The Senior Capstone Experience: Voices of the Students

Abstract

The Senior Capstone is the culminating course in the University Studies sequence. Each Capstone is implemented by students with the help and encouragement of an academic advisor. Students work as an interdisciplinary team, utilizing the knowledge and skills they have acquired throughout their educational years. All Capstones address community problems, issues, or concerns associated with either public agencies or private corporations.

Under the direction of an Adjunct Professor of Sociology at Portland State University and Professor of Criminal Justice at Chemeketa Community College, 9 students participated in this Senior Capstone. These courses are generally selected from an array of choices and the student teams are in principle interdisciplinary. ¹ While the projects may be related primarily to one discipline, they either require or can benefit from the perspectives and skills that students bring from their different majors. Although the majority of Capstones are offered in the immediate Portland metropolitan area, this one took place at one of Portland State University’s off-campus centers where students are enrolled as cohorts in degree completion programs. This article has been edited from the final project report made to the community partner by the students themselves and provides a sense of what the student experience is like.

In September 1997, with no idea of what we were facing, 9 of us registered for our Capstone course, a 2-credit class for each of fall, winter, and spring terms. The course description listed only 1 all-day class that was not due to start until early December. Each of us works and attends school in the evening so a class meeting only once for 2 credits really looked good at the time; frankly, we were each envisioning a quick and easy “A.”

In October, a message appeared on the computer network with our 1st and only assignment: purchase one text (an anthology), read it, write responses to every article, and bring the completed journal to class. Suddenly things began to look a bit more demanding.

When we gathered for the first time, we were a bit confused and wary. The text we had just completed concerned the criminal justice system; none of us were remotely interested in criminology. We began to wonder what we were doing here and what criminal justice had to do with us.

There was another concern going through the group. What was it going to be like to work with the same small group of people for 3 terms? Some of us knew each other slightly, but none of us knew anyone well. All of us had worked with groups in other classes, but they were groups we had chosen ourselves. This was an entirely different situation and our first few meetings were guarded and polite.

All of us were familiar with the course advisor from previous sociology classes. She explained that our reading and journals were the groundwork for our project, which was to conduct a community service delivery assessment for the local county sheriff’s department. Before we could begin the actual assessment, there were a number of things we needed to learn. To develop a feel for the inner workings of the criminal justice system, we were asked to do a “court watch” (sitting through a complete day’s activities in one of the local courts) and encouraged to do a “ride along” (accompanying a county sheriff’s deputy on a duty shift). We attended 2 subsequent classes where we were instructed in the workings of the sheriff’s department, the ins and outs of doing surveys, and how to create a framework for planning and implementing our project, which by now had taken on a name: the Law Enforcement Service Assessment, or LESA for short.

The results of this project, now completed, cannot be described; all the information we gathered, analyzed, and reported to the sheriff is confidential and now official property. ² But we can report that the project was successful for this department and especially for us. The project clearly had significant value not only as a contribution to the community, but also as a learning process. It is the various aspects of the learning process that we would like to expand on here.

Diversity

As we were asked to complete a project that was to address the population of a county with a wide range of inhabitants, we faced issues of diversity from the outset. Our textbook on criminal justice had acquainted us with the population that the survey would be about: the people that law enforcement personnel deal with on a daily basis. Issues of race, age, sex, and ethnicity were salient in developing a representative sample, but we also were concerned with developing an instrument that would be equally understood by respondents at all educational levels.

A video viewed in class introduced us to the varied roles of law enforcement and this further helped us in formulating our survey questions. As we wrote and rewrote our questionnaire, language issues presented a particular problem because we lacked the time and financial resources to address the range of languages represented in this county.

As we explored our options, we discovered that many of the classes that we had in our collective background had given us the tools with which to solve these challenges. Psychology classes helped provide us with the answers about what to write. Writing classes reminded us how to write. Sociology classes told us why we would write in a particular manner. The subject matter from these classes was supplemented by that of many others we thought we would never use again. Now it was finally all coming together to aid in the completion of a valuable experience. In addition to our academic training, both our personal and professional experiences added to the body of knowledge that eventually helped us to accomplish our goal.

