The Capstone Course: A Rite of Passage

In its report to the profession, the Sociology Task Force of the American Sociological Association and the Association of American Colleges (1990) made 13 recommendations aimed at enhancing the sociology major in American colleges and universities. Following the guidance of the Association of American Colleges' influential report Integrity in the College Curriculum (1985), the Task Force emphasized in in a major field as essential for a truly liberal education. To achieve such study in depth in the undergraduate sociology major, the Task Force recommended that departments structure their curriculum in a sequence of courses in the major containing at least four levels (ASA 1990, pp. 15-17). These four levels are 1) introductory courses; 2) basic (lower-division) required substantive courses, including basic skills courses in theory, research, and statistics; 3) advanced (upper-division) substantive courses focused on breadth and depth, and building on the basic skills courses; and 4) one or more courses aimed at integrating the diverse elements of the coursework into a coherent and mature conception of sociology as an approach to inquiry and to life (1990, p.16). This paper is an elaboration of the fourth level of this recommended structure, in which I briefly describe the capstone course as a rite of passage through which students go to become liberally educated citizens. The rite of passage, according to Mircea Eliade (1958), is an initiation through which one becomes another. He writes: