Concordia College implements a capstone course into student’s coursework. It is stated to reinforce the connection between liberal learning and various academic disciplines. Neurochemistry was my capstone course, and I felt it met or exceeded all the exceptions to be called a capstone class.
Instill a love for learning
By taking neurochemistry, it has increased my interest in different areas of study. When I first signed up for the class, I thought it would be another class where the teacher teaches and the student take notes and listen. It was also interesting how it did not have a lab, since every chemistry course I took here had a lab with the lecture.
On day 1, my exceptions were completely thrown out. The class was orientated to helping each other learn. The beginning few weeks had students post on different synapse and signaling molecules. We each had to contribute something to our course wiki page. The fun part was when we got into reading different neurological disease. Mondays had us talk about the paper, and figure what we did not know for “speed dating” on Wednesdays. Friday had us just talk about anything related to the topic of the week. This classroom format was unique and installed a new way for me to learn.
The love of learning also comes from how each of us had to help one another to be able to succeed in this class. The collection of ideas from each other helped pushed thinking into a new aspect, in ways I would never have thought of.
Develop foundational skills and transferable intellectual capacities
Most articles we read each week was a hot topic in health. They included Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s, autism, concussions, and obesity. All of these topics have real world application due to the increase of them in recent years. Concussions have become relevant due to Will Smith’s movie “Concussion” and how retired NFL stars have been seen with chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). All of the topics were known previously before reading the articles, but the science behind how these topics were not uncovered until taking this class.
The knowledge we learned was also transferred to our weekly blog posts on the topic. We were able to condense the article and spread it to the public. Our public service announcement (PSA), also helped spread awareness of a hot topic of our choosing. Both activities helped reinforce our thinking and to be able to tell the public about it.
Develop an understanding of disciplinary, interdisciplinary and intercultural perspectives and their connections
Even though this class was a chemistry class, it was relatable to other disciplinary fields too. Some articles had biological pathways, psychology with animal studies, and English with the blogs. This class presented ideas from different fields in connection with chemistry. This class being neurochemistry was related to neuroscience as well. The study of the central nervous system was always relevant due to these diseases being in the brain.
Cultivate an examined cultural, ethical, physical and spiritual self-understanding
From taking this class, I learned how diverse chemistry can be. With the combination of different disciplinary fields in this course, I learned how they might be able to correlate together to find cures for different diseases. By understanding different pathways from articles in previous weeks, I was able to understand better how they relate to pathways in future articles. It showed me how my area of study could be used in different aspects of the learning.
Encourage responsible participation in the world (BREW)
By taking this class, it helped me think critically in other areas besides chemistry. I also learned how different areas of study can correlate with each other to do good. It made me think more critically about the topics we discussed. Marijuana, which is a schedule 1 drug, has shown to be effective in treating different diseases. The stigma of it still clouds people’s ideas on it.
This class has helped me engage with different aspects of studies, which I would have never known about, or would have thought about.
My Capstone Experience
