The Capstone class and the Capstone project has been a key part of junior year at WHS for the past four years, starting in the 2021-2022 school year.
The Capstone class consists of a project proposal, research paper, project, product, and exhibition.
The project can be about any topic a student chooses, and the student must put in 20 hours of time into the project. The product is a tangible result of the project.
On December 20, 2023, Mr. Samuelson sent out an email to all students informing them of a change in graduation requirements regarding Capstone and LTS hours.
Learning Through Service, LTS, hours were no longer a requirement for students. Starting with the class of 2027, Capstone class will no longer be required, and has been replaced with a financial literacy requirement for all students to graduate.
Some students and teachers believe that it was beneficial and should continue to be a class.
Junior Arden Bonnano says, “I didn’t mind Capstone, I thought it was nice that we got to research anything we wanted, it just took a while. I think its beneficial to practice collecting information and stuff.”
Capstone teacher Mr. Cheney says, “For many students, Capstone was a cool opportunity to study and work on a topic that interested them, perhaps even gaining real world skills in the area.”
Capstone class brings many benefits that are essential to becoming an adult, such as time management, research, public speaking, gathering information, organization, and talking to new people.
However, for some, Capstone was stressful and took too long to complete.
Mr. Cheney says, “For many students, Capstone was an annoying requirement, even more than a typical class. As a result, I think it was one of our least popular classes, one that experienced considerable non-compliance from resistant students.”
Because Capstone required the majority of students to put in a lot of time and effort into it outside of school, many found it difficult to complete.
What also made Capstone difficult is that if a student doesn’t pass one of the six aspects of Capstone, they do not pass the class overall.
Overall, Capstone class has been a short- lived class, and it is difficult to determine if it was the right decision to get rid of it.
