Search Courses
You may search for a Senior Capstone course by selecting a THEME or TERM from the menu at the left. You may also search by entering a part of the title or the instructors name in the box below. For concise listings of all 2019-2020 Capstone offerings, review our Capstone Capsule. If you need assistance, contact the Capstone Office/University Studies at 503.725.5890.
Please refer to the PSU Class Schedule regarding the days, hours, and meeting location. For information about when the new class schedule is available or when you can register for the new term, follow this link: When to Register.
NOTE: Due to the intensive nature of Capstones, students must receive permission from the course instructor prior to the first day of class if they are going to miss the first class session. For on-line Capstones, students must demonstrate active participation during the first week of the term. All Capstone courses factor in student attendance and participation into the final grade which is deeply impacted by missing the first week of the term.
NOTE: "Sustainability" tagged courses will NOT automatically count toward the Sustainability Minor. Students must seek approval from Joseph Maser, Ph.D. in the Environmental Science & Management department to count any Capstone toward that specific minor.
SEARCH BY Title or Instructor: Enter a single word from the title of a Capstone, "gardens", "justice", "literacy", etc., the Course Registration Number (CRN), or a professor's first or last name in the box below.
Instructor Name: Amy Greenstadt
Inside/Out Prison Exchange: Imagining Justice
This course is taught on the model of the Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program, which brings together college students living in prison (in this case, Coffee Creek Women’s Correctional Facility) with students on the outside. In this unique classroom environment we will focus on the question, “What Is Justice?” The premise of the course is that living a just existence means living imaginatively. “Justice” is not a thing, but an abstract ideal that we...
Criminal & Juvenile Justice Arts
Instructor Name: Joshua D Binus
The Pacific Northwest has earned an international reputation for innovative environmental policies, from land-use planning to organic farming to solid waste recycling and more. Oregon’s business leaders, non-profit organizations, and elected officials have been working to build on this historical legacy in order to position the state as a global leader in sustainable development. Through this capstone project, since 2006, students have developed what is now referred to as the Sustainability...
Instructor Name: Katherine Kangas
CRN: 64499
This online course explores how civic action, and the process of story finding and telling through the medium of digital portraiture, as inspired by Humans of New York, can effect change in our community. Each student is expected to volunteer thirty hours with a community organization of their choice over the duration of the term. Positions must be arranged before the term begins.
Over the course of the term, students will be expected to photograph and interview three to four people with whom...
Spring 2020Winter 2020
Hybrid or Fully online Online or Hybrid Courses
Instructor Name: Lisa Bates
This Capstone provides an opportunity for students seeking to advance their skills in community development, youth organizing, and urban sustainability practices through developing authentic relationships and a meaningful project with our community partners at the Multnomah Youth Commission.
PSU students will work in partnership with the Multnomah Youth Commission’s Sustainability Committee in a project of participatory action research and policy advocacy. The MYC engages young people aged...
Instructor Name: Kristin Teigen
CRN: 81203, 14186
This Capstone partners with the Urban League and the Community Alliance of Tenants (CAT) to confront housing disparities and strengthen the voice and influence of communities of color in Multnomah County, Oregon. Students will learn the history of communities of color in Portland while engaging in programs with the Urban League and CAT to expand renter’s assistance programs and support those who have been newly housed.
Fall 2019Spring 2020Summer 2019Winter 2020
Anti-Racism Grantwriting Education Activism Leadership
Instructor Name: Carrie Cohen
This winter 2015 “Supporting Non-Profits” will partner with Camp Fire Columbia, a community based non-profit that works to empower children and young adults by helping them develop academic, social and life skills, and by facilitating youth involvement in the community.
Students will assist Camp Fire in evaluating youth programs by working with site teams and assessing opportunities and strategies used to help students develop leadership, social and academic skills. We will also look at...
Instructor Name: Linda Golaszewski
CRN: 64039
Nonprofit organizations hold an important place in our society by providing services of all kinds. Organizations must have adequate resources from diverse sources to be effective and to make a difference. This course partners with City Repair Project to expose students to issues related to nonprofit effectiveness and to develop personal skills in research and grantwriting. Students will examine the role of nonprofit organizations in bringing about social change and responding to community...
Instructor Name: Mary Ann Schmidt
CRN: 64095
Quality Assurance for Volunteer Stream Monitoring. Science Background Not Required. Students will coordinate and implement all aspects of the quality assurance project plan (QAPP) for the Student Watershed Research Project (SWRP)'s volunteer monitoring program. Students will work as a team to ensure data quality for the 15 high school groups involved in SWRP. Non-science majors are encouraged to become "citizen scientists" through their participation in this capstone.
Potential Students for...
Education Sustainability Research Science
Instructor Name: Vicki Reitenauer
CRN: 81680
In this Capstone course, PSU students will serve as trip leaders and mentors to Oregon high school students in Camp Fire Columbia’s Xploregon program, a summer “road trip” that engages teens in a 12-day youth-led adventure.
This intensive, immersive experience helps high school students broaden their academic and personal horizons, build leadership skills, and promote active civic engagement through service projects at various sites along their route, and it requires PSU Capstone...
Instructor Name: Anmarie Trimble
CRN: 82068
What is a "creative industry"? From the sciences to the arts, any industry needs creative thinkers. The capstone explores the nature of creativity in the professional world, specifically the field of marketing. For this hybrid course, students will work together (online and in the classroom) to develop a public outreach marketing campaign for a not-for-profit organization, Fair Trade Music (www.fairtrademusicpdx.org), a grassroots campaign working to improve the music industry in Portland. To...
Instructor Name: Sarah Dougher
Rose Haven serves women and children experiencing the trauma of abuse, loss of home and other disruptive life challenges. Rose Haven's mission is to maintain a safe, respectful community while providing guests with support and services to assist them in regaining stability in their lives. THis capstone egages students in scholarship about food cultures and scoial justice, responding and partnering with Rose Haven to support their work.
Community Health Education-Youth
Instructor Name: Colleen Kaleda
This course will delve into the modern refugee and immigrant experience through direct contact with refugee and immigrant youth served by Immigrant and Refugee Community Organization (IRCO), a Portland non-profit social service organization. Students will work as volunteer teaching assistants in a classroom setting in after-school tutoring programs (for youth grades K-12) at various Portland middle schools and/or a high school. Students will be required to travel to the IRCO program schools...
Instructor Name: Molly Gray
CRN: 14157
Older Americans have been witness to great social and political changes in the lives and acceptance of LGBT people in American society. As the Stonewall generation of boomers near their later life, is estimated that as many as 7 million older adults will identify as LGBT by 2030. These seniors face unique challenges in accessing the care and rights that enable them to age with dignity and stability. For many LGBT seniors, recent research has marked a disconcerting trend of going "back into the...
Fall 2019Spring 2020
Hybrid or Fully online Online or Hybrid Courses
Instructor Name: Deborah Smith Arthur
CRN: 81182
This course asks each participant to examine and discuss their own spiritual beliefs, and use that reflection as a spring board for social justice activism on an issue of their choosing. All students are welcome - those with a solid faith tradition, and those with none - and anywhere in between. Each student will develop their own partnership; each partnership and project must be approved by the Instructor.
Students will have the opportunity to create meaningful relationships with their chosen...
Summer 2019
Instructor Name: Judith Patton
CRN: 81662
Students in this Capstone will partner with Portland State’s The College of the Arts, COTA, (http://www.pdx.edu/the-arts/). Class uses an experiential approach: that is, students learn to write compelling grants by engaging in the process of writing actual proposals to be used by COTA in its pursuit of funding.
Under the leadership of Dean Barbara A. Sestak, the College of the Arts includes the four schools: Architecture, Art & Design, Music, and Theatre & Film. The College is...
Instructor Name: Andy Reed
CRN: 81184, 14154
The class will work alongside The Water Project, a non-profit that is focused on providing clean water to communities in Africa. Students will address needs affecting the field of water scarcity. Students may participate in the following forms of service-learning, which depends solely on the priorities of the non-profit in any given term:
• Research cultural practices and country dynamics to assist NGOs transition into new markets;
• Provide critical feedback to...
Fall 2019Spring 2020Summer 2019Winter 2020
Online or Hybrid Courses Hybrid or Fully online
Instructor Name: Zapoura Newton-Calvert
CRN: 81183, 14153
Since the implementation of the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001, the “achievement gap” has been at the forefront of discussions about school equity. The public has been tuned into this so-called “achievement gap” alongside shocking high school dropout rates, lack of access to equitable early childhood education, public disinvestment in the education system, disparities in access to higher education, and more. According to the Children’s Defense Fund’s 2012 State of America’s Children Report...
Fall 2019Spring 2020Summer 2019Winter 2020
Education social justice Education-Youth
Instructor Name: Jenna Padbury
CRN: 14167
During this course students will grow in their cross-cultural skills and understanding. They will learn about refugee resettlement and the systemic educational obstacles that English learners face and overcome.Students completing this capstone will have a well developed sense of their civic identity as it relates to newcomers in their local communities.
Capstone students will serve as homework helpers and classroom assistants for about 3 hours a week. They will serve 1 day a week at one of two...
Fall 2019Spring 2020Winter 2020
Online or Hybrid Courses Education-Youth Global Perspectives
Instructor Name: David Osborn
Student Debt: Economics, Policy and Advocacy This course provides an overview of the economic and social context and impacts of student debt in the U.S., examining parallels with developing nation debt, mortgage debt and credit card debt, investigating policy options and studying grass-roots advocacy strategies for policy change in partnership with Jubilee Oregon and the Working Families Organization. Working collaboratively with faculty, community members and each other, students will...