Their Passions, Their Projects

Their Passion, Their Projects

2021-22 marked the sixth year Windward has offered its culminating curriculum— the Honors Senior Capstone Program. In order to graduate, all Seniors must complete an Honors Capstone, a yearlong course that is designed to ensure that every Senior participates in an in-depth research experience in an area of passion guided by a dedicated teacher.

All Capstones involve research and many also include experiential and entrepreneurial components, interdisciplinary work, artistic expression, collaboration, experiments and analysis, and/or service-learning. These courses culminate in May with a community-wide celebration of learning to highlight the intellectual curiosity of Windward’s Senior scholars.

Six Capstone courses were offered in the 2021-22 school year: Historical Analysis, Psychology, Ethics and Leadership, Social Justice and Public Policy, Spanish, and Data Analysis.

Since emerging from the pandemic, the Capstone program has taken flight once again with in-person teaching, learning, and support.

“I think we can all agree that the level of work that we saw from the Class of 2022 was of a very high caliber. Their work was extremely impressive,” said Sarah Clark, Director of the Center for Teaching and Learning and Research Librarian.

“In my conversations with students, when they were doing their research, it was very evident that they were choosing a topic they were genuinely interested in. This is not just a requirement for school, they're choosing topics to research that they are passionate about and doing something big with it.”

New for the 2021-22 school year was a video component from Tony de los Reyes’ Social Justice & Public Policy course, which seeks to enroll curious students who are interested in engaging deeply with social justice and civic action. The course is very open and creative, giving students the opportunity to think critically about the issues they care most about. Tony’s class teamed up with Drue Metz,

Director of the Media Arts & Film Lab, to produce professional-level end-ofyear videos, which showcased their skills in cultural understanding and their ability to find, frame, and solve problems.

“Drue noted that these were high-level film students. It was a beautiful thing to see—the content and high-level exploration of a topic, but also the film production being at such a high level,” said Cielo Botello-Williams, Associate Director of the Center for Teaching and Learning: Research Instruction and Library Services.

A highlight of the Colloquium day for Dahlia Setiyawan, Associate Director of the Collegiate Division, was seeing Windward’s robust peer support system in action firsthand. “One thing I witnessed during the Colloquium as I moved from room to room was this beautiful sense of collegiality and support within the room amongst the students. Regardless of whatever level of confidence the students may have had in public speaking, the audience was completely behind them, and that audience was their classmates. They've been on this journey the whole year and have seen each other's work grow and develop. There was great energy in the presentation rooms, which was very impressive to me,” said Dahlia.

While the Capstone program gained considerable momentum this past year, the program hasn’t reached its peak. There is a lot in store for the 2022-23 program, including two new Capstone offerings, one of which is the Collaborative Arts Capstone, which was previously on hiatus.

Once a Capstone teacher, Dahlia now finds herself in a leadership role within the program as she has transitioned to her Collegiate Administration role. During her time as a History Capstone teacher, Dahlia partnered closely with Sarah and Cielo. The trio is now spearheading the program together for 2022-23.

“Sarah and Cielo’s talents, skills, and contributions are absolutely vital to not just the Colloquium but the further development of the program. The value that they bring to working with all of the faculty is the reason why this program is getting stronger and stronger. They both have a huge role in the success of the program,” said Dahlia.

QR Code: Scan here to view "Strategy or Circumstance: Evaluating Manuel Noreiga’s Tactical Prowess" by Sammy Motzkin '22

QR Code: Scan here to view "Studio Ghibli and Hayao Miyazaki: The Cinematic Expression of Historical and Modernized Japanese Culture" by Pia Brosmith '22