The SOC 495 Senior Capstone Seminar provides senior sociology majors the opportunity to transition from being consumers of sociological knowledge, to being producers and practitioners. Capstone students can choose one of two tracks: 1) completing an independent research project or 2) completing an internship at a local social service organization.
In the research track, sociology majors have the opportunity to engage in professional academic research as the culmination of their program of study. Students apply the skills and knowledge that they have acquired from other sociology courses to a major academic project by developing and implementing an independent research project that integrates core sociological concepts/theories and employs sociological methods of data analysis. The course itself guides this process, focusing on how to review the literature, develop a research question, collect and analyze data, and draw conclusions. At the end of the course, students will submit a research paper in the form of an academic journal article and will formally present their findings.
Examples of recently completed capstone research projects include:
- 鈥淒ifferences in Job Satisfaction by Gender鈥�
- 鈥淏eliefs About Science Among Adults in America鈥�
- 鈥溾�橮eople Were Just Being Weird鈥�: Microaggressions and the Alienation of Black Women in Nursing Schools鈥�
- 鈥淐ompliance with Safety Rules Among Fast Food Workers鈥�
- Earth Benders Aren鈥檛 the Only Thing Groundbreaking Around Here: Fandom Reactions to Under-Represented Sexualities in The Legend of Korra
- 鈥淚s Age at First Marriage Correlated with Area of Residence?鈥�
- 鈥淭he Effect of Parental Influence, Parental Support, and Scholarship Selection on Continued Participation of Female College Athletes鈥�
Please note that SOC 495 is only offered in the spring semester and has SOC 301 Research Methods as a prerequisite.