SOC 495: Sociology Senior Capstone (Professor Suarez) [Fall 2022]

Overview

Your Senior Capstone Final Project will argue for an advocacy position on an issue of your own choosing. After years of training as a sociology major, the project is an opportunity to ask yourself:

• What would you like to see change or improve in society?
• For whom in particular might such changes and improvements make a helpful difference?
• Where and when would such changes and improvements be most/ least effective?
• Why should institutions, organizations, policies, and practices - and the people that influence them - have stakes in the changes and improvements you propose?
• How should these changes and improvements take place?

This semester you will do the scholarly work involved in building a case for your advocacy position on meaningful social change. You will examine how historical systems of power based on race, class, gender, sexuality, ability, etc. have shaped contemporary institutions, policies, practices, behaviors, and attitudes regarding the published research scholarship on that issue. As such, extensive library research is expected for depth of analysis, and will involve YOUR evaluation of peer-reviewed scholarly research that engages your advocacy position.

If you have a virtual internship or volunteer placement, you will reflect on your field notes and present a constructive critique of scholarly literature that engages with the concerns evident at your virtual placement. Simply put, the advocacy position serves as “thread” that enables you to “sew together” a nuanced and informed understanding of social life to scholarly research, and more broadly, to society. The ultimate goal is to demonstrate your intellectual growth and achievements in the major by developing your advocacy skills in argumentation and in leadership.

As always, please consult Cougar Courses and your professor for full assignment guidelines.