Group Process

The primary reason for our shared accomplishment during the LESA project was the way the group came together as a working, collaborative team. Each member brought to the Capstone project a high level of energy. Our class consisted of a unique blend of 9 different personalities. As one of our team-building tasks, we implemented a mediation of differing opinions to overcome barriers within the group. No one member was more important than any other, thus allowing the full play of different perspectives. Each member shared leadership and responsibilities. Members mentored and supported each other to assist the class in realizing our goal. Members had their own ideas about how the project would look, but through collective decision efforts we were able to combine our ideas into a finished product. Effective communication between the group members was the essential factor in team building. We generated ideas by brainstorming and introduced norms of verbal consensus and constructive criticism. We formed sub-committees for the major tasks, but came back to the full group for feedback and all our final decisions. All members took an active part in facilitating, note-taking, and active listening. The result was the creation of a comfortable atmosphere in which team members could express how they were thinking in a respectful and safe environment.

The LESA project was a definite learning and growing experience. Each member contributed to the success of the project; both the knowledge gained and the group process through which we proceeded gave each member an invaluable experience. When we all came together for one last decision during our course, we concluded that the project, the experiences, and the learning all could be summed up in 2 words: team effort.

Interdisciplinary Influences

A number of academic content areas were utilized throughout our Capstone experience. In addition to the intensive preparation in criminal justice, the largest contributions were derived from courses in sociology, psychology, history, and communications. We used sociology in the development of the questions, understanding the demographics, recognizing the multicultural and diverse population of the county, and paying attention to different socio-economic statuses. This helped us phrase the survey questions in a manner that would reach the most people and alienate the fewest.

We used psychology in deciding to utilize the reciprocity principle, offering respondents a sheriff’s badge sticker as a way of inducing their participation. We used official letterhead stationary as a way of communicating the authenticity, authority, and credibility of our survey. We compared open versus closed questions and determined that closed, multiple-choice questions utilizing a Likert scale would be more effective. Our efforts paid off in a response rate of 25%, whereas the average response rate in similar surveys is between 10% and 15%.

History came into play when we began to gather information on past research and an earlier survey. Examining the history of the sheriff’s office surveys, the makeup of the county, and past reactions to the sheriff’s office helped inform our questions as well. This background work prepared us for both the positive and negative comments we received on the questionnaires.

Compiling the written report and presenting our findings and recommendations to the sheriff’s office demanded our conscientious attendance to form, style, audience, and a variety of other skills learned in our communications courses, such as proofreading, editing, rewriting, and finalizing a complete product. Our ability to both receive and give information was dependent on the proper working of questions and presentations, while our personal journals required us continually to reflect about our experiences. Graphs were used to present information visually and to help reinforce the major observations we had made and the conclusions we had drawn.

The specific background in criminal justice provided by the instructor of the Capstone enabled us to better understand how the law enforcement system works and the kinds of problems and stresses that are peculiar to it. In both the court watch and the ride along, we had opportunities to observe directly the tensions and issues experienced by law enforcement officers on the job.

Professional Development

One way to think of a capstone is as a dense rock capable of withstanding the effects of weather and time, perhaps sitting atop a pillar of less dense material and holding it in place as the wind erodes all the surrounding material away. This class, like the capstone that sits upon a pillar of lesser rock, exists because of a symbiotic relationship. Only through the use of knowledge gained in previous classes was the successful completion of this course possible, making this achievement a capstone of professional development.

Professional development is not something that is confined to the process of completing detailed research as part of a group effort. All persons must both validate themselves and contribute to the project within the dynamics of a group. In a conventional sense, we can recognize development as enhanced communication skills, confidence in decision-making, task and time management, report formatting, and writing skills. These skills are not abstract but are relative to each individual. Every individual gains particular skills in a different measure; when these skills are woven into the character of the person, they become immeasurable. Like the steadiness of a surgeon’s hands or the warming smile of a homemaker, these skills have reached their fruition when they are no longer easily seen but have become simply part of the individual.

Every person who completed this class can feel assured that he or she has obtained a level of professional development through the density and richness of our collective experience, which has cemented new skills and knowledge into each and every one of us.