BGS Summary Project Guidelines (GS 297)

The Bachelor of General Studies Summary Project (GS 297) is a senior project synthesizing your BGS coursework. It may be a comprehensive report, specialized field experience or internship, creative writing or artistic production. The project reflects the interdisciplinary nature of your customized plan of study and explores in-depth an area of interest relevant to that plan.

• You will meet with an appropriate faculty supervisor to develop a Summary Project Proposal. The supervisor decides the criteria for evaluation and grades the final project. Proposals require the signed approval of the Faculty Supervisor, the Advisor, and the Program Director.

• Components of the project are:
• Research, which may be satisfied by one of the following:
• Review of selected professional writings relating to the topic
• Comprehensive review of the writings of one aspect of the topic
• Development and testing of a hypothesis (which may be done as part of an internship or specialized field experience)
• Creative writing such as poetry, fiction, journalism
• Artistic production such as painting, drama, film, video, music
• Other methods of research appropriate to the topic
• Synthesis/Analysis, in which you will demonstrate through a comprehensive research paper or other vehicle, the ability to:
• Understand the ideas and perspectives in the literature reviewed
• Evaluate the author’s use of evidence
• Integrate the material into a coherent whole or prove why such integration is not possible
• In an experiment, evaluate if and/or how the results confirm the hypothesis
• In an original written or artistic creation, produce a completed work that meets the criteria established by the faculty supervisor
• Quantitative, in which you will demonstrate the ability to comprehend and evaluate the quantitative material, if applicable.

A proposal form is provided.