An Honors Senior Project is required for graduation through the WWU Honors College. The Senior Project serves as a “capstone” experience, synthesizing what students have done in their entire education, including but not limited to their work in the major and in Honors.
The term, Senior Project, is vague, and for a reason. The term “Senior Thesis” is easily available, but it is one the WWU Honors College deliberately has avoided. While the project must be “product oriented,” i.e., there must be something tangible at the end of the process, it may be a long paper, that is a thesis, but it may also take several other forms, e.g., a recital, a painting, an album, a bound book, all of which have been quite successful senior projects.
2020
i am still holding your hand, Sophie Glessner
Sharp Power: How Foreign Election Interference is Changing the Global Balance of Power, Ethan Greene
Bramble Senior Project, Lara Haines
From Fruit Flies to the Frontline: Slow Science in a Demanding Medical Climate, Riley Haner
Fostering Resilience: Connecting Children with Dance and Movement, Emma Harbison
Multicultural Education in Secondary Science Classrooms, Kasey Hebert
The Syntax of Guaraní: A Pronominal Argument Analysis of a Noteworthy Indigenous Language, Emily Hillman
Fundraising for Families: A strategic communications campaign for Give Hope 2 Kids in Honduras, Emily Jackson
Sorting Out Sortases: Designing a Better Enzyme and Synthesizing Trapping Peptides Towards Capturing a Bound-State Structure, Katherine Johnston
Storytelling Through Comics: An Animated Reflection, Skylar Kaster
Gender Separate Effects of Human Capital on Economic Growth, Jordan King
Patterns and potential mechanisms of thermal preference in E. muscae-infected Drosophila melanogaster, Aundrea Koger, Carolyn Elya Ph.D., Jamilla Akhund-Zade Ph.D., and Benjamin de Bivort Ph.D.
Crisis State: Locating Populism's Conceptual Core, Noah Latsch
Characterizing the Behavior of Mutated Proteins with EMCAP: the Energy Minimization Curve Analysis Pipeline, Matthew Lee, Bodi Van Roy, and Filip Jagodzinski
The Political Economy of Nuclear Energy: Why there is not broad public support for nuclear policy & why there should be, Willa Grace Mei Lee
Oswald of Northumbria: Pagan Hero, Christian Saint, Caleb Lyon
Chalk Drawings: A Series, Sophia Marble
Is the Risk Worth It?, Porter McMichael
Inventing America: National Politics in the New Republic, Stuart Medalen
What If Society Changed?: A Collection of Dystopian Stories, Mara Miller
Daju Dar Daju, Ruth Myers
Speaking the Unspeakable: Intellectual Virtues of Unconventional Communication, Mac Neaville
An Emergent Literary Theory: The Darker Haptic Counterpart, Micala Nitz
Robust and Simple Synthesis of CIS/ZnS Refined for High Luminescence in the Near-IR, Maya Noesen
Evaluating Impacts of Nanopesticides and Microplastics in an Agricultural Rhizosphere, Emma Nordlund and Manuel Montaño
Consider the Ravens: An Exploration of Anxiety, Mckenzie Oliver
NimbleKnow User Documentation, Camille Estee Ottaway
Birdsong at Sunrise, Sarah Packard
Blogging Politics: How elementary students can use technology and critical analysis to learn about history and culture, Andrew Painter
An Overview of Hypotheses and Supporting Evidence Regarding Drivers of Insect Gigantism in the Permo-Carboniferous, Ryssa Parks
Red or Green? Gentrification in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Michael Patterson
Happiness Across Cultures: A Review of Subjective Well-Being in Asian Americans, Hannah R. Proctor
The Modular Table: A Potential Clue for the Future Dilemmas Concerning Bioethics in Human Genome Applications of CRISPR, Alina J. Purcell
Give Me a Mic and a Stage: A Case for Slam Poetry, Identity, and Socio-Emotional Learning in the High School Classroom, Cristina V. Ramirez
Good Heavens! A play in two acts, Daniel Repp
Technological Bodies, Serena Riley
A Republic in its Own Time: The Re-Imagining of Republican Theory in the Federalist Papers, Jonah Rink
H(u)ina, Hokulani Rivera
Painting Ecological Change in Pacific Northwest Bird Populations, Rachel Rothberg
“We Know We Are Forgotten”: Re-Centering Women in the Study of Economic Sanctions on Iraq, 1990-2003, Samia Saliba
Spectral Variability of Weathered Basalts and Sandstones, Isabella Seppi
The Gendered Political Economy of Africa: How the Empowerment of Women in Smallholder Farms Can Spearhead Economic Growth, Mayzie Shaver
Original Environmental Education Lessons and Curriculum, Waverly Shreffler
COVID-19: Isolation and Vaccinations, Jesika Smith
