Welcome to the class!

This is the blog for the capstone class, Biology of Disease, at Southern Utah U. Students of the class will be posting curated papers based on their study of and reflection on different animal and plant diseases discussed in the course.

While the capstone experience is defined differently at different institutions, my personal definition is that a capstone course would integrate knowledge and skills learned in previous courses, including scientific knowledge, quantitative literacy, and communication skills, and to apply these products of the university education to a creative activity. For a biologist, a fundamental expression of applied knowledge, creativity, and critical reasoning is to engage in a scientific inquiry. In this course, I encourage students to use their knowledge of science to explore and develop writing topics of their own choice in some depth. A primary goal of this requirement is for students to be able to demonstrate to themselves the high quality work that can be achieved when a writing project is conducted over a period of several months with considerable feedback and time for reflection. Students are not expected to start from scratch, rather it is hoped that each student will have done something as a major on which they can build. The papers are expected to be very well-documented and of very high quality.

By completing this capstone experience students are completing a "Signature work" as defined by the LEAP challenge (https://www.aacu.org/leap). In doing Signature Work, students take the lead and produce work that expresses insights gained from the inquiry. This helps students demonstrate achievement of the LEAP essential learning outcomes and their ability to integrate learning from multiple sources.

So why do students need this? Real world problems require students to engage with diverse resources, explore issues from multiple perspectives, and then apply what they learn to new situations. I think a capstone experience like this will help students reflect on their college careers and be ready to take on whatever the next step is in their lives.