Senior Capstones Celebrating Hands-On Learning This year’s Senior Class was the 17th class at Island School to complete Senior Capstones which is a graduation requirement for every Island School senior. This process is completely student-centered from beginning to end: students choose their own topics -- which range greatly -- conduct their own research, and present their findings to a group of their peers, staff and faculty members. Students this year presented on a variety of topics ranging from sports medicine and how to build a golf course, to fashion illustration and the feminization of veterinary medicine. Students are given the choice between writing a traditional thesis paper and presenting their findings, doing an internship on Kauaʻi, or completing a project. This year, several students chose to do internships on Kauaʻi or complete projects within Island School to fulfill their Senior Capstone requirement. We sat down with six students to talk about their projects, which included designing a theoretical Student Center to be built on Island School’s campus, presenting to a class on eating disorders and the effects of social media on body image, building a robot, building a loʻi (taro field) on Island School’s campus, designing a model for sustainable housing, and studying limu (seaweed) across each ‘Ahupuaʻa on Kauaʻi. The project approach to Senior Capstones is a much more hands-on experience, allows students to create something outside of themselves, and cultivates involvement with the larger Island School and Kauaʻi community. Here are just some of the projects from this year:
22 Voyager