The Effects of Different String Positions of the Bow on Right Scapular Kinematics in Experienced Violin Players, Shannon Stein, Jun San Juan, Sarah Pine, and Stephanie Hall
Taste of Place and Provenance, Alison Stevens
Investigating the effects of glutamate trafficking and receptor mutations on the unfolded protein response (UPR) in C. elegans, Savanna Takasaki
Creating an Inclusive Culture in Cycling: The Story of Spoke Folx, Chuck Tookey
Call of the Chorus Frog: An Undergraduate Experience in Field Research in the Elwha River Basin, Nicole VandePutte
The Secret Life of Objects, Tessa Vroom
Seasonal Differences in the Optical Properties of Chromophoric Dissolved Organic Matter at Hoag’s Pond, WA, Kimberly Wallace
Controversial Speakers - What a University Ought to Do, Elizabeth Webb
Knitting Math: Geometric Shapes, Cynthia Wright
An Investigation into Morocco's Water Crisis, Elliese Wright
2019
The Best Medicine: An Exploration of Laughter and Dark Comedy, Helen Anderson
An Investigation of Plastic Ubiquity and the Redundancy of Waste, Barbara Avery
Seeking Asylum: Immigration Law in the Context of Human Rights, Hannah Blank
She Is: A Poetry Collection, Emma Braun
Women in the First Crusade and the Kingdom of Jerusalem, Maria Carriere
The Next Generation Science Standards: Saving K-12 Science Education, Kaitlin Caylor
Memes and Metamodernism: An Analysis of a Medium, Epiphanie Couture
Whose Decision Is It, Anyway? An Analysis of Modern-Day Jury Selection Processes, Macallan F. Craig
Exploring Trauma, Healing, and Accountability through Music, Mieke Johanna Doezema
Acting is Reacting; Acting is Coping?, Oceana Marie Dunsire
Effects of Finger Taping on Forearm Muscle Activation in Rock Climbers, Brynne Dykes, Julianna Johnson, and Jun G. San Juan
Robodoc: Ethics of AI in Medicine, Halley Egnew
Women and Gaming Culture: A Pilot Study on the Experience of Feminine Individuals Entering the Video Game Community, Molly Engelberg
One Nation Under God: Navigating Tensions Between American Culture, Christianity, and Education, Cassie Engvall
Framing Feminism: How U.S. and French Media Frame #MeToo and #BalanceTonPorc from a Feminist Perspective, Kira Erickson
Temporal and Spatial Variability of Carbonate Chemistry in a Tillamook Bay Tributary: Tracing Acidification from the River to the Bay, Abigail Ernest-Beck
Negotiating the Boundaries of Solarpunk Literature in Environmental Justice, Kenneth Farver
The Subject(s) of Feminism: Gender Identity, Emotion, and Deconstruction in Contemporary Feminist Politics, Gwen Frost
Against the Grain: A Philosophical Case for Requiring Service-Learning, Not Volunteer Hours, Among College Students, Daniel Gallegos
Protein Quality Control at the Endoplasmic Reticulum and Nucleus in Caenorhabditis elegans, Daniel Hassell
The Birchwood Food Desert: a Neighborhood's Fight for Food Justice, Kate Haworth
Quick Guide to Plant Families of Western Washington, Maggie Hayward, John D. Tuxill, and James M. Helfield
Equity in STEM: Utilizing Student Experience to Better Inform Policy and Practice, Natasha Hessami
The Old Leopold Hotel, Hailey J. Hoffman
From Adoptees to You, Iris Hubbard and Saige Wilde
Museums in a Shifting Paradigm: Defining a New “Traditional”, Cejay Johnson
Sociology Department Climate Survey, Emma Johnson
Critical Environmental Theory: Examining the Mainstream Environmental Movement with a Critical Race Theory Analysis, Madeleine Jones
Do Men Matter? In Statistics, Probably, Michael Kelly
Women's Agency in Movements of Collective Violence, Juliet Knowles
Rising Expenditures on Pets, Rachel Marsh
Wildfire Education in Washington School Districts, Jessica Martin
The Microbiome and Medicine: The Relationship between Early-life Colonization and Health Outcomes such as Asthma and Allergies, Madeline May
Trauma in the Classroom: A Manual for Training University Faculty and Staff in Survivor Support, Laura Meerdink
A More Sustainable Future: Energy Efficiency Policies in Buildings, Campbell Miller
Origin of the Lorelei, Kerstin Miller
Public Meetings: Barriers and Solutions, Pauline Mogilevsky
The Fuck is Going On? The Grammaticalization of Taboo Words in English, Laura E. Munger
Diamonds and Toads: An Adaptation of Charles Perrault’s Les Fées, Jessi Pitts
Tinder Tales: Examining Variations in The Process and Outcomes of Dating, Gracie Rauen
Sustaining Our Communities Through Care and Action: An Exploration of Indigenous, Feminist Environmental Care Ethics, Kate Rayner Fried
Friday Night Lights: A Photo Gallery Normalizing the Psychological Struggles Faced by Student Athletes, Sam J. Reardon
Finance in the Fifth Dimension: Lessons in Logic for the Social Sciences, Dawson J. Sanders