the telephone, and set a plan to get in bear upon once a month for check-ins and communication, if they can make themselves bachelor.

Senior fall:

Boot it up a notch! Set new goals for the coming year.
If your capstone results in a major event—a conference, a fundraiser, etc.—plan on bringing information technology to fruition by the eye of the senior fall semester.

Senior bound:

Gear up a legacy program. Does someone need to take over the project or organization you've built? Choose them. Or perhaps yous demand to follow up after an outcome to make sure you met your goals. Senior spring is a expert time to send out surveys for feedback.
Reflect on how y'all'll behave this forward into college. Have you congenital or begun something—a charity organization, a publication, a long-term research project—that you lot can continue working on as an undergraduate? If not, take a look at the extracurricular offerings at your new school and see how your feel building something from scratch can propel you through a new landscape of clubs and student jobs. You might be just what a campus society needs! Mayhap you've adult skills that might make you a great treasurer, or perchance you're ready to seek out a research lab during your first year.

Function four: Ideas for capstone projects

Beneath, you'll find a full general list of ideas to get your child started on brainstorming their capstone project. We've organized information technology roughly by discipline, simply your child should push the limits! Great capstone projects need not stay neatly within the bounds of ane field (though that's perfectly fine, likewise).

Arts

Developing a portfolio in a creative field—music, visual arts or photography, film, trip the light fantastic toe, writing, etc.—and possibly finding a way to display it online. Annotation that pushing incomplete creative piece of work into the world for its own sake might be something your kid regrets later. The pursuit of the work itself may exist satisfying enough.
Putting on a production of a play or screening a film.
Creating a community art space, reading series, or open mic nighttime at a local coffee store, contained bookstore, or library.

Humanities/social sciences

Hosting a seminar series, salon, or reading group on topics not covered in the standard curriculum.
Belongings a conference to talk over topics not covered in the standard curriculum.
Writing op-eds or launching a publication, podcast, or other aqueduct for addressing interesting bookish and intellectual issues.

Stalk

Conducting basic science inquiry in a university lab, with a goal of becoming an author on a published newspaper.
Edifice a piece of technology—hardware or software—that serves a specific need, and possibly beginning the process of distributing it, either bringing it to market or altruistic it.

Entrepreneurship

Figuring out a local need and launching a single for-profit projection (non necessarily a whole company!) to see it.
Curating events with local concern leaders for immature people with entrepreneurial aspirations, perhaps trying to brand information technology accessible to people across the socioeconomic or educational spectrum.

Service

Overseeing a single major service project from start to stop, either solo or through something like the Eagle Scouts, Daughter Scouts, a local religious organisation, etc.
Starting a clemency or a nonprofit to serve an unmet need.

Athletics

Launching or coaching a youth league in your sport of choice, mayhap in an area where access to that sport is limited.

Final thoughts

If your child's interests and activities exist outside of organized extracurriculars (i.e. clubs and teams), a capstone project tin be a bang-up way to transform some of those interests into concrete milestones. Not only practice these kinds of accomplishments await great on college applications, allowing your kid to come across equally a specialist, they also take benefits outside of the admissions race.

Pursuing a capstone project will teach your child about initiative and delivery, and it tin can assist them figure out what actually appeals to them and what areas, bug, or questions they want to dive into when they enter higher. Plus, when they're inevitably asked, "What is your passion?," they'll be that much closer to a terrific response.

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