Education Commons^™

Honoring The Gift: An Epistolary Exploration Of An Alternative Approach To Learning Grounded In Reciprocity And Gratitude, Tegan Keyes

WWU Honors College Senior Projects

In this project, I explore what it means to honor knowledge as a gift. This document includes a selection of letters I wrote to my teachers to express my gratitude to them, along with a written narrative in which I describe my vision of an alternative approach to undergraduate education that centers gratitude, reciprocity, and self-determination. This narrative weaves together lessons from emergence theory, Indigenous systems of education, and gift economies to tell a story of a life-sustaining education system that is grounded in the understanding that knowledge is a gift.

Dear Future, Sarah Kerby

WWU Honors College Senior Projects

Dear Future is a children’s book that gives the main character Lucy, and our younger readers, insight into life during the COVID-19 pandemic through the form of letters. In the story, Lucy decides to question her mother about the pandemic after vaguely hearing about it throughout her childhood. Lucy’s mother was also not alive during the pandemic, but shares letters written to Lucy’s namesake and grandmother Lucille. The letters throughout the story are real letters written by 17 anonymous individuals about their current Covid experiences. Through this book I hope to teach others in the future about the hardships we …

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

WWU Honors College Senior Projects

Many research companies in the past decade have been interested in Social and Emotional Learning (SEL). In particular, these companies often look at how a lack of SEL education in schooling affects the ability for students to learn and later develop essential skills such as identifying emotions, positive goal setting, decision-making, and many other crucial socio-emotional skills that are often taken for granted. This paper seeks to find and discuss how SEL intersects with teaching a slam poetry unit in a high school sophomore English classroom. Through looking at the connections between slam poetry and SEL, this paper argues that …

Negotiating The Boundaries Of Solarpunk Literature In Environmental Justice, Kenneth Farver

WWU Honors College Senior Projects

Imagine a world where climate change issues are solved. Societies have begun a green reformation, and postponed other endeavors to focus solely on creating a sustainable planet. Different nations make use of green technology and alternative energies, while still allowing citizens to live a relatively similar lifestyle to people today. Global green quotas are met by major nations, and the climate catastrophe is pushed far ahead into the future. Now imagine a world where climate justice issues are also solved. Along with achieving sustainable restructuring of environmental ecosystems, societies have undertaken a serious upheaval in their social ecosystems as well. …

The Reason: A Young Adult Novel Exploring Efficiency And Artificial Intelligence, Kira Stussy

WWU Honors College Senior Projects

The project presented was a novel written over the course of a year. It is a young adult science fiction book that takes place in a future ruled by an AI that separates everything (even people) into efficient and inefficient. The actual novel discussed in this presentation is in the process of being queried to agents for publication. Therefore, the actual content of the novel is not included. Instead, provided is the process and next steps for the book to give a general idea of the thought and work that went into this project and what hopefully awaits it in …

The Best Medicine: An Exploration Of Laughter And Dark Comedy, Helen Anderson

WWU Honors College Senior Projects

A brief and personal exploration of laughter and dark comedy: what laughter is, what it means, and why it matters, with specific emphasis on the contributions of laughter, humor, and dark comedy to modern society. Personal anecdotes and some short fiction writing alternate roughly with sections of more research-based writing to lend an “easy read” style to the piece.

Unfinished Beliefs: Three Stories And An Essay, Adam Kane

WWU Honors College Senior Projects

Unfinished Beliefs, is a collection of three short stories and an essay written for the Western Washington University Honors Senior Project.

1. Lightweight
2. My Stall
3. Spiro's Mountain
4. Spiritus Mundi

Life Through My Eyes, Heather Nicole Casler

WWU Honors College Senior Projects

Life Through My Eyes, a collection of poetry.

Nearing Home, Benjamin Dow

WWU Honors College Senior Projects

Nearing Home, a collection of writings by Benjamin Dow.