In the fall of 2021, Father Gabriel Richard High School premiered the newest element of its curriculum. All seniors were invited to apply for a place in the cohort participating in FGR’s “Senior Capstone” course. At the end of the year, each participant would present a well-researched vision of a topic using knowledge they had integrated from a variety of classes and academic disciplines. This year marked the third successful year for the capstone projects.
Sixteen seniors presented capstones this year on April 22nd, 23rd, and 25th. Each presentation ran approximately 30 minutes and covered its question in depth, giving the audience a chance to learn a significant amount about its topic. The projects are a culmination of the intellectual growth and development these students have undertaken during their high school years and have provided an opportunity to practice their individual intellectual habits of seeking truth, knowledge, understanding and wisdom. The optional projects are a tangible result of the individual’s love of learning and pursuit of excellence.
In one Capstone entitled “A Student’s Cry for Change: The Current State of Education and an Aspirational Vision for What It Could Be” Caroline Valdes ‘24 inspired her schoolmates to consider education’s intended purpose and its meaning in their lives. “Why does our motivation disappear?” she asked her fellow seniors, then traced the history of education through the Industrial Revolution, where the state designed an education system intended to produce workers rather than promote human flourishing. Catholic education, Valdes suggested, can provide an answer to this broken system, and she recommended that each student focus on what she called its “pillars”: education of the whole person, truth and objective reality, dignity and virtue, faith and life and culture, and a Catholic worldview.
In accordance with Valdes’s vision for education that promotes human flourishing, her fifteen fellow Capstone scholars educated and engaged their audience on a full range of topics. They covered disciplines including science, technology, history, geography, medicine, philosophy, theology, sociology, and bioethics. Students, staff, and parents who attended the capstone presentations had the opportunity to learn about and contemplate topics such as gene editing, the foster care system, microplastics, bog bodies, eating disorders, music’s effect on the soul, faith and reason, the relationship of the individual and society, the meaning and importance of work, and education, and prayer